Truly Mine (31 page)

I let out a breath and feel as if a weight has dropped off my shoulders. “Why this? Why in God’s name would you end up in this line of work?” I drop into a chair in her sitting area.

She sits on the edge of the chair directly across from me, and she tells me the story of how she supported herself when she came to New York and then how she met the girls. This off-the-wall business seems to have sincerely started off with good intentions and morphed into a viable business that afforded them the lifestyle they have been living. But what a way to do it.

“This is a lot to take in, Truly.” I can’t sit with all the adrenaline shooting through me. “Were you ever going to tell me?”

She pauses, sucking in a deep breath. “No, I wasn’t. I know that makes me a liar. But, Tyler, this isn’t something I ever put out there. We have always kept it quiet. I’m not proud of myself.”

“Lissa, does she—” I begin to ask.

Truly cuts me off, “Don’t. Please. I won’t discuss her.” She stands slowly, favoring her right side, and walks over to her desk. “What I can tell you is that she is a good person, and no matter what she has done concerning this business, she feels the same as me and is leaving, too. The two of us are ready to move to Fallport and start a new life. With or without you, I’m moving, and I will carry out the plans I told you about.” Her eyes fill with tears, and she turns away from me. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t share this with anyone. I mean, anyone, Tyler. It would ruin me in that town.”

“I would never do that, Truly.” I don’t know where to place this information though. It’s just too crazy to get my thoughts around it all.

I walk to her, and she turns to face me but does not look at me.

“You know what I really don’t understand? It takes everything I have to get you to open up. To be vulnerable. Then, I walk in and see you with that guy, and I find out that you do it for a fucking living. Help me out here. I don’t understand.”

She leans back against her desk and looks up at me. “Those who can’t do…teach. Ever heard that? Story of my life.”

Okay, wow.
“I can’t lie to you and say that I get it because I don’t. But I can tell you that I love you. I don’t want to live without you. It’s just going to take me a minute to figure it out in my head.”

She’s sighs a heavy breath. I know the weight of the world just came off her shoulders.

“I understand.”

“I have to ask. Is this it? Is there anything else you want to tell me? I don’t want to find out there’s more to the story later.”

“Well, there is one other thing. But I don’t have a resolution in sight for it. And I don’t want to bother you with it,” she explains.

“Tell me, Truly. Now.”

I already know, of course, but she’s not getting out of giving me the full version of it.

“I have been getting threatening calls.”

I stare at her.

“From a client, I think,” she continues, still not offering the entire story.

I stare, my body still.

“You already know, don’t you?”

“Yep. Keep talking,”I demand.

She shakes her head and sighs. “I was attacked on the way home yesterday.” She falls down to her desk chair and sobs. “I was so scared, and I thought I would never see you again, Tyler. I thought he was going to kill me.”

I drop to my knees in front of her and wrap my arms around her waist. “You’re going home with me. You and Lissa both. Everything’s going to be okay. I won’t let anything happen to you, Truly.”

Shortly after Lissa arrives at the office, I bring her up to speed on our plans to get her and Truly out of New York and to the safety of Fallport. She’s completely on board.

I still have questions I want to ask Lissa. I feel that since it’s become glaringly obvious that my son is having his first crush on an older woman, I should know the extent of her involvement with the clients. But maybe it’s best I just leave well enough alone. She’s a smart woman. I’m sure she took care not to put herself at risk.

The next day we pack a U-Haul with all of Truly’s and Lissa’s belongings, minus the furniture since we’ll send movers to retrieve it later in the week.

It’s hard to believe these two women, who are sleeping so peacefully, appearing sweet and innocent, have such a shocking occupation. I’m still having a hard time processing everything that I have learned.

As we walk into my—
our
house, I feel complete.

“Welcome home, babe.” I hold the door open and wave her in.

“Thank you, for everything.” Truly sets her purse down on the sofa. “Do you care if I take a shower? I feel so gross.”

“This is your home. You don’t have to ask to do anything,” I remind her.

She smiles and walks off in the direction of our bedroom.

We spend the next week moving Truly’s belongings into our house. She insists that she doesn’t want to rearrange anything. I know she’s just making it a point not to appear that she’s taking over. I, on the other hand, want nothing more than for her to change the place up and make it ours. When I come home, I want her things mingling with mine. I want her jewelry cluttering our table and her clothes lying over our furniture. Already, this house feels brighter and livelier.

“So, Ty, what are your thoughts on this?” Truly enters the kitchen, and her head peeks out from the top of a poster-size print of a nearly naked model. “Do we need to display this?”

She’s so cute.

I take the print from her and walk to the side door that leads into the garage, and I drop it on top of the garbage cans. Stepping back into the house, I look across the room to where she stands. “Nope, I think we can get rid of that. It doesn’t fit in here anymore.”

“Good. I wasn’t sure where I was going to find room for her.” She smiles ruefully and disappears down the hall again.

Those little things should probably annoy me, but they do anything but. I fucking love it.

From across the room, Truly’s phone rings.

“Will you grab that, babe?” she yells from the back of the house.

I pick up the phone and look at the display.

Unknown Caller.

“Hello?”

The caller doesn’t answer me, but I hear someone breathing.

“Hello?” I speak louder.

