A Billionaire's Redemption

She smiled up at him weakly. He told a hotel employee to bring the senator a glass of orange juice, and she remembered at the last second not to look over her shoulder for her father.

One of the governor’s aides hustled up to her. “The governor wanted me to let you know your Secret Service detail will arrive tomorrow. Would you like us to provide you with police protection in the meantime?”

“Heavens, no,” she exclaimed. She just wanted her life to remain as close to normal as possible.

The fellow scurried off as a hotel employee arrived with a pitcher of orange juice and poured her a glass of it.

While Gabe watched on, she drank up the refreshing liquid obediently.

“Now what?” he asked.

Now what, indeed.

Chapter 5

Gabe climbed out of his SUV in front of his folks’ old place in Vengeance. The neighborhood had changed a lot since he’d been a kid. Back then it had been shabby, bordering on squalid. But sometime in the past decade, the crowd at Darby College had declared this area funky and cool, and had moved in to gentrify the place. Refurbished bungalows with neat paint jobs and new lawns now lined the street.

As for him, he kind of missed the old days. Coming back here used to remind him of where he’d come from. Who he was. Now it felt foreign and fake.

He supposed he should have expected the news crew parked on his front porch, camera and microphone at the ready. He’d been too distracted to spot the white van before. “Paula Craddock, isn’t it?” he asked. “What do you want?”

“I hear you’re an old family friend of the Merrises. What do you think of Willa’s accusations against James Ward?”

“I think whoever told you I’m a friend of the Merrises was smoking crack,” he snapped.

“You were all over Willa Merris today at the press conference. A regular knight in shining armor for her. It looked to me like the two of you are more than friends.” She added slyly, “A lot more.”

“Climb up out of the gutter onto the curb, Paula. The girl just lost her father, and she’s dealing with a ton of crap right now.”

“Right. The alleged rape. She didn’t look very raped to me.”

An image of Willa cringing away from his touch, her eyes big with fear, flashed through his head. “And what exactly does a raped woman look like?” he snarled.

“Some actual evidence might be nice. Even a few cuts and scrapes would lend a little credibility to her story. Assuming she fought back, of course. For all I know, she liked it rough, and is just suffering a case of buyer’s remorse.”

An urge to bury his fist in the obnoxious woman’s face surged through him. Not that punching a reporter would be anything other than a disaster. Instead, he asked smoothly, “Are you sure you’re actually human, Ms. Craddock? You have all the compassion of a rock.”

The cameraman nearly dropped his camera as he tried unsuccessfully to stifle his laughter. The reporter scowled. Not only was she not getting the sound bite she was looking for, but she seemed to realize she was losing control of this interview.

She pointed the microphone at him again. “Yes, but what do you think of the charges against James Ward? Are you with everyone else in believing that Willa Merris made up this alleged rape in a desperate, and frankly pitiful, attempt to use her father’s notoriety to get attention for herself?”

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