Page 102 of Earned Husband

You asked if I was coming back and I’ve replayed that question in my head every day since I left. The answer is yes. Always yes. That’s what I should’ve told you before I left, Deja. I will always come back to you.

I’m not questioning whether I want to marry you. I never have and I never will. It’s simply a matter of whether asking you to marry into my family is fair. I desperately don’t want you to come to regret your decision of saying yes to a Thayer, but at this stage, I fear that you will. I’m afraid that you might even come to resent me for it.

When I agreed to marry you, I thought that by the time it happened, my family name wouldn’t be a symbol of shame anymore, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. If you do agree to go through with this, you will be burdened with a name that will be tarnished for generations, if not forever.

People will look at you and see the daughter-in-law of a criminal. They will judge you and treat you with disdain and disrespect that you don’t deserve.

I miss you.

I don’t know how long this investigation will take or how complicated our situation will become, but I do know this. Every decision I make, I will make because I want to build a life worthy of you.

Whether or not you agree with my reasoning or my methods, that’s the truth. I will come back as soon as I can, and when I do, I hope to be able to offer a name, and a future, you can be proud of.

Until then, don’t let Nanna forget about me.

Always yours,

Colin

For a long moment after I finished reading, I couldn’t move, but then something clicked into place in my mind like a bolt out of the blue. I’d spent the last few days wondering why he’d shut me out so suddenly as soon as something bad and unexpected had happened back home, but as I sat there, thinking about what he’d written, I realized I already knew the answer.

This was who Colin was. Whether it was because of his family history or simply his nature, Colin Thayer was a protector. He was a fixer. A helper. He was the one people turned to when it all went sideways or when they needed well-reasoned, calm advice.

During the time he’d been here, I’d seen that firsthand. He’d gotten so many calls from everyone, his brothers, his sister, the Westwoods, and people at his office. He was just that guy.

But at the same time, he didn’t know how to let anyone help him carry his own burdens, or how to let them protect him, or how to ask for help when he needed it himself. I had a feeling it was because for so long, he’d been at the forefront of the storm they’d been facing.

Colin and Jane had stood in front of the rest of their family to shield them, but they’d had no choice themselves except to face it head on, with no one to shield or protect them in turn.

Jane had found that later on in Alex, someone to help her carry the weight of their father’s actions, but Colin?

All this time, he’d been going along with whatever my family wanted. He would never ask for anything, but right now, he needed someone to show up for him for a change.

I looked across my desk at Khaled, who hadn’t picked up the letter to read it like Jasmine might’ve. In that sense, Khaled had something in common in Colin.

They were the people their siblings turned to when they needed something practical done fast. He cocked his head when I met his gaze, the slight smile on his lips telling me he already knew what I was about to ask, but I went ahead and told him what I needed anyway.

“How fast can you arrange a flight to Chicago?”

CHAPTER 43

COLIN

Jane sat next to me, looking like a stone-cold killer with her hands folded neatly on top of a yellow legal pad and her face perfectly straight. She was just as pissed off as I was, though. I just wasn’t as good at hiding it.

We sat together on one side of the conference-room table, a pair of federal agents on the other. Last week, they’d raided our office building and now they were here to apologize for the mess they’d made, both in the office and publicly.

Nothing they could do would fix it, though.

They’d strutted in with a warrant tied to what they’d called,an active investigation into hidden funds connected to Mallory Foundry’s dealings with Thayer.

Naturally, even though they hadn’t found a single thing, the damage had been done.

Our stocks had fallen, reporters had camped outside our building for days, and our employees would have to spend at least another week putting thousands of documents back where they belonged after agents had emptied most of our filing cabinets onto the floor.

Thankfully, Alex and the Westwoods had managed to redirect the media circus before it could completely consume us,spinning the narrative away from the Thayers, but still. We’d taken a hit and these two agents were trying to do everything they could to appease us.

“We regret any inconvenience caused,” one of them said. “I’m sure you understand that during the course of our investigations, we have to diligently pursue any lead.”