“So does it feel weird meeting me on campus now?” Eliza asked, as she and Nash strolled side-by-side. She had a two-hour gap between classes that they usually used as a chance to grab lunch together. Once she’d learned he wasn’t an actual student, Eliza assumed Nash would prefer not to come to campus anymore.
“No,” he told her, their hands clasped as they strolled lazily in the sea of students rushing between classes. “Is it strange that I’m here for you? I thought it’d be easier this way to meet.”
“It is.” She nodded, then tucked her thick blonde waves over her shoulder. As the end of February approached, the weather had taken a turn for the warm, and she was able to get away with just a spring jacket over her sweater and jeans combo. The dry weeks had also negated the need for her boots, and she was able to stroll around in a cute pair of ballet flats instead. When they’d met up only ten minutes earlier, her usually stern Dom had let slip how cute he thought she looked. The compliment had made things easier between them, but it hadn’t erased all that had happened.
Eliza was still in the midst of processing how she felt about all of Nash’s lies. One night, while they chatted on the phone, he’d admitted that he would understand if she wanted to run, if her interest in him had waned so much that there was no point in continuing what they had. Of course, her interest hadn’t waned—not in the slightest. In fact, Nash was suddenly infinitely more interesting to her, with more layers to him than she’d ever imagined before. Still, he’d lied, hid things from her, and she wasn’t just going to let it slide. If her relationship with Nash had taught her anything, it was not to be a pushover anymore—for anyone. While she was a submissive in the bedroom, Eliza was steadily finding her voice outside of it.
And she liked the way it sounded.
“Have you…” She gulped and pulled her hand away, slipping it in her pocket instead. “Have you told anyone about my father yet?”
While she’d spent a long time thinking about everything Nash had told her that night, they’d done remarkably little talking about it since. No one had come and kidnapped her father in the dead of night, but that hadn’t stopped her from worrying about him.
Nash looked away, his gaze roaming the open fields that rolled gently down to the front gates and walls, and Eliza noticed the way he clenched his jaw. Unable to stop herself, she murmured his name and placed a gentle hand on his arm, surprise gripping her when he pulled away.
“They know I suspect him,” he said tightly with a slight shake of his head, “but I’m holding them off… for now.”
She let loose a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”
“But I don’t know how much longer I can do it,” Nash admitted after a lengthy pause, and once more the cold hand of fear gripped her. Heart hammering in her chest, she looked to him, brow furrowed.
“Why?”
“Because…” Taking her hand, he tugged her away from the rest of the meandering students, pulling her out toward the open space. Their shoes clomped across the dry, hard grass, the campus greenery yearning for just a few more weeks of snowy moisture. Finally, when they were totally alone—as alone as one could be on such a huge, cluttered campus—Nash turned her to face him, his expression almost unreadable.
“What is it?” she asked in a very small voice, too small for the person she was growing into. Eliza squared her shoulders, taking in a deep breath and letting it out slowly before adding, “I can handle it. Whatever you have to say, just say it.”
“Three of our guys were found dead last night,” he told her, and she covered her mouth with her hand to hide the gasp. “They were making a scheduled drug run to an old client, one we’ve trusted and worked with for years, and they were ambushed. Executed with a bullet to the head.”
“Oh my god.” Her stomach rolled at the mental image he painted, and she looked away, eyes suddenly teary. “Oh my god.”
“So you can understand why I’m struggling not to just go where the evidence has been pointing me,” Nash continued, gripping both of her arms tightly and forcing her to look back at him. “Eliza… All roads lead to your dad—”
“No—”
“And I want to protect you from him.”
She licked her lips, unable to believe him. In that moment, she just couldn’t. She knew her father. Nash had to trust her—the evidence was leading him in the wrong direction. Right then and there, she didn’t care about drug deals and bikers and whatever other sordid details Nash’s life might entail. All that mattered was that he was pushing a wedge between her and her father, the man who’d raised her without a mother since she was a child, and Eliza couldn’t stand for it.
She owed her father, no matter how much of a hard ass he was with her, more than that.
“You don’t need to protect me from him,” Eliza insisted, words coming out in a shaky but confident tone, “because he wouldn’t do this.”
Nash exhaled deeply, reaching out for her again, but she pulled away and he murmured her name imploringly.
“No,” she said with a shake of her head, slowly backing away. “No. This isn’t him, and I’ll find a way to prove it to you.”
She turned and fled before she could lose her nerve, feet pounding across the familiar lawns of Blackwoods University. Behind her, Nash called out to her, but she refused to look. She couldn’t go back—not until she had something concrete to give him.
Something to prove her father wasn’t the man Nash thought he was.
Something to prove to herself that the two most important men in her life were worth all the trouble.