Page 52

FIFTY-TWO

Kinsley

It’s quiet when I get back to the office, and I can’t help but wonder what my guys are up to. Colin’s surgery is tomorrow, and while I know they’ll be seeing plenty of me at home, this is my last day in the office for a couple weeks.

James gives me another one of his dirty looks per usual. He’s made it crystal clear he’s not my biggest fan and I couldn’t give two fucks what he thinks about me.

I’m here to do a job, and that doesn’t include going out of my way to be nice to him.

I stick my nose up in the air and walk right past him to go find the guys. They’ve been working hard today, and I brought them coffee. Only Wyatt’s office is empty. Brantley’s too. That’s odd.

After taking one last look around Brantley’s office, just to make sure I didn’t miss anything, I head to Maverick’s.

His door is closed, so I perch the coffee on one arm and knock on the door with my free hand.

“Come in.” Wyatt speaks with a cold, almost detached tone.

The hairs rise on the back of my neck, and my skin breaks out in goosebumps. I missed something, and I’m not sure I want to find out what it is. Not when every cell in my body is telling me to turn around and walk the other way.

I push open the door slowly and take a hesitant step inside. Maverick is sitting behind his desk, his head resting in his hands. Wyatt is sitting across from him, his arms crossed, staring a hole in the center of the desk. Brantley has his back to me, his eyes glued to the Nashville skyline, and he makes no attempt to turn around as I close the door behind me.

In fact, none of them have even glanced my way.

Shoot.

What did I mess up now?

I swallow. Hard. “I brought you guys some coffee.” My voice wavers as I slide the cardboard container on the end of Mav’s desk.

Wyatt’s gaze snaps up to meet mine, and I take a step back. His green eyes have turned to stone. Ice is radiating from his pores, chilling me to the bone.

He’s fucking pissed.

At me.

And I have no idea what I did.

“Did you enjoy your break?” Wyatt’s head cocks to the side as he assesses me, every single word dripping with disdain.

I clasp my hands in front of me, my fingers twisting around each other, and I try to smile even though my heart is threatening to bust out of my chest. “It was fine.”

“I hope he paid you well.” Brantley still hasn’t turned around. His shoulders are rigid, his spine straight as an arrow, and his jacket is missing. Correction, it’s balled up on the floor in the corner of the room.

What the heck is going on here? Paid me well? Who? And for what?

My pulse is pounding in my ears, and I try to take a few breaths to take the edge off, but it doesn’t work. “I don’t know what you're talking about.”

“Don’t you?” Maverick’s glare is searing, burning right through me.

“No, I don’t.”

Brantley finally turns, his face an unreadable mask. “Come on, Kinsley. You can drop the act. We all know what’s going on.”

Well, that makes three of them because I have no freaking clue. None at all. But instead of responding, I cross my arms and look between them. Either they can tell me what’s going on, or I’m going back to my office and pretending this bizarre conversation never happened.

Everything was fine before I ran out for coffee.

Surely, there hasn’t been another scheduling error. I’ve double and tripled checked everything before putting it in our calendar. And no one would be paying me for that. Well, except the three of them.

“You want to play this game?” Brantley takes a step forward, the corner of his lip going up into a sneer. “Well, someone has been leaking information to the press about two of our cases. Cases involving our biggest clients that are now entirely compromised. They’ve also handed over pictures of the four of us. Unless they knew where we were at all times, they wouldn't have been able to get those images.”

“What kind of pictures?” My brows draw together as I try to wrack my brain. When could someone have taken pictures of us together? We haven’t exactly been discreet, but we haven’t been obvious either.

And I’ve been under the impression we weren’t trying to hide our relationship. If they were concerned about their reputation, they could have been more conspicuous. This is on them as much as it is me.

But then there’s the info leak.

Why are they just mentioning it to me now? Why are they coming at me like I’m responsible?

Then it hits me, right in the face, like a ton of bricks.

“You think I’m the leak?” My voice wavers, and my hands shake. Not because I’m scared, but because I’m pissed. They can’t be serious. I’ve done nothing but work my ass off. I tried to keep things professional after our night together. I freaking tried, and they insisted on spending more time together.

Maverick lets out a tortured sigh and pushes away from his desk. “We know. Everything has been traced back to your computer. And Wyatt saw you meeting with Thomas this afternoon.”

“What?” My voice rises about five octaves, and my fingers flex at my side. I’m itching to wring their necks, but I doubt it would help my case. Although, it sounds like they’ve already made up their minds. Without asking me a single goddamn question.

I thought they were better than this. Hell, I thought we were stronger than this.

Turns out I was wrong.

Wrong about so many things.

Wyatt huffs a laugh, the sound grating on my skin. “You’ve been playing us the whole time, and we fell right into your trap like a bunch of fucking chumps.”

Fuck him and fuck this.

“I didn’t know it was illegal to run into someone out in public,” I grind out, my blood turning to molten lava. “I can’t believe you think I would do this. You don’t know me at all.”

“You’re right,” Brantley says with a shrug of his shoulders. “We don’t know you. Not the real you.”

All because I ran into another lawyer at the coffee shop, a colleague of theirs. If they had asked instead of jumping to all these conclusions, I would have told them that he did offer me a job and I very politely declined. That’s it. Nothing else. End of story.

I don’t have a clue how the case files were leaked, and if Thomas is behind the scenes pulling someone’s strings, it sure as hell isn’t mine.

He didn’t mention a thing to me about any of this.

The fact that everything came from my computer is slightly damning, but I’m sure it can be explained. I’m not at my desk twenty-four hours a day. James flits around this office like he owns the damn place. The senior partners, while they usually stay on the other side of the office, could come in here. Hell, even Brianna came up a few times to learn the ropes after that hellish meeting with the junior associates.

We could have gone through this together.

We could have talked about it.

But they’ve already judged me.

I can’t believe I fell for them. They’re so blinded by their own self-righteousness, they can’t see anything else. They’re lawyers, yet they don’t seem to give a rat's ass about the truth.

“Doesn’t look like I know you either. Any of you. The guys I knew would ask questions, but you don’t want the truth. You want someone to blame and I’m an easy target.” I grab the door, fully intent on going back to my office and packing up my shit, but first I turn around, taking in the three of them one by one. “Did either of you assholes even consider someone was setting me up to take the fall or do we only care about justice in the courtroom?”

I’m met with silence and there’s no doubt my words are falling on deaf ears.

“Don’t worry about firing me—I fucking quit. Good luck finding the actual person responsible for this.”

And with that, I’m gone.

Gone from this office and gone from their lives.