Total pages in book: 29
Estimated words: 30055 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 150(@200wpm)___ 120(@250wpm)___ 100(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 30055 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 150(@200wpm)___ 120(@250wpm)___ 100(@300wpm)
“What?” His eyes flutter open and he releases his grip on my hand, looking completely nonplussed about the past minute and a half. “What are you doing, Scarlett?”
“You hurt me during a nightmare.” I hold up my hand in front of him, showing off the deep red marks on my skin. “I tried to get you to wake up.”
“I’m so fucking sorry…” He glances at my hand, looking ashamed.
Slowly rolling me off him, he gets out of the bed.
“Stay right here,” he says, leaving me alone in the room.
Ignoring the sudden flare of pain, I grab my phone and check the time.
3:00 a.m.
I have eight hours before I need to head to the airport.
“I will leave,” I mutter to myself softly. “I will leave…”
Jameson returns to me with an ice bucket and a bag full of something I can’t see.
“I’m sorry, Scarlett.” He looks into my eyes. “I would never want to physically hurt you.”
“Only emotionally, right?”
“No…”
I wait for him to take my bait and fire back with something sarcastic, but he doesn’t.
Instead, he sits on the edge of the bed and takes my hand, icing my wrist. Then he softly wraps it in a warmed white towel.
“Thank you…” I let out a breath.
“You’re welcome.” He lifts my wrist to his mouth and kisses it. “What made you leave Manhattan for Los Angeles?”
“I needed a lot of space from everyone.”
“Including me?”
“Especially you.”
“You went through my mail.” His voice is low. “And you accused your own father of being a murderer.”
“Because he is…” I’m still trying to come to terms with it, but the weeks I’ve spent away in California have made my childhood recollections so much clearer.
I’ve had plenty of time to put the puzzle pieces of his shady business practices together, and although I don’t have the entire picture, the corners I do have are ugly and compelling enough.
“I know you want to believe the worst of him because he’s hurt you, but…” Jameson pinches the bridge of his nose. “If I win his case—one that affects your brothers as well—it’ll be my nine hundred sixty-seventh career win.”
“I hope you’re not expecting me to throw you a party.”
“I’m hoping you’ll understand.”
“Understand what, Jameson?” I ask. “You haven’t told me anything.”
“I’ve told you I missed you,” he says. “That I clearly fucking want you.”
“So, that erases our last ugly conversation and all this time in between?” I shrug. “It completely deletes all the questions I wanted answers to?”
“It should…”
“So, we can just start over with the exact same issues hanging in the balance?”
“That’s what mature adults would do, yes.”
“Well, feel free to call me an immature teenager forever, then.” I get up, and he grips my waist. Then he pulls me back down.
“The person I go to see twice a week is my father,” he says, answering one of my old questions with ease. “He’s currently serving a life sentence in state prison for murder.”
What? I can feel all the color draining from my face. Every assumption I had about his obsession with defending the guilty slowly shifts out of place.
“He’s been locked away there since I was a kid.” He looks as if the words pain him to say. “But he’s completely innocent. Happy now?”
“No…”
“Well, you should be. Only a few other people know about this.”
“I…” I don’t even know what to say to him.
“This is the part where you ask me how I know he didn’t do it, Scarlett. Ask me.”
“I don’t want to know.”
“Oh, now you don’t want to know something?” His voice is strained. “What the fuck do I need to tell you to get you to come back and let us start over?”
“Cut ties with my father.” I pause. “Or at least tell me everything you’re doing for him.”
He says nothing.
He just stares at me for several seconds, his expression shifting from vulnerable to vexed.
“Scarlett Hunter—”
“It’s Winters now.” I correct him.
“Fine,” he says, straightening his back. “Scarlett Winters, I meant what I said about attorney-client privilege, and you know damn well how much winning cases means to me.”
“It means more than this so-called relationship, right?”
“That’s a trick question,” he says, “but I’m not breaking the law for you.”
“And I’m not changing my plans for you.” I stand up from the bed and quickly move out of reach. “I’m going to shower and catch an Uber to the airport. Please don’t join me or try to make me get in your car. I’m done with you this time. For good.”
“Get back in the fucking bed, Scarlett.” He looks at the sheets. “We can finish this conversation in a few hours when you’ve come to your senses.”
He moves back onto the mattress, gesturing for me to move back on top of him, but I don’t.
“I meant what I said about not following me, Jameson.” I pick up a towel and wrap it around my body.