Raging Hard: A Stepbrother SEAL Romance (With bonus novel Based!) (48 page)

Without another word, I left.

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I
t made sense that he suspected something. It explained why Jess showed Aubrie the video. It explained the whole Brent thing. Actually, the Brent thing was particularly fucked up, and I had to hope that something went wrong there.

Still, it was completely screwed that her dad knew she and I had something going on. He could easily have stopped it by saying something to her, but clearly he had ulterior motives. He was more interested in his ability to use my fame to make him money.

It was probably part of his plan to force me to act the way he wanted. Whatever he thought I was missing, whatever insane shit that was.

Hours after that conversation, the night was dark as I sped through the streets, my car taking the curves like they were nothing. I wasn’t supposed to leave the house without supervision, but I knew I would be fine if I made it fast.

She didn’t live far. And I doubted it would take long.

My mind had worked a million miles per second all through therapy. At first, I was so angry I could barely breathe, but fortunately Tracey and her brutal training helped work that out of me.

And once I was clear, I could begin to plan.

It felt good to be out on my own, even though I knew that if I got caught there would be trouble. Still, it was hard to give a shit with the wind in my hair.

I turned down a side street and parked the car, feeding the meter a few quarters. I limped up onto the sidewalk and headed toward my destination: the Boulder Marriott Hotel in downtown.

Inside, the lobby lights were harsh. It took me half a second to adjust to everything as I approached the front desk, hoping nobody recognized me. It looked like any other hotel, with vaguely modern-looking decorations, all designed to appear artistic and welcoming while remaining as vague and unobtrusive as possible.

“Good evening, sir. Can I help you?”

“I’m looking for a guest. Her name is Jessica Green.”

The concierge nodded. “I’m sorry, but I can’t give you her room number.”

“Could you call her for me?”

“Sure, that I can do. One moment.”

She dialed a number and handed me the phone. I took it, turning away as it rang. After a few seconds, Jess answered, her voice heavy with sleep.

“Yeah?”

“Jess, it’s me.”

“What?” she muttered.

“It’s Lincoln.”

“What do you want? I was asleep.”

I checked my watch. I had to admit, I was a little surprised that she turned in by midnight.

“I’m at the hotel. Can I come up?”

There was a long pause. I had to resist the urge to make sure she was still there. Finally, she said, “Fine. Room 237.”

I handed the phone back to the concierge and got into the elevator, riding it up a floor. It was annoying that I couldn’t take the stairs, but my legs always hurt the most at the end of the day.

Once there, I hobbled down the navy blue rug with concentric circles and designs all over it, probably made to confuse drunk people as much as possible. Hotel corridors always had a strange in-between feeling, like they weren’t exactly one place or another. Not exactly in the hotel, but not exactly out of it. Not a destination, but somewhere else.

I knocked on her door. A few seconds later, she pulled it open.

“Evening, ma’am,” I said.

She wore a loose sweatshirt and sweatpants and her hair was messed up from sleeping on it. “Why are you here?” she asked.

“Not going to invite me in?”

She sighed and moved aside, letting me enter. I quickly surveyed the place and grinned to myself.

It was an absolute wreck. Bags were half packed and clothes were thrown all over the place. Underwear was conspicuously piled in one corner. She clearly wasn’t interested in living an orderly existence.

“Neat,” I said.

“I hate living in hotels.” She sat down on the little guest couch, and I took the chair across from her, stretching my legs.

“Nobody does.”

“Okay. I’m asking one more time. Why are you here? Finally came to your senses?” She gave me a sly little smile

I laughed. “No, not that. Sorry. This is strictly business.”

“I figured. What’s going on? You’re not supposed to leave the house, right?”

“Do you like your boss, Jess?”

She blinked. “Cliff? He’s fine.”

“Fine? Cliff is a fucking asshole. We both know it.”

“Okay, yeah. He’s an asshole.”

“I want to end him.”

She stared at me for a second. “I can’t help you, Lincoln.”

I decided not to waste any time.

“Fifty thousand dollars,” I said.

She paused. “What about it?”

