“How do you think the media got these documents?” Cayden barked.
She shook her head to chase away the nagging whisper in the back of her mind. “Noah had nothing to do with this.”
Cayden snorted. “Right.”
“He wouldn’t do that.” Bile rose in her throat.
“So I’m supposed to believe it’s just a coincidence?”
“Yes! He wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t. He knows . . .”
“Knows what?”
That I care about you all. She didn’t say it, because she could tell he didn’t want to hear it and wouldn’t believe it anyway. She didn’t say it, because the truth of it took her by as much surprise as it would Cayden. And what a fool she was, because Cayden was staring at her like something he’d stepped in on the lawn.
“Noah didn’t do this. I know he didn’t.”
Cayden pointed his finger. “You are the worst fucking thing that ever happened to this family. Stay away from us. We’ll find him another fucking kidney.”
His words reverberated off the stainless-steel appliances in the kitchen, and their echo followed him as he stormed back through the swinging door. As soon as he left, Alexis deflated against the counter. This wasn’t true. It . . . wasn’t true. Was it?
Jessica ran in. “What the hell was that?”
Alexis looked at her but barely saw her. “I need to go.”
“Are you okay?”
No. No, she wasn’t. Alexis grabbed her purse from the hook on the back of her office door and removed her apron. Her hands trembled when she unlocked her car and when she fumbled with the radio to find a twenty-four-hour news station on her satellite radio. The first one she tried was talking about the upcoming election, so she tried another one.
Just in time to hear a commentator say, “This leak has all the markings of a Hatchet operation.”
A sour taste filled her mouth.
She pulled into Noah’s driveway and turned off the car. Wooden legs carried her to his front door. She knocked and realized belatedly how ridiculous that was. She normally would just walk in, but nothing made sense. A moment passed before the door opened. He grinned. “Why are you knocking?”
But then he froze. “What’s wrong?”
* * *
Lexa walked past him, her movements robotic, her face devoid of emotion. “Jesus, Lexa. Talk to me.” He turned her around to face him.
“Cayden—” She stopped and licked her lips.
“What about Cayden?” He gripped her shoulders. “Honey, you’re scaring me. What is going on?”
“He was just at my café. Someone hacked into Elliott’s company and leaked documents to the media.”
He blinked. “Today?”
She handed him her phone. “It’s all right there.”
Noah skimmed the screen and absorded just enough to know it wasn’t good. BosTech was in some serious shit if this was true. He wasn’t surprised, though. Everyone knew they’d lied their asses off before Congress. “I don’t understand. Why did Cayden—”
Cold adrenaline washed through him. “Are you kidding me? He thinks I did it?”
She nodded.
“Does Elliott think I did it?” And Jesus, when the hell did he start to care what Elliott Vanderpool thought of him?
“I don’t know.” Lexa stepped back, putting just enough distance between them to be meaningful. A cold draft from the open door replaced all the warmth between them, but it could just have easily come from the icy detachment in her gaze.
Noah’s arms fell like lead against his sides as another sickening realization knocked him senseless.
“Holy shit, Alexis. You think—” He stumbled over his own words because his heart, mind, and mouth were at war with one another. Alexis stared unblinkingly at him with one hand clenched into a fist against her stomach. He wished she’d use it. Just slam it into his chin and be done with it. It would hurt less than what he was about to say. “Do you think I had something to do with this?”
She blinked and let out a breath. Two actions, connected but not. One was a hesitation. The other a sign of relief. Both added up to one conclusion that turned his stomach.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t think that.”
She reached out, but Noah backed up. “But did you?”
“No.”
Noah might have found some small comfort in the tremble of her voice, but the hint of guilt that seeped into her eyes destroyed it. Destroyed him.
“You did. For at least one second, you thought I did this, didn’t you?”
“No—”
“Yet you drove straight here to ask me.”
“Of course I drove straight here! Cayden accused you.”
“And you wanted to make sure it wasn’t true.”
His footsteps on the hardwood floor sounded a defeated retreat to his kitchen. Hers were the frantic march of a battle not yet over.
“That’s not fair. I know you didn’t do it. How many times do I have to say it?”
“How about one more time,” he said, gripping the edge of the kitchen counter. “Admit it. For one moment, you actually thought I was responsible for this.”
“Fine!” She threw her hands in the air. “I admit it! I thought maybe you did it. Why does this matter?”
“Because it does.” He barely recognized his own voice, but the emotion rising inside him, tightening his chest and heating his skin? He recognized that. And he hated it.
“That is so unfair,” she said, crossing the kitchen to jab a finger in his chest. “Of course people would suspect you. Even me, for just a tiny, split second. You have the means. You have the access. And you hate people like Elliott.”
“But I love you!”
Alexis jumped. He’d never raised his voice around her like that. And certainly not to declare that he loved her for the first time. But the words were out there now in the worst possible way, and instead of the beginning of something, they felt like the end of it.
“I would never hurt you like that, Lexa, because I love you more than I could ever hate him.”
Lexa’s eyes glistened with a sudden sheen as she raised trembling fingers to her lips. She reached for him, but
