Page 49 of Burden of Proof

“If that’s what you want to call it.”

We boxed up our leftovers and Marshall walked me back to the office. He didn’t say anything else about Lincoln, but when we parted, he hugged me extra hard, kissed the side of my head before pulling back to look at me. Like…really look at me.

“For what it’s worth, Hunter, I did mean what I said. You’ve grown up to be a good man, and you’ll be a good partner. But if you don’t think the same…”

I sighed, scrubbing a hand down my face. “It feels arrogant to assume I’m the best he can do.”

“It shouldn’t feel arrogant.” The corner of his mouth twitched up and he shrugged before taking a step past me, then another. “It should feel like a goal.”

CHAPTER 15

LINCOLN

Avoiding Smith made me feel like shit. He’d been texting incessantly about getting me set up with another fish, and I’d been leaving his messages unread because I didn’t think I could see him and not tell him about Hunter, and Hunter had explicitly said he wanted to be the one to tell his youngest brother about us first. I made a mental note about telling Hunter at some point in the night that I needed him to come clean and instead turned my attention to Silas.

I waited until I was on the way to Hunter’s apartment to call Silas, also knowing there was a gap in the night between when Silas got off work and when Marshall got home. They were both workaholics, but one was far worse than the other. The phone rang through to voicemail, and I frowned out the windshield. Thankfully, almost as soon as the call disconnected, my phone rang and a picture of me and Silas lit up the screen.

“Hey,” I answered, rubbing my palms on the steering wheel.

“Sorry I missed you,” he said. “I was in the shower.”

“That’s fine.”

“What’s up?” my best friend in the world asked, and suddenly I felt like shit for telling him this over the phone and not in person.

“Nothing,” I lied. “Just driving around and thinking about you.”

Silas let out a low laugh. “Just cruising the city?”

“You know. I like my apartment, but it gets boring when it’s just me,” I said.

It was a lie wrapped in truth.

“Have you got another fish yet?”

I made a dismissive sound in the back of my throat. “Are you and Smith in cahoots?”

“Me and Smith?”

I could hear Silas’ eyebrows raise into his hairline, and I grimaced. “He’s been on me about a Cassandra replacement too.”

“I didn’t know the two of you were that close.”

We were closer, but Idefinitelywasn’t going to tell Silas that over the phone.

“We’re friends,” I summarized, pulling my car into the parking garage at Hunter’s apartment building. “Going into a parking garage, might lose you.”

“That’s convenient,” Silas mumbled. “Do you want to go out Friday night? Maybe hit up Rapture?”

“Maybe, yeah.”

The call disconnected before he could question me, and I’d never felt more relieved. Here I’d spent the last half of the day looking forward to going over to Hunter’s apartment and losing myself in him, but the more time passed, the more shit there was for us to talk about. I had been so wrapped up in overthinking all of it, I hadn’t even filmed any of the content I’d woken up ready to record.

What the fuck was I doing?

I was an absolute mess of a human, and I shouldn’t take Hunter down with me. Just because he’d been blind enough to fall for me didn’t mean I needed tolethim. I was on the cusp ofdevising a way to break up with him when somebody knocked on my window, scaring me enough that I jumped out of my seat and screamed. I snapped my head toward the left and found Hunter there, hand still lifted and eyebrows raised.

I screwed my eyes closed and cursed under my breath, turning off the engine. Hunter pulled up on the door handle and the rush of cool garage air was almost enough to snap me out of my spiral.