Chapter 76: Unsent Words

She walked out before she said something even worse. The restaurant door closed behind her, and Naomi marched toward the Range Rover with her lunch in one hand and anger vibrating through her entire body. She got inside, slammed the door and dropped the food onto the passenger seat.

she simply sat there. Then her eyes started to sting. She blinked rapidly. "Oh, come on." She hated crying.

At least not over someone else’s stupid husband. But one tear escaped anyway. She dropped her head back against the headrest and closed her eyes.

Jordan was right about one thing. This would crush Tessa. Her best friend was absolutely giddy about her marriage, telling Naomi to stop overthinking hers and enjoy whatever happiness Dorian brought into her life.

Naomi wiped the tear away angrily. What was she supposed to do now? Tell Tessa immediately? Give him a chance to explain whatever complicated apparently meant? She needed to talk to someone.

Normally, that person would be Tessa. Tessa was her closest friend in the world. The person Naomi gossiped with, complained to, vented to and called whenever life did something ridiculous.

Except she obviously couldn’t call Tessa to discuss whether she should tell Tessa that Tessa’s husband might be cheating on Tessa.

Naomi opened her eyes and looked at her phone. There was one other person she wanted to talk to. Her unreachable husband who had chosen this particular weekend to disappear into whatever mysterious legal catastrophe had swallowed him. Naomi picked up the phone. She didn’t bother calling this time.

She opened their messages instead and began typing. Surely, he’d get it when his phone comes on.

I hope you’re good. Something came up, got me rattled.

Naomi stared at the words on her screen. Why was she doing this? Why, the moment something upset her, was she reaching for Dorian?

That frightened her almost as much as what she had seen. Because today it was Jordan. Tomorrow, it could be Dorian hurting her like that.

All she had to do was give him enough power. Enough of herself. That was how it happened, wasn’t it?

Nobody handed someone their heart while expecting them to crush it. They handed it over because the person had been kind.

Until they weren’t.

"Nope." She tossed the phone onto the passenger seat, started the Range Rover and pulled out of the parking lot.

******

Dorian pulled into the townhouse garage that night and switched off the Mercedes. For a moment, he remained behind the wheel.

Coming home had not been part of the plan. He had fully intended to stay away until he could look Naomi in the eye without feeling like the world’s worst liar.

After Adrian left him at the hotel, Dorian had done what he always did when something bothered him.

He worked.

If he couldn’t tell Naomi the truth, then perhaps there was another solution. Get Marianne out. Simple in theory.

Complicated as hell in practice.

If Dorian could find a legitimate way to challenge Marianne’s conviction without dragging Naomi’s name into the case, then Marianne would eventually be released.

Once she was free, she would have no excuse to continue pretending she was dead. She could reconnect with Naomi herself.

Then Dorian wouldn’t technically be hiding anything anymore. It was an excellent plan. Or at least an excellent example of a lawyer desperately trying to find a loophole in his own conscience.

He had spent hours buried in transcripts, trial notes, witness statements and old motions.

Nothing.

Marianne had done an impressive job of destroying her own defense. Any route toward reopening the case risked uncovering exactly what she had spent years protecting.

Naomi.

The idea that Naomi might genuinely have no memory of shooting her father bothered him. How did a person lose something that enormous?

There was nothing in the transcripts about Marianne drugging Naomi. Was it just the drugs or had Naomi repressed the memory?

He had read until the words began blurring together. Still, he found nothing. Eventually, sitting alone in that hotel room with Marianne’s case spread across the desk, Dorian realized he was no longer reading, he was obsessing.

Then her message came in. Five minutes later, he was dressed. Ten minutes after that, he was in the car.

Now he stood inside his own garage staring toward the elevator. He still had no idea what he was going to say.

He couldn’t explain why he had vanished. After a bit, the elevator carried Dorian up to the guest floor. He stepped out, walked straight to Naomi’s room and knocked lightly on the door. "Naomi?"

It sounded as though the entire room had collapsed.

Something thudded.

Naomi cursed.

There was a hurried shuffle, followed by quick footsteps racing toward the door. Dorian barely had time to wonder what the hell she was doing before it flew open.

Naomi practically launched herself at him. He caught her automatically, arms closing around her as she pressed herself against his chest.

And despite everything sitting heavily in his head—Marianne, the case, Naomi’s father, the secret he absolutely should never have uncovered—he couldn’t help smiling.

She really did act like a child sometimes. Especially when she forgot to pretend she didn’t need anybody.

"Hi there," he murmured, holding her close.

"Adrian said you weren’t coming."

"I... uh..." Dorian hesitated. "I got your message and I couldn’t..."

Naomi pulled away from him. "What message?"

Dorian frowned. "You said something happened."

"I didn’t send that. I typed it, but I didn’t send it."

"I received it. What’s going on?"

Naomi was still looking at him strangely. "And you came?"

"Yeah." His brows pulled together. "Didn’t you want me to?"

"No... no, it’s not that." She immediately started fumbling over her words. "I just... if you were with an important client, or working on something serious, you didn’t have to drop everything because I was having some kind of crisis."

"It’s fine. I can catch up on the rest on Monday."