The Right Swipe

by Alisha Rai

  Lakshmi’s grin was wide. “With pleasure. Chelsea’s gonna be so excited.”

  “Any lawyer of mine should be. She ought to know that there might be some compromising photos of me in Peter’s hands. He didn’t use them, because he knew I had all this, but he might go nuclear now.”

  “Girl, my nudes could wallpaper my house. We’ll take care of you.”

  Rhiannon’s shoulders relaxed. “Thank you.”

  Lakshmi brought the phone closer to her face. “You know we all believe in you, right? My living room is full of heart eyes right now.”

  Rhiannon licked her lips and tasted salt. “I see that. Thank you. Can you let Katrina know I’m okay?”

  “Of course. She was actually watching virtually in the living room through my computer, though, so she saw you. Are you sure you want to go to your brother’s right now? You could come home.”

  She yearned to go back to California. But no. She couldn’t flake on Gabe’s engagement party, not when her family had undoubtedly seen this piece. “How many times has my mom called you?”

  “Not important.”

  “Yeah, I have to go to my brother’s.” Funny how she couldn’t bring herself to call the town she’d grown up in home. Her family, though, that was a home. “Only for the party. Get me out of there by late tomorrow evening.”

  “Hang on.” The screen went blank, Lakshmi was silent for a moment, and then she was back and spit out some gate info. “Go there. Private jet. I’ll charter another one to be waiting for you tomorrow. You want me to intercept your calls and texts for now?”

  “Yes. Actually . . .” she hesitated. She’d never said the following words before, in her life. “I’m going to turn my phone off for the next twenty-four hours. If there are any emergencies . . .”

  “There won’t be. We can handle it. I’ll call Sonya and tell her when to pick you up from the airport. Turn your phone off and keep it off.”

  “I will. Hey. Was that Tina I saw in your living room?”

  Lakshmi gave a sheepish shrug. “What can I say? Don’t worry, we’re only friends for now.”

  Rhiannon smiled, even as a wave of sadness went through her. Samson. God. She’d avoided thinking about him since she’d left Annabelle’s house. Had he seen the show? Had he texted or called her?

  Would he, after she’d accused him of something he hadn’t done? I guess Swype was looking to buy another company, and the owner of that company called me.

  It was highly probable Annabelle hadn’t found out about Peter from Samson, but from her own due diligence. Meanwhile, she’d flipped out on Samson.

  “Rhiannon? You have to get to your gate.”

  “Right. Goodbye.” She hung up and looked down at her phone. It only stayed silent for a second before it buzzed with another text.

  She almost braved her in-box, to see what, if anything, Samson had sent, but she simply couldn’t do it. She pressed the button on the side and powered it off.

  She tugged her sleeves down and grabbed her bags. Since she still felt exposed, she pulled up the hood of her sweatshirt and kept her gaze down as she made her way through the airport.

  Her phone, a useless piece of glass and metal now, was blessedly, finally, silent.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  HER LITTLE brother had always been a soft soul, but from the second he’d picked her up from the airport Gabe was extra gentle with her. Rhiannon knew he must have seen the show, or at least the clip of her interview, but he danced around discussing it, instead chatting inanely about the engagement party.

  She’d rather talk about the show. She’d rather talk about literally anything else.

  “Anyway then the cloths were more an off-white than an eggshell, so I said—”

  “If you explain the difference between various shades of not-white to me now, I will tuck and roll out of this moving car,” she said, without opening her eyes.

  He clicked his tongue. “Fair enough, fair enough.”

  She rolled her head to look at him. He was her adopted brother, so they didn’t look alike—Gabe was white passing, big and strong and bearded, like a lumberjack. He was also tattooed all over, a side effect of his profession as a tattoo artist.

  He was marrying an heiress, so he had cleaned up a bit for the engagement party tomorrow. His beard was neatly trimmed, his hair a little shorter than shoulder length. But he was still her little brother. “You saw the show.”

  Gabe kept his gaze determinedly on the road. “Let’s wait to get home to discuss it.”

  They rode the rest of the way in silence, though Rhiannon looked around in surprise when he pulled up in front of a tidy little house. “We’re not staying at the Chandlers’?” Gabe’s fiancée, Eve, lived in her family mansion, and Gabe had moved in there a while ago, leaving his own home vacant.

  “No. I thought it would be more comfortable for us to stay here.”

  And they’d have privacy. Always thinking of people’s feelings and whatnot, her brother. She got out of the car and followed him to the door.

  They’d barely cleared the threshold of the living room before Rhiannon was swallowed up in a giant hug. She wrapped her arms around her mother and hugged her back, burying her face in her neck and inhaling the scent of apples.

