As a whole, I had led a somewhat charmed life. I was self-realized enough to know that I hadn’t experienced much heartbreak or hardships in my time. I didn’t know true hunger or extreme physical pain or prejudice.
But no one, absolutely no one, could say that I didn’t know fear. True fear. The kind that sank in through the skin, infected every organ, and became a part of your very marrow.
I knew that fear.
I had lived it day in and out for weeks.
The way things were going, there didn’t seem to be an end in sight.
I needed help.
I just couldn’t seem to make myself ask for it, even though I knew it would be right there for me if I did.
It was just that, well, it would be a mess. One of my own making.
I had a lot of respect for these men and women. I didn’t want them looking down on me for the situation I had gotten myself into.
And I really, really, really didn’t want my sister to tell our parents.
Sure, that made me sound a bit like a teenager, but anyone who had ever met our somewhat over-protective family would understand my need for them not to know what was going on.
“Gem?” Lincoln asked, snapping me out of my thoughts.
I guess if it had to be someone, I could count myself lucky that it was Lincoln. The only possible better person would probably be Bellamy. He would be absolutely no help, of course, but he wouldn’t spill the story to everyone else. Mostly because he would immediately move onto a new subject directly after. Something equally important to him. Like salsa dancing or the best truffle oil on the market.
But Quin, Gunner, Smith, Miller, Nia, and Finn would all call meetings, get everyone involved. And Kai, well, he was married to my sister. So there was no way he would keep anything from her.
Lincoln was the most likely to not get too worked up over it.
He was just a laid-back kind of guy. You couldn’t work as a middle man between two feuding individuals as your daily job if you were prone to anxiety or anger or tended to overreact to every little thing.
If I was going to need some help, he would give it. And so long as things didn’t get too crazy, he would keep my secret.
“It’s a bit of a long story.”
“It always is, isn’t it?” he asked, brow raising.
It was right then that I realized how exhausted he looked. It was well after two, likely closer to three. He’d been in the office. He needed some sleep.
“Why don’t we talk about it in the morning? You look exhausted.”
“You want me to pass out, so you can slip out without giving me any answers.”
“That’s not entirely true,” I admitted, reaching up to brush my half-dry bangs out of my eyes.
“But true enough for me to make some coffee and sit through this story,” he countered, already moving close to my side to go for the coffee machine.
All the guys at the office, in general, were a bit of, well, an assault to the senses when you were around them. Tall, strong, great voices, fantastic faces, authoritative and confident auras. They were a lot to take in. Especially when they got close.
It had been a long time since I was sharing personal space with any of them. Kai aside. And I think everyone who had ever met Kai would agree he was a bit of a puppy dog.
Lincoln, yeah, Lincoln was not a puppy.
I remembered when I first started at the office that every week I had a new crush on one of the guys. Of course I did. No one could blame me. Everyone else in my position would feel the same way. Especially since teenage girls, as a whole, were a bit boy crazy and swoony. Or, at least, I was.
At first, it was Quin. Because he was the boss. The intimidating man in a suit who ran the place like a well-oiled machine. Then, after seeing him with his shirt off, I’d had a bit of a fascination with Smith.
Gunner got to me because there was something undeniably sexy about his cocky aloofness, his quick wit, his sarcastic comments.
Ranger was someone I had drooled over whenever he–very rarely–made it into Navesink Bank.
Finn was someone who had grown on me. I hadn’t been able to get a feel for him for a long time. Always standoffish. Always cleaning. Always with that haunted look in his eyes. He’d always been attractive, but there was a deep well of sadness there that could sometimes almost overshadow that. But he won me over one week when Jules had given me a particularly embarrassing lecture about the office being a mess after she’d left me to handle it because she needed to be in a meeting with Quin for a couple of hours. By the time I had pulled myself together in the bathroom, I had come out to the overwhelming scent of industrial cleaner, a spotless office, and Finn with bloodied nails and a sweet smile for me. That had done me in for a long while.