“You give me something I can use against him, and I’ll pay you fifty grand. Cash.”

She paused, looking thoughtful. “Why would I risk my relationship with Cliff for you?”

“Because you hate him. I’ve seen the way you react when he calls you up. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.”

“He’s hard to work with.”

“He’s impossible. And he treats you like garbage. I’ve done some digging on you, Jess, and you have a pretty damn good resume. You can get work anywhere you want.”

“Cliff has a reputation.”

“I understand that. But so do you.”

She leaned back, thinking it over. I knew that stroking her ego a little bit would probably do the trick, but the money was the clincher.

“Okay, say I do this. What happens with this documentary?”

“It’s yours, isn’t it?”

“Cliff is the money. He owns a stake, yeah, but not the full rights.”

“Okay. I’ll bankroll the documentary myself if he pulls out.”

She nodded. “Fine. I also want another interview with you and Aubrie.”

I blinked. “Why?”

“I want to talk about Brent. We need the footage of her discussing what happened, and it’ll look bad if we don’t get it.”

“Fine.” I sighed. I didn’t want to get Brie involved anymore, but an interview wasn’t bad.

“One last thing. Fifty grand isn’t even a year’s salary for me. I need more on top of you paying for the film if Cliff pulls out.”

A huge grin broke out across my face. I didn’t love that she was trying to get more money, but the fact that she was bargaining at all meant I had her.

“What’s your number, then?” I asked.

It didn’t take long after that. We talked for ten more minutes, hammering out the details, but she agreed faster than I expected. I figured there was something I didn’t know about, but that was a problem for another day.

It was a lot more expensive than I was hoping, but she promised that she’d get me something very useful. And knowing her, I figured it was going to be pretty damn good. At least it better be, considering the deal she just made.

As I left the hotel, I was out of a large chunk of my cash savings. But for the first time in weeks, I felt good.

I felt in control. And that was what I needed.

Fuck Cliff. I was taking control back.

Interview #3

“W
hat happened the night of the charity auction, in your words?”

I glanced at Aubrie as she slowly began to recount the night.

It hadn’t been hard to convince her to do the interview. For whatever reason, as soon as I asked, she said yes. Part of me figured it was because she would take any excuse to spend time with me, but truthfully she probably just wanted to clear the air.

There was a lot of air to clear, although a huge chunk of it had to remain a secret. It didn’t matter what Cliff knew or guessed, and that Jess probably knew as much as he did. We had to maintain the illusion of the secret.

Otherwise, I didn’t know what would happen.

“It was toward the end of the night when . . . when that girl won the date with Lincoln.”

She glanced at me and I grinned innocently. It wasn’t my fault I attracted a certain kind of insane stripper.

“So what happened after that?” Jess pushed gently.

“I was feeling tired and sick and I figured I could cut out early. I wasn’t exactly an important part of the operation at that point.”

Jess nodded, seemingly accepting that very clear lie. Brie wasn’t exactly the best actress. But it was becoming obvious to me that although we all knew the truth, we were all going to pretend like we didn’t.

Because apparently, it was so fucking horrible for me to want Aubrie more than anything. It was so terrible if the sinner Based Carter was into Aubrie Evans, the perfect little science geek, straight-A student, all around stunner.

We weren’t even related. It shouldn’t have mattered.

But it did. Somehow, it did. And that’s why the secret stayed a secret no matter how badly I wanted to tear her clothes off right there, cameras be damned.

“It was late and it was dark out, but it didn’t matter. There were so many people inside, you know? I felt safe. So I headed toward my car.”

“And that’s when you saw Brent?” Jess asked.

I steeled myself for this part. I kept running what I saw through my mind, over and over, and the anger never went away. I wished I could have beaten that piece of shit even more.

“Yeah. I didn’t think anything of it at first, you know? I’d seen him around here a million times since he worked on the crew.” Aubrie shrugged. “But I guess after a second I realized that he was drunk.”

“Why was he drunk?” I cut in, directing my question at Jess.

Jess looked at me. “Probably because he drank.”

“But why?” I pressed.

“He has an alcohol problem. We offered to get him help but he turned it down.”

