“No, there was nothing.”
“So?”
“Do you think knowing I had no options makes me feel better? That I haven’t gone over those two seconds in my mind a million times, looking for a different outcome? There wasn’t one, but it didn’t matter. Not when his parents turned their PR machine on to the task of discrediting me. I guess they didn’t want anyone to know it was the mom’s fault.”
“She did not hit him with her car.”
Randi felt those words like a blow and had to look away from him. “No, she didn’t, but no child of four should have been on that street unaccompanied.” She looked back, her face tight with anger she would no longer hide, not out of misplaced compassion for the Madisons, people who had shown they had absolutely none for her. “The doctors said that if I’d been going the speed limit, he would be dead. His tiny body was no competition for even my eco-friendly subcompact.”
“He would not have been, no.” There was definitely a dark overtone in both Baz’s words and manner.
“The papers, news reports, people all over social media, they all took your attitude.”
“My attitude?” he asked.
“They believed it was all my fault. I must have been driving recklessly or not paying attention. The Madisons made sure that was the message being fed to every outlet. Mrs. Madison played the victim very well.”
“She was a victim, surely. Her child was in the hospital.”
She was going to be sick. She should have been prepared for this, but she wasn’t. “And that is why despite the police ruling it an unavoidable accident, despite screen shots and traffic cams that proved she was negligent, I said nothing. I knew she must be going through hell and I wasn’t taking her through more. Not even with the truth.”
“If she was negligent, she would have been charged.”
Unbelievable. Okay, they’d only slept together one night, but didn’t she deserve even a tiny bit more consideration than a complete stranger? “By that same argument, then I must have been innocent, right? After all, if I was the monster the Madisons painted me, wouldn’t they have taken me to civil court, even if the DA declined to prosecute?”
“That is a point, yes.”
Could he have been any more skeptical in his tone?
Randi was definitely regretting telling this piece of painful history to the man with the stony expression. “You still think it was my fault.”
“I did not say that.” But his attitude and the expression in his espresso eyes did.
“Would you please take me back to my apartment?”
“Does it matter so much what I think?”
“I’ve had my fill of being judged a monster when there was more than enough blame to go around.” She knew better than to open herself for more of the same.
She’d been a fool to think it was safe sharing one of her most painful secrets with a temporary sexual partner, regardless of his help in finding a home for the Kayla’s for Kids shelter.
“Are you going to do something about it?” he asked.
“As a matter of fact, I am. I have plans to set the record straight with the media.”
“People have already made up their minds, according to you. What difference will a press release make?”
“An interview, on national television, not a press release.” Which was overwhelming and scary to think about, not that she would offer that proof of more vulnerability to him. “I’ll get to tell my side, the truth.”
That was what was important. She had to remember that.
“Why would you put the family through that?”
Seriously? The family angle again? She supposed to a man so steeped in obligation toward family it made sense, but what about her? What about what her family had been through when she’d been vilified for behavior she’d never engaged in: reckless driving, inattention, not caring?
“You don’t think it’s fair?” she demanded skeptically. “After the media crucified me because of the story the Madisons fed them, I lost my almost fiancé, my scholarship and my position at the university. To achieve any measure of peace and anonymity in my life, I had to give up my last name and move away from my father and grandparents. Now the Madisons are trying to do it all over again. I’m not giving up another thing for their sensibilities.”
“What do you mean they’re trying to do it again? What are they doing?” he asked like the answer really mattered.
She wasn’t buying that bridge. Not again. But she didn’t mind telling him. It wasn’t a state secret. “Their best to keep the truth under wraps, to make me their scapegoat again.”
“Trying to find peace after such a tragedy is hardly making you the scapegoat,” he scoffed.
Was this really the man she’d shared her body with the night before? The same man who had worked so hard to find the best property for her without anything in it for him? “What would you call threatening to destroy my new life?”
“The attempt to protect his family by a desperate man.”
“Oh, my gosh, you don’t even know these people, but you’re their champion?”
He frowned, looking almost guilty. “It is clearly an untenable situation for everyone.”
“I guess I should be grateful you include me in that everyone.”
“It was a terrible time in your life. That accident cost you a great deal. I would have to be blind not to see that.”
“You think?”
His lips twisted with frustration. “Yes, I do. However, I do not think bringing it all back up in front of the national media, no less, is going to make your life better. It will certainly hurt a family that has already been through hell, especially their children. The young can be so cruel.”
She had firsthand experience with just how cruel adults could be. “And the hell I’ve been through?”
“Won’t disappear by opening yourself up to further comment and potential vilification.”
“You don’t think it matters if the truth comes out?”
“I don’t think it will help you, or them.” He reached across the console, cupping her cheek. “Don’t stir it all up again.”
She jerked her face away from touch that should not be comforting. “I’m not the one doing that.”
“Then who?”
“First it was a small article written for one of the online news media, nothing that really got a lot of attention, but then somehow Mr. Madison became aware of it, and before I knew what was happening, I was being trolled on the only social page I keep. Other articles started popping up, all with a heavy slant to what my supposed carelessness had cost the Madison family. It was five years ago all over again, only this time Mr. Madison came to me personally. He threatened me, threatened to get me fired.”
“He didn’t realize you work for your sister?” Baz sounded disgusted by such incompetence.
It would have been funny in another situation.
“No. We’ve never shared the same last name. Only the people closest to us even know we’re sisters.”
“And you threatened him back,” Baz guessed, proving he had no inkling of who Randi really was.
“No. Not at all. I told him to leave, but he wouldn’t. He had some goon with him, a big man who wouldn’t let me leave, either.”
“This goon, did he restrain you?” Now Baz sounded furious.
She couldn’t imagine why.
“He and Mr. Madison. I screamed. Carl Madison slapped me. I was terrified. He said he was going to make people believe I had abused the children I worked with. He said what was left of my life wasn’t going to be worth living when he was done with me.”
“That is not...” His voice trailed off, the expression on Baz’s face murderous. “Did you file charges for assault?”
“Not at first. I was so used to feeling guilty, to believing the Madison family needed pro
tecting after what had happened to Jamie, that’s the name of the boy, I just broke down. The goon threw me on the floor, and after a few more vicious threats that made me wonder if my life was seriously in danger, they left.”
“And then?”
“And then I went home.”
“But somehow you got from there to here.”
“That was Kayla. I was still shaken up the next day when we had a meeting about Kayla’s for Kids. She pried the whole story out of me, and for the first and only time, someone learned about the horrible day without judging me a monster.”
“I do not think you are a monster.”
She wasn’t touching that denial. Randi knew what she’d seen in his eyes. “She and Andreas convinced me to press charges. Not that it did much good. Mr. Madison has a whole bevy of expensive lawyers on his side. He got a plea deal that allowed for a misdemeanor, settled with a fine. Andreas was adamant I take out a restraining order after that.”