  She started to cry when her brother also put his arms around them. She was embraced from every side, and the sensation was so beautiful, she couldn’t contain herself. They weren’t delicate, tiny tears, because nothing about her was delicate or tiny, but deep and racking sobs.

  Her mother let her carry on for a few minutes before pulling back and wiping at Rhiannon’s cheeks. She was also weeping, Rhiannon noted, through her own haze of tears. “There, there,” Sonya whispered. “You’re with family now. No one’s going to hurt you or point a camera at you here.”

  This was true. No one would come here to Rockville to shove a mic in her face. “I’m thirsty.”

  Gabe ushered her to the couch. “I’ll make some tea. Sit down.”

  Sonya perched on the coffee table in front of Rhiannon and seized her hands, chafing them between her own. Rhiannon wasn’t cold, but it felt so good to be touched and held in any way, she didn’t complain. “I’m glad he’s calmed down,” Sonya whispered. She tipped her head at the wall.

  Rhiannon raised her eyebrows at the fist-sized hole in the drywall. “Gabe did that?”

  “He got so angry when we watched the interview. I’ve never seen him like that. Don’t say anything.”

  Sweet, peaceful Gabe?

  Rhiannon took in her brother’s scratched-up knuckles when he came back to the living room. Yeah. He’d punched the wall. For her?

  Gabe handed a glass of whiskey to their mother and gave her a mug. Rhiannon dunked the tea bag into the mug and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”

  “What are you sorry for?” Sonya demanded. “I knew that Peter was bad news. From the moment I met him, I knew he wasn’t any good. Something weaselly in his face.”

  Rhiannon had thought Sonya loved Peter. He was wealthy and traditional and had also criticized Rhiannon’s taste in clothes. “I’m sorry for the inevitable blowback this is going to cause for you guys.”

  Gabe rested his mug on his knee. “If there’s any blowback, it’s going to be on you, Rhi. We’re way more worried about you.”

  “Why didn’t you go public with this when it happened?” Sonya demanded.

  She’d known her mom would want to know that. “For the same reason I said on the show. Because I didn’t see any positive upside to it. Sure, some people may have believed me, but most would have taken his word over mine. I thought I could give it less fuel if I stayed quiet.”

  “No. You should have defended yourself right then.”

  The last thing she wanted or could deal with was for her mother to lecture her on her past choices. She scrubbed her face.

  Gabe slung his arm over her shoulders. “She did what she thought was best.”

  “I focused on beating him instea
d.” Rhiannon’s smile was wobbly. “It’s like you used to say, Mom, success is the best revenge.”

  Sonya’s brow furrowed. “When did I say that?”

  “In school. Don’t you remember? When kids were mean to me.”

  “In school? That was ages ago.”

  “I remember it like it was yesterday.” That horrible period of being too much.

  Sonya squinted. “Oh. I vaguely recall.”

  “Uh, I’ve basically used that one piece of advice to cope for the last few years. It was the only thing that kept me going sometimes.” And her mother only vaguely remembered it?

  “Well, if it’s helped, that’s great, but I wouldn’t advise you to use every snippet I said to you as a child in your adult life. Half the time, I was throwing stuff at the wall in the hopes it would keep you balanced and well-grounded in that school full of toxic assholes.”

  “What?”

  “I hate to admit this, but I don’t know everything.” Sonya drained her glass of whiskey in one shot and made a face. “Do you have any idea what it’s like, to be the mother of a prodigy? To know your child is brilliant and destined for greatness but will still have to work four times as hard as people with a fraction of her intelligence? I was furious when your classmates were rough on you, but I figured my job was to keep you calm and focused and not let you lose this opportunity. I couldn’t let you be angry, or at the very least, I couldn’t let you show that anger. Because then you would be that angry Black girl, and everyone would dismiss your intelligence or worse, suppress everything that makes you you. So I—” She stopped, and inhaled sharply. “I guess I suppressed you. My God. I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.”

  Guilt and love coursed through her when her mother started weeping, and she rose from her seat to put her arm around Sonya. “No, Mom. It’s not—”

  “Mom.”

  The steel in Gabe’s voice had them both looking up. “This isn’t about you. Don’t make Rhi comfort you tonight. We need to be here for her.”

  Sonya sniffed and surprised Rhiannon by nodding. “You are absolutely right.” She cupped Rhiannon’s face. “My dear, let me make it clear. Success is the best revenge? No. Sometimes, revenge is the best revenge.”

  Gabe took a sip of his tea. “What you did wasn’t revenge, though, Rhi. It was justice. Justice is the best justice.”

