Page 137 of Shadow Of Sin

“I saw that part. I recognized the company name from the work I did for Dmitri. After completing my prison sentence,” she bites out. Her jaw tightens. “Keep going.”

“I dug into the prosecution’s evidence and found holes. The digital trail that pointed to you was manufactured after the fact. Someone else was in the system at the same time as you. I traced their signature and confirmed you were set up.”

“And you buried it.”

“Yes. I buried it because following it would have sent investigators straight to our business.” I hold her gaze even though everything in me wants to look away. “You were a stranger. I didn’t know your name beyond a court record. All I saw was a risk to my family, and I made the choice to protect them over you.”

Her nostrils flare. Dots of pink pop into her cheeks, a vein throbbing in her forehead. “And you’re telling me this like it’s an explanation?” she hisses.

“It’s not an explanation. It’s the truth. It’s ugly and it’s selfish and I’ve hated myself for it every day since I met you. I can’t undo the fourteen months you spent in prison because of a choice I made. But I’m doing everything I can to make it right now.”

“The Globe article.”

“That’s me. I took the analysis from the case file and built a trail that would lead investigators to the person who framed you. It’s in federal hands now, and your conviction is going to be reviewed.”

She’s quiet for a long moment. Her fists loosen slightly. She’s still standing. Still pissed as hell. But she hasn’t walked out.

“The relocation plan,” she says. The words come out like they taste like shit on her lips.

I don’t dare look away now. “Ronan told me he wanted you gone after the operation. He said he’d handle it himself if I didn’t. And I knew exactly what that meant coming from him.” My good thumb taps against the tabletop. “After you fell asleep that night, my brain started spiraling. What if Ronan forces the issue? What if the only way to keep you alive is to get you far away from my own family? My brain wouldn’t stop churning, and the only way I know how to deal with a scenario is to plan for it.”

“So you built a plan to ship me out of your life seventy-two hours from then.”

“I built a plan to keep you breathing if my brother tried to make sure you weren’t. Every detail in that document was designed to get you somewhere safe and fast if Ronan came through on his threat. I was never going to execute it.”

“But you never told me your brother wanted me dead.”

“Because I thought I could handle him. I thought I could win the fight, and it would be over.” My voice drops. “I didn’t want you carrying that fear. And I was wrong to make that call for you.”

Her chin trembles for just a second before she locks it down. She presses her hands to her face and lets out a shaky breath.

“The texts,” she says without opening her eyes. “She won’t be a problem. I’ll handle it.”

“That night, on the phone with Ronan, I told him you were staying. I said it twice. I meant it both times.” I lean forward. “Texting to me is mechanical. I don’t do emojis or emotion. I don’t think about tone. And I don’t try to rationalize with someone who is beyond rationalizing with. So I get how it sounded to you, but that’s not how I meant it. At all.”

Her eyes flutter open. They’re red-rimmed, still furious, and searching my face for something. A shudder ripples through me because I can’t tell if she finds it.

“I need to tell you something else,” I say. “Something I’ve never told anyone.”

“What?”

My chest tightens so hard I have to work to pull in a full breath. This is the part I’ve been carrying since I was nineteen years old. The part that explains every silence, every hesitation, every time I opened my mouth to tell Eva what she means to me and my body physically shut the words down. She needs to hear it, something I’ve never told anyone.

“When I was nineteen, my father decided to run an experiment on me.”

Eva goes completely still. “What are you talking about?”

“He knew I was different. He’d known my whole life, and he resented it. The way my brain works, the way I process the world, the way emotions don’t come out of me the way they come out of other people—he thought all of it made me weak. And he wanted to find out exactly how weak.”

I stare at the grain of the kitchen table and trace the crooked line because looking at Eva while I say this might break me.

“He introduced me to a woman. Her name was Lydia. She was a few years older than me. She was beautiful and she was the first person in my life who didn’t treat me like I was broken. She would sit with me while I coded and ask me questions about what I was building. She touched my arm when she talked to me. She remembered things I said and brought them up weeks later like they mattered.”

I struggle to keep my voice is steady.

“I’d never had that before. Not from anyone outside of my brothers. I didn’t know what it was supposed to feel like when someone wanted to be close to you, so I just let it happen. We spent about four months together, and somewhere in the middle of it I started to believe that maybe the way my brain worked wasn’t a deficiency. Maybe it was just different, and different could still be wanted.”

“Wolfe.” Eva’s voice is barely audible. But I still can’t look at her.