Trust he didn’t deserve filled the woman’s stunning gaze, and with a dip of her chin, she filled her lungs and looked across the table at Rose. She hesitated, and when he noticed the slight tremble in Scarlett’s hands, he reached over and linked his fingers with hers.
A silent gesture to let her know he was here, and everything was going to be okay.
Scarlett exhaled slowly. “This is harder than I thought it would be.”
“What is?” Rose’s gaze bounced between his and Scarlett’s. “Olly, what’s going on?”
But rather than answer his friend’s question, he remained quiet and let Scarlett take the lead. After all, this part of the story was hers to tell. Not his.
“Rose, I’m not just Olly’s friend.”
One corner of Rose’s mouth curved into a smirk. “Yeah, I kinda figured that one out already.”
Olly felt his own lips twitching, and damn if he wasn’t happy as hell to see the old Rose was still in there.
They didn’t break her.
With a soft chuckle, Scarlett bit her bottom lip and nodded. “Right. Yes, we’re more than friends, but I wasn’t talking about mine and Olly’s relationship. I was talking about ours.”
“Ours?” Rose frowned. “No offense, but you and I just met like an hour ago, so…”
“Go on, sweetheart.” Olly tightened his supportive grip. “Tell her.”
“Tell me what?”
Scarlett squeezed him back, her gaze remaining fixed with his a smidge longer before she looked back at the woman and said, “Rose, I’m not just Olly’s friend or lover.” A quick, nervous lick of her lips. “I’m also your sister.”
14
Scarlett stoodin the middle of an FBI conference room, her breath frozen in her lungs as she and the others waited for Special Agent Noah Killion to speak.
After revealing her true connection to Rose, she’d explained everything to the stunned woman. The DNA test she’d sent off. How her father had been just as much in the dark about Rose’s existence as she’d been. That she’d hired the best P.I. she could find to help find her.
Olly had jumped in then to finish the part about how he and Scarlett had come to meet.
They didn’t go into specifics. Scarlett decided it best to save the whole locked-out-of-her-room-in-a-towel story for another day. But the rest of the story had been told. And now, Scarlett was left to wonder where she and Rose went from here.
In the meantime, their focus was exactly where it should be. On the case against Victor Manning and Paul “Pauly” Ethridge.
“Jesus.” Agent Wade Crenshaw—Agent Killion’s partner—shook his head in disgust. “The bastard just shot the poor girl in the back as if he were putting down a fucking feral dog.”
Along with Scarlett—and everyone else who’d gathered in one of the Denver FBI’s private conference rooms—the handsome agent stared up at the paused image filling the mounted screen before them.
The still frame showed a scene that looked like something out of a movie. An awful, terrifying movie where an innocent young woman was killed simply for trying to escape what had to be hell.
She looked over to Rose, who was sidled up next to Olly. He had an arm around her shoulders and was holding her close.
How does he not see it?
Scarlett saw it. She sawhim.
Aside from her father, he was the most incredible, caring, and giving man she’d ever known. And somewhere along the way, she’d fallen hopelessly and completely in love with him.
She blinked against the moisture suddenly stinging the corners of her eyes. How was it possible to have a heart so filled yet aching, all at the same time? On the one hand, she’d found her sister.
Rose was back home. She was finally safe. And with some time and the love and support from Olly—and Scarlett, if the other woman allowed it—Rose would eventually be okay.
Hopefully better than okay. Hopefully happy.