I hear a click, and the call has ended. I scroll through her recent calls and find my name, Lissa, and Marie. I run my hand across the back of my neck and drop my head. Just as I move to set the phone down, it rings again. This time, I hear Truly’s footsteps. She appears from the hallway and looks at me, confused.

“The person hung up on me.”

She scrunches her face and continues toward me. I hold the ringing phone out to her. She looks down at the display and immediately drops the phone to the floor. “Oh my God. No!”

“Is it him?” I ask.

“Yes. Yes! Why won’t he just leave me alone?” she whispers, looking at the phone still lying on the floor.

I reach down and pluck the phone off the floor. “Truly, listen to me. You have to answer it.” Stooping down so that I am eye level with her, I plead, “Please, Tru. You have to keep him on the phone for as long as you can. Okay? I’ll be able to track the call.” I press Send and take her hand in mine, placing the phone in it. When she doesn’t move, I press the speaker button and mouth,
Hello?

She locks her gaze on mine and doesn’t look away. “Hello, asshole.”

I clench my eyes tight, wishing she wouldn’t antagonize this creep.

“Well, I’ll give you credit. You’re tougher than you look. For such a little thing, you sure can fight.” The voice is altered.

“Fuck you,” Truly cries.

I feel so helpless. There’s nothing I can do but keep my eyes locked on hers to let her know that I am right here with her.

“Oh, I’d love to, babe. But, honestly, you have something I want. You’d be smart to just work with me.”

I tip my head back and stare at the ceiling. It’s taking everything I have to keep my mouth closed.

“What? What is it that you want, goddamn it?” Truly screams.

My eyes are back on her.

“Tell me!”

It’s okay. It’s okay
, I mouth. I rub her arm and nod my head.

“Good idea. See you soon.”

Click.

With that, I drag Truly behind me as I lock every door and then rush into my office.

Once through the door, I let go of Truly’s hand and crash into the chair behind my desk. I wake up my laptop and open the telecommunications software that I’ll use to trace the call. I log in and pull up Truly’s phone record. I’m so preoccupied with tracking down the guy who is tormenting Truly that I haven’t noticed her still standing at the door. She appears to be in complete shock. She has a blank look.

“Come here, Tru.” I wave her over to me, but she doesn’t respond. “Babe.”

When she still doesn’t move, I stand up and walk slowly to her. I take her hands in mine and gently guide her to my desk. I sit down and then pull her onto my lap. After choosing the unknown caller from her log of calls received, we sit for several minutes, watching the software status symbol spin as it searches for a number tied to the call.

“Yes!” When the software returns a phone number, I nearly jump out of the chair, tossing Truly to the floor.

“It’s just a phone number. How do you find out who it belongs to?”

“Like this.” I switch to the Details tab and scroll to the bottom, passing by the cell tower location and coordinates, until I find what I’m looking for.

I highlight the name, and Truly gasps…and so do I.

Rodney Addison.

“Holy shit.” I can’t believe what I’m seeing.

“I knew it!” Truly shouts excitedly.

We’re talking over each other, and neither of us can get a word in edgewise.

“Wait. Stop!” I yell, taking hold of her shoulders. I’m so confused. “What do you mean by, you knew it? You know him?”

“Yes! He was a client several months ago. Then, he requested another session. We thought he was odd, but until the last session, we didn’t know what he was up to.”

“What happened at the last session, Truly?”

She is barely stopping for a breath as she waves her hands and tells me about her interaction with Rodney, “He asked me out. I told him that I don’t date clients, and he was an ass about it. From the first threat I got, I thought that maybe it was him…or Scott.”

I grab my bag, close my laptop, and shove it inside. I take Truly’s hand and drag her down the hall to the living room.

After depositing the bag on the sofa, I turn to her. “Truly, I have to do something, and I need you to stay put. As a matter of fact, I want you to call Lissa and tell her to get over here now. I’m going to track down Rion and have him stay with you girls.”

I run back to my office and retrieve my phone. I dial Rion. When he doesn’t answer, I tap out a text as I race back down the hall.

Me: Rion, can you come to the house ASAP?

Truly’s sitting at the table, talking on the phone, when I enter the living room.

She ends the call and looks across the room to me. “They’ll be right over.”

“They?” I ask.

“Lissa and Rion,” Truly says with a matter-of-fact tone.

I squint my eyes and then turn away from her. I have a few questions concerning those two, but I’ll have to deal with that later.

Right now, I have to come up with a way to get Dara to help me deal with the issue at hand. She’ll likely not want to see me at all after our argument, but unfortunately, she’s the only person who can help me pull this off. If she calls Rodney and asks to meet with him concerning his father’s money that is tied up in Truly’s mother’s estate, he won’t think twice. He has no idea of the connection between Dara, Truly, and me. But Dara hasn’t spoken two words to me in the past week.

I pace the floor, trying to think of a way that I can bypass Dara altogether. I could call Rodney myself.

“Ty, what are you going to do?” Truly is standing just a few feet from me. She’s intently watching me.

“Don’t worry about it. For once in your life, just listen to what I tell you to do, please,” I beg of her.

“Don’t do anything stupid, Tyler. Please. He isn’t worth it.” She closes the gap between us and wraps her arms around my neck. “We’ve waited our whole lives to be together, and now that we finally are, I don’t want anything to get in the way. I love you. I want to spend every day from here on out with you.”