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“Do you want some coffee while we wait?” I ask.
“Yes, actually,” Dana says. “Something warm would be nice. I swear I’ve been chilled to the bone since my father’s murder.”
“Come with me then,” I say, leading her into the kitchen, and thankfully somewhere during our chat, my stomach calmed down.
Once we’re in the kitchen, I let Dana choose her flavor of coffee, as we have several, and as we both doctor our cups with cream and sweetener, she looks at me and says, “Reese really loves you.”
My heart warms. “I really love him.”
“Women flirt with him.”
“Well, he is Mr. Hotness. There’s a fan blog and all.”
She laughs. “Yes. I know about that, but my point is that he doesn’t flirt back.”
She has no idea how much this conversation hits a nerve. Reese is amazing. He’s so very good to me and I hate the idea of Debbie making the world think we’re broken. We are not broken. I shouldn’t care what others think, but I can’t seem to help it. I do. “I’m a very lucky woman.”
“I’ve never been loved the way Reese loves you, obviously, since I’m now defending myself against the man I thought I might marry. Heck, I wanted my father to love me even when he made me hate him.”
“You don’t think he loved you?”
“I guess in the only way he could: by throwing money at me. I thought if I walked away from the money, maybe he’d see me instead. Maybe he’d be a real father. I should have.” She shakes her head. “I need to not go there. I start tearing up when I do. So tell me. What’s it like to have someone who loves you as much as Reese does you?”
“Perfect,” I say. “It’s perfect like he is. Don’t settle. I didn’t.”
“Nor did I.”
At the sound of Reese’s voice I look up to find him in the doorway, and when his eyes meet mine they are warm with love. “Dana,” he says, seeming to force himself to tear his gaze from mine. “Your ride will be here any minute.” The doorbell rings and he says, “Or rather now.”
Dana sips her coffee she’s barely touched. “I hate wasting this. Thank you, Cat.” She sets her cup in the sink.
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You occupied my mind. And you’re a good listener.”
She heads toward the door and Reese follows her while she sparks an idea for my column about what is real and what is a façade. I’m playing it out in my head when Reese walks back into the kitchen and steps in front of me, tilting my cup up to take a sip for himself. And as silly as it might be considering all we share, this act of sharing warms me and even goes so far as to heat my skin.
“What do you think?”
“I believe her. You do too, don’t you?” My brows furrow. “Or don’t you?”
“I do.”
“But?”
“There’s something the boyfriend can do to damage her and us. If she doesn’t tell me what it is and I get sideswiped, I’m not going to be happy.”
“Yeah I kind of got that impression, too, but I think having her write out the conversations is good. Sometimes the tough stuff is easier to write down than speak.”
He sets my cup aside. “I need to talk to you about something.”
“Okay. Why don’t I like how that sounds?”
“Because I don’t like how it sounds. Basically, your brothers believe that no matter what, arrest or no arrest, Debbie will make a stink with the press. And if we pay her off, she’ll come back for more if we don’t get a DNA test now. She could threaten to go to the press and not give us the test.”
My throat tightens and anger starts to burn in my belly. This is already old. I’m ready to end this. “What do they suggest?” I ask.
“That we find dirt on the attorney helping Debbie and use it to blackmail him to get out of this and take her with him.”
