Chapter 12 #2
I paused, forcing myself to think things through as though Kane was completely innocent—because after all this time, I truly wanted to believe that about him, without any reservations—and how powerless he must have felt while his entire life unraveled around him.
“What frustrates me is that people don’t understand if everyone did the right thing, those threats would be meaningless,” I pointed out.
“If they’d all stuck together and stayed with the truth, you would have been exonerated.
But instead they each gave in individually, and you paid the ultimate price.
I hate that doing the right thing is apparently too much to expect from most people. ”
Kane frowned. “You don’t have a very high opinion of people.”
“I care about people.” I considered the distinction. “But I don’t trust them. There’s a difference.”
“Two years ago, I would have said I trusted people,” he said, his voice quiet. “I know what changed for me. What made you this way? Your father?”
“Yes.” I took a breath, steadying myself as I decided to share more of my childhood with Kane.
“I told you he was a conman. I grew up watching him manipulate people and exploit their trust. I became a journalist because I wanted to expose people like him —people who think they can take advantage of others without consequences.”
Kane scrubbed a hand over his jaw, his gaze dropping briefly to the floor before finding mine again. “You must have been furious when you thought I was one of them. A cop breaking the law.”
I nodded, throat tight.
“I didn’t do it.” Kane’s voice dropped, rough with frustration. “I don’t know who set me up or why, and that’s the hardest part. Not knowing the truth about my own fucking life.”
I could only imagine. My entire career was built on uncovering truths. The idea of being trapped in a lie I couldn’t disprove—it would drive me insane.
Kane paused, seeming to gather himself. When he spoke again, his voice was different. Quieter. More vulnerable.
“It was painful, knowing you were behind that article. It felt like salt in the wound. I’d been looking forward to our dinner date. To getting to know you outside the club.”
My throat constricted so tight I could barely speak. “Me too. I’d been counting down the days. When I saw your name in my research files...” I had to stop, swallow, try again. “It hurt. I didn’t want it to be you.”
“I can see why you might have felt betrayed, considering the evidence against me.” His eyes met mine, and something in them had softened. “I’m still angry, but I understand better now.”
“Thank you.” The words came out soft and low. “The evidence was overwhelming along with the testimonies that were turned into Internal Affairs. I didn’t know what else to believe.”
Kane gave a slight nod, his gaze steady on mine. “I know.”
“Any idea where the money went?” I asked, curious about that. “Or the drugs?”
“None. I assumed someone higher up kept it, which would make a nice retirement nest egg. But it’s been two years.
If that were the case, they’d have cashed out by now.
” He shook his head. “It just seemed to have disappeared, or someone has it stashed away somewhere and is using it in small increments.”
Silence fell between us, then Kane spoke again.
“I know you only have my word. You have to decide whether to believe me or not. But I swear to you, Charlotte—I never took anything from that evidence locker. I never broke my oath. And someday, someone is going to slip up, and I’m going to find out who destroyed my life.”
I studied him, his conviction palpable. I’d grown up surrounded by criminals—not the violent kind, but criminals nonetheless.
I’d learned to read people before I could read books.
In that moment, I blocked out everything else—our history, the sex, the complicated tangle of emotions—and focused solely on what my instincts were telling me.
Kane held my gaze without flinching. It wasn’t confrontational, wasn’t aggressive. But it was open. Like he could sense I was searching for something, and he was letting me look and see a version of him I hadn’t allowed myself to acknowledge until now.
“Did you do it?” I asked one more time.
“No.”
I watched for the tells. The gaze dropping left or right. The pulse jumping in his throat. The subtle tension in his jaw that signaled deception. Everyone had tells. Everyone.
I saw nothing.
He just looked at me, exposing himself—open, steady, raw—and it felt honest. It felt like truth.
“Do you believe me?” he asked after a long quiet moment had passed between us.
I thought about all the evidence I’d gathered two years ago. The handwriting analysis, the testimony, the paper trail that seemed so damning. I thought about how easy it would be for a group of corrupt cops to frame an innocent colleague—especially one who wasn’t part of their inner circle.
I thought about the man standing in front of me who was now protecting me without hesitation when he had no reason to.
Who’d answered my questions even though every one of them must have felt like reopening a wound.
A man who’d looked at me tonight with raw honesty instead of resentment when he swore he was innocent.
I exhaled a deep breath. “I do,” I said.
The words hung in the air between us—fragile and weighted and filled with…hope.
I could still be wrong. I might be letting my softening feelings for him cloud my judgment, exactly what I’d been afraid of all along.
But for the first time since I’d seen Kane’s name in those files, something shifted in my chest, some piece clicking into place that had been misaligned for two years that now felt undeniably like the truth.
I believed him.
Now I just had to figure out what that meant for whatever this tangled, complicated thing was growing between us, if anything at all.