The Devil You Know (The Devils #3)(32)

For a single moment I can remember the girl I was back then. I wasn’t the child jumping in puddles that my mother discusses, but I wasn’t nearly so removed from her as I am now.

“Could we try something?” Ben asks, pulling me from my memories. “Could we just talk? Not about work.”

I turn my head toward him. It seems like a bad idea—boundaries are clearly not my strong suit when it comes to Ben, and maintaining a strictly professional relationship is easiest when our interaction remains work-related. “I’m not sure what else we’d talk about.”

“You could tell me what the deal is with your parents,” he suggests. “Why’d you get so upset that night I brought it up?”

I laugh. “Wow, Ben, you’re so good at small talk. Why don’t we talk about the worst thing you’ve ever been through instead?”

He runs a finger inside his collar. “My father’s death. What would you like to know?”

My head whips toward him. Slowly, my body follows, twisting his way. “I thought you made that up to make me feel bad.”

“You thought I’d lie about something like that?” he asks. “Especially when the odds of you experiencing guilt about anything seem shockingly low? Yes, he’s really dead. He was in a car accident when I was ten.”

I wince. “I’m sorry.” Perhaps I’m capable of guilt after all, because I’m feeling something like it right now. “I spend a lot of time wishing my dad would die, so I guess I was a little insensitive.”

He barks a startled laugh. “Are you serious?”

I wave my hand. “We’re talking about you right now. Ten is really young.”

His lips press together. “It was just a bad situation all around. My youngest brother, Colin, was only a week old at the time. It was…hard. For all of us.”

I picture a woman like my mom, overwhelmed with a newborn, suddenly a widow, presumably still in love with her husband. It would be agonizing, but at least children would give you a reason to keep plowing forward, and that’s what you need in life when the worst things happen: a reason to keep going.

My father and I were all my mother had, and he tried to remove us both from her life. I think that’s what upset me most: the way you can, in theory, love someone and then just stop, without warning. I wonder if it bothers Ben that it can happen by accident too.

“She was lucky she had you and your brother, at least,” I suggest. “To give her a purpose.”

A muscle flickers, just beneath his cheekbone, as if he disagrees. For a moment, he seems very far away. “What happened with your parents?” he asks.

My trauma now seems small compared to his, barely worth discussing and certainly not worth hiding.

“My father left my mom when I was fifteen,” I tell him. “He completely pulled the rug out from under her.”

Ben’s head turns. “Was he a lawyer?”

I give a small, bitter laugh. “Yes, so he knew exactly what to do and who to call. He hid assets, took the house, even repossessed her car. She found herself without a penny, with every credit card cut off. She was absolutely screwed.”

His tongue taps his upper lip, as if he’s learned something about me that he hasn’t.

“Don’t get that look on your face like you suddenly have some deep insight into my psyche,” I warn with an irritated click of my tongue. “It’s all very much on the surface. My father treated my mother terribly in their divorce, like tons of men before and after him, and I want to even the playing field. You all call me The Castrator. You know what I bet they call Paul Sheffield for doing the same fucking thing? A really good attorney.”

He's quiet for a moment and finally nods. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

I blink in surprise. Males, especially male lawyers, love to tell you you’re wrong about these things, then pontificate for hours on how you’re wrong.

“I honestly have no idea what to say when you agree with me,” I tell him, hiding a smile. “You just made it awkward.”

He laughs. “How rude of me. I’ll try to do better.”

The car slows and I realize, to my surprise, that we’ve arrived at the Getty Center. Even more surprisingly, I sort of wish we hadn’t.

Ben climbs out first and extends a hand to me. I accept, reluctantly, and try not to think about how much I like the feel of it—his large, firm hand swallowing mine. Staying close to my side, he moves me toward the red carpet, where a photographer stops and insists we pose. I’m on the cusp of saying, “we’re not together” when Ben’s arm eases around my back, as if we’re a couple. It’s bizarre, how natural it feels. There’s no weird “where should I put my hand?” moment, no question of whether we’re too close or too far apart—we just fit. But I’m not going to think about that right now. Boundaries, Gemma.

“Do I need to remind you not to hook up with a client’s wife in the bathroom at regular intervals?” I ask with a grin while the photographer gets in place. “Or do you just, like, set an alarm on your phone to remind yourself?”

There’s a flash. The photographer has just caught me smiling up at Ben like he’s Prince Charming. Super. “I wasn’t hooking up with her,” Ben says, steering me toward the entrance. “That client’s wife? He was taking money from their kids’ college funds to go to Vegas, and she wanted me to tell her how she could stop him.”