“So you knowingly had an alcoholic on the crew?”

Her eyes narrowed. I knew I shouldn’t push, but I couldn’t help it. “He had never been a problem before. He kept the drinking and work separate. What he did on his free time was none of my business.”

“Became your business, though. Our business, actually.”

“You want to blame this on me? Fine, go ahead, Lincoln. But can we finish this interview without you interrupting?”

I clenched my jaw. Aubrie looked at me, concerned. “Fine. Go ahead. Finish it,” I said.

Brie paused for a second, looking at me, and then turned back to Jess. “So anyway, he was drunk. I told him I was going home, but he said we should hang out. I said no, thanks and started walking away. He pressed and I said no again. That’s when he grabbed me.”

“Describe what he looked like.”

“Drunk, obviously. Sweating a little bit. His eyes were wide open, a little crazy. Honestly, he scared the hell out of me, made me uncomfortable. Even before he grabbed me, right after he started talking and I realized he was drunk.”

“Had he ever made you uncomfortable before?”

“No, not at all.”

“What happened next?”

“His hands grabbed my arm. He was being really rough and pulled me back toward him. I yelled, told him to get off me. He didn’t look like he was listening, just kept telling me to wait a minute.”

“What did you think he was going to do?”

“I didn’t know. Honestly, I had never been in a situation like that before. I was just hoping that yelling would attract some attention and scare him off.”

“It attracted attention all right,” I mumbled.

Aubrie gave me a look and then turned back to the cameras. “That’s when Lincoln showed up.”

“Were you afraid of Brent at this time?”

“Yes, I was terrified.”

“Did you think he was going to hurt you?”

“I don’t know. I thought that was possible, yeah.”

“What happened next?”

“Well, once second he was pulling at my arm, his eyes crazy, and the next he dropped to the ground. I looked up and Lincoln was standing there holding his cane like a baseball bat. He hit Brent again in the body. I guess he had hit him the first time in the knee. Anyway, he hit him again and Brent dropped to the ground. That’s when Lincoln grabbed me and we walked away.”

“What did you think at the time?”

“I was scared, but relieved. I was also confused. I didn’t know that Lincoln was looking for me, so I didn’t expect him.”

“Were you afraid of Lincoln?”

“Not at all. I was worried he was going to kill Brent, but then he didn’t.”

“Why did you walk away with him?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t. It just felt like the right thing to do.”

“Why do you think Lincoln saved you?”

She paused. “Wouldn’t you?”

“Maybe, maybe not. I might not have broken the guy’s kneecap, especially if I was on parole,” she said.

I rolled my eyes at Jess.
I knew you were a coward
, my look said.

“That’s not Lincoln, though. He doesn’t do anything half way.”

“Explain that,” Jess prodded.

“I don’t know.” Brie paused, thinking. “It’s like, you watch him talk to someone, or he’s talking to you, and you’re the only person in the entire world for him. Or all those pinball machines in our game room, he set the high score on every single one.”

“So he’s intense?”

“Intense isn’t the right word. I mean, he is, but it’s much more than that.”

“He really made an impression on you.”

“Yeah. When someone does something like that for you, it means something.”

“So I want to ask you this again. Why do you think he did it?”

“Because he couldn’t have done anything else. He’s Lincoln. If he sees something, he does something. He’s not the kind of person to get help. He is the help.”

“One last question. Where did you guys go?”

“Not far away. We mostly just walked around. He made sure I was okay. I was pretty shaken up about it, so he helped calm me down. Then we went back.”

“Okay. Thanks, Aubrie.”

“That it?” I asked.

“From her, yeah.” She looked at Brie. “Do you mind sitting here while we ask Lincoln some questions?”

“Sure, whatever.”

“Okay, Lincoln. How did all that make you feel?”

“Pissed off, mostly. I’m not a fan of reliving painful memories.”

“No, specifically what Aubrie just said about you. How did that make you feel?”

I looked at Brie, at her wide eyes and pouty lips. I wanted to grab her face and kiss her hard, run my hands along her body. I wanted to feel her curves and skin and breathe in her smell.