Another few moments passed, and still Lottie didn’t move to go down the hallway. I held her, and some of the color had returned to her face at least.
“Why did you become West’s mistress?” she asked quietly. “Really?”
“I’m sure you know about the postnup…” As she’d had to sign it. Lottie nodded, and I continued, “Grayson sent that, video evidence, and everything needed to free us—and destroy himself and his family—to West. It was Grayson’s solution.”
“But he would have been so miserable,” Lottie parroted my words back to me.
“So West offered me a solution. I’m trying to get it all back, to delete it.” It felt like a lifetime ago when it all happened.
Her eyes grew. “Are you close?”
I fell to the bench, tears clogging my throat. All I could do was shake my head. Lottie sat beside me.
“He told me he’d give me everything if I chose him over Grayson. I can’t ever do that.” I exhaled, staring at my lap.
“Every day for the past month, I’ve slept in his bed and tried every password combination I could think of while he slept. I didn’t know what else to do—”
“Story.” Lottie gripped my forearm so tight it bruised.
I lifted my head, looking into earnest, warm brown eyes.
“What?”
“I know his password. He’s an idiot. He uses one password for everything, and like everyone else, he doesn’t think I’m paying attention.”
My mouth dried as blood rushed and pounded through my ears.
“It’s songbird,” she said, then shrugged like I don’t know why while inside I struggled to breathe.
Songbird.
I put my head in my hands. I would have never tried that, because the implication was too dark. That somewhere in his cold heart, West du Lac had a heart.
“Does that help?” she asked.
I nodded, because I still couldn’t breathe.
“Good. Every day I look at Grayson, at you, and I think of what I broke. You don’t… You probably won’t understand. You’ve probably never broken something so badly that you just stare at the shards and wonder how.”
I broke something priceless. I don’t expect you to believe me, but…I can’t live with myself if it ends this way.
The night I met Grayson and ruined everything, ruined them, flashed into my head.
“I have,” I said hoarsely.
“I want to fix it, Story. I don’t know how, but I need to fix it.”
It’d been months since I’d had any real moment with Grayson, just Grayson. There was so much I needed to tell him. I needed to know how he was doing—really doing. I needed to see him in person. I needed his sideways face.
I would risk anything.
I looked at her. Her hair was down, her curls soft and springy. I bet the guards couldn’t tell the difference between us.
If she gave me her pajamas…
“I shouldn’t ask it of you,” I said.
“Whatever it is you want me to do, I’ll do it,” she said. “I’ll do anything.”