I tug Trent’s hand away from my chin, and for a brief moment, my hand closes around his, our palms brushing together. He’s still staring at me intently, and the depth of emotion in his eyes makes butterflies flap in my stomach.
“Okay,” I whisper. “Okay.”
He doesn’t let go of my hand or look away, as if he’s trying to see through every layer and barrier I have wrapped around my heart, right down to my very soul. Finally, he kisses my knuckles once and releases my hand.
“Good,” he murmurs.
Keeping his grip on my hand, he leads me over to the couch as the two other men settle in around us. I end up sandwiched between Reese and Trent, with West sitting in a chair nearby.
“Fucking hell.” Reese leans forward, running a hand through his light brown hair. “What a goddamn disaster this is.” He looks up, his gaze moving between the three of us. “I mean, we think this was Leslie, right? All of it?”
“I’d bet my last damn dollar it is,” West growls.
“Yeah.” Reese chuckles darkly. “I’m not sure I’d take that bet, considering if she gets into your bank account, you won’t have any dollars left.”
“We can start making calls first thing in the morning,” Trent says, his tone shifting as he begins to work on solving this problem. “Get banks and credit cards sorted. The bigger question is, how the fuck did she manage to do all that from the rehab facility she was in? Wouldn’t they limit people’s access to internet in that kind of place?”
“They should. Especially if one of their patients is a known hacker.” West leans back in his chair, spreading his legs. He’s pure masculine grace, his shoulders broad and his thighs thick and muscled. I try not to let my gaze shift downward as he crosses his arms over his chest, but I’m not entirely successful.
“Maybe she set everything up before she went into that facility,” I offer. “She could’ve done all that in between getting kicked out of Clearwater and being put into rehab by her parents. And she’d have motivation to move fast if she knew her parents were about to put her in lockup. Maybe this was her last bit of revenge.”
“Yeah.” Reese shrugs. “That makes sense. I sort of hope it’s true, actually. That would mean she can’t pull more shit while we try to unravel the mess she already made.”
“True,” Trent agrees. “But I think we need to prepare for the possibility that she’s still somehow got access to a computer or something. We can’t afford to let our guard down. We did that once before and got fucking burned. I’m not doing it again.”
“Fuck, no.” Reese grimaces. “I’m with you on that. We should probably—”
“Oh, shit.”
West’s voice is quiet, but it cuts through Reese’s words like a knife. When I look up at him, he’s got his phone out and is staring at the screen with a hard look on his face.
“What?” My stomach drops. Jesus, what else did Leslie do? Did she hit us again already? “Did Leslie—”
“No. No, it’s not that.” West jerks his head up, meeting my gaze. “I’ve been doing some digging to try to figure out who told Trent’s dad about your parents
. Who tipped him off to the affair. For so long, Trent was sure it was you, but…” He holds up his phone. “It wasn’t. I knew it.”
The room goes quiet. It’s a thick silence that hangs over us for several long seconds, seeming to suck up all the oxygen in the place.
Finally, I force air past my vocal chords, my voice raspy as I speak. “Who was it?”
“Caitlin Smith. At least, according to this friend of Jack Wyman’s. He put me in touch with some people from high school, and one of them just emailed me back.”
“Caitlin Smith?” Reese grimaces. “The cheerleader who wanted to get on Trent’s dick so bad?”
“Yeah.” West huffs out a breath, dropping his phone onto the chair cushion beside him. “Fuckin’ hell. I should’ve guessed. Maybe she thought if she split the four of us up, if she turned Trent against Ems, she’d finally have a chance with him.”
My stomach dips unpleasantly. I remember Caitlin. She was pretty and curvy and much more popular than me. I barely said two words to her for the entirety of my time at Amundsen—first because I was too absorbed by my friendship with the Icons, and then because I was too busy trying to escape their torture.
But even though we barely ever spoke, she harbored that much hatred for me?
She deliberately sabotaged my relationship with the three boys, all in the hopes of attracting the attention of one of them?
“Well, it worked, I guess.” I laugh softly, although there’s no humor in it. “She got what she wanted.”
“Fuck.”
Trent’s voice is a low rumble. A second later, he’s off the couch. I expect him to stalk away or maybe pace the room in frustrated anger. After all, he finally knows the name of the person who betrayed his mom’s secret and ruined his parents’ marriage.