  “Exactly that,” Sonya said. “Even if it took four years, I’m glad you finally came forward.”

  Rhi stirred. Physical and emotional exhaustion had taken root, and she didn’t want to think about Peter anymore. Especially when that thinking included the very real possibility that everything she’d done tonight was for naught and Peter would emerge from this unblemished. “Can we stop talking about this for a while? I’m beat.”

  “Of course.” Sonya made a face. “Did Gabe tell you about our napkin crisis today?”

  RHIANNON SLEPT WELL in Gabe’s guest room, her mom snuggled in the bed with her, quietly snoring. When she awoke in the morning and puttered into the kitchen, she was welcomed by a scene from her past: Sonya making smiley face pancakes while Gabe cut fruit.

  Rhiannon found solace in their familiar banter and the rhythm of her small family, especially when she realized they were going out of their way not to talk about Peter. As kind as they were, the walls of the small home pressed down on her. She excused herself after breakfast, and went outside to enjoy the weak spring sun and the rustle of trees.

  Gabe wandered out a few minutes later and got to work chopping wood. His house wasn’t too isolated, but there was some land behind it. This was a normal pastime for him.

  Rhiannon glanced up at a particularly loud crack and eyed her brother’s form. She’d grown up chopping wood too. He was using more force than necessary. She marked her place in the art history book she’d snagged off Gabe’s bookshelf. “Did you put a hole in your living room wall, yesterday? Watching the show?”

  Gabe paused and swiped his arm over his forehead. If he was discomfited by the abrupt question interrupting their companionable silence, he didn’t show it. “I did.”

  “Why?”

  “’Cause I was mad.” With a grunt, Gabe set up another log and brought the ax down.

  “Why?”

  “What do you mean why?”

  “Why were you so mad?”

  He cast her an incredulous look. “Some dick hurt you, I didn’t even know, you think I won’t be mad?”

  “You’re not a violent person.”

  He raised an eyebrow. He was a big guy, her brother, yet those huge fingers could manage the most delicate fine-line tattoos. “Anyone’s violent with the right provocation. I choose not to be violent, that’s different.”

  She fiddled with the edge of her blanket. “Are you mad Peter hurt me, or mad you didn’t know?”

  Gabe put the ax down carefully and walked over to her. “Both.”

  She scooted over, making room for him on her blanket. “That doesn’t make sense.”

  He gathered her hands in his and paused for a moment, like he was organizing his thoughts. “I’m your brother. I’m supposed to protect you.”

  “You’re younger than me.”

  “Right, which mattered when we were both young. In school, I couldn’t stand up for you because I wasn’t big enough. I barely saw you after you went away to college. But this? I find out some guy hurt you so bad, it almost destroyed your career? The career that’s your life? How do you think I’m supposed to feel?”

  “I don’t need anyone to protect me.”

  He frowned. “I love you, Rhi. Of course I’m going to protect you. It’s not failure to accept protection sometimes.”

  She thought of how she’d called Samson to her room to scare Peter away. Could she have done it herself? Maybe. Had it been nice to have a shield? Yes.

  Gabe squeezed her hand. “I know you’ve always considered yourself the provider of our little family. I never thought of the toll it must take on you. My sister, she’s one tough bitch. That’s what I’d tell my friends.”

  “I’m a bit concerned you called me a bitch to your friends.”

  Gabe chuckled. “Only in a good way. You’re an alpha. But alphas need to rest. And they need to recoup. And they need to cry and be vulnerable and take a break from taking care of everyone.”

  Her throat grew tight. “I always thought I couldn’t show any weakness. Like my career depended on me being strong.”

  “You’re strong no matter what. You’re strong for speaking up about Peter, you’d be the same degree of strong if you’d stayed silent.” He tapped her shoulders, and she consciously lowered them. “It’s not a weakness to take care of yourself. Asking for and taking what you need to function should never be considered a weakness.”

  “I don’t think I know how to ask for what I need.”

  “Think of it this way. You delegate a million and one things at work, right? Lakshmi makes your plane reservations. Suzie runs interference on marketing stuff. All of your employees take something off your plate, either because they’re better at it or because it’s stuff you don’t want to do.”

  “Yes.”

  “So delegate in your personal life.”

  “Delegating. That I understand.” She licked her dry lips. “Trust is harder to figure out.”

  “Mmm.” He looked off into the distance, and a soft smile played on his lips. She knew that smile. He was thinking about his fiancée. “Trust is the only reason the world ever functions as it should. Sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t, and I know that uncertainty is scary, but that’s the only way you figure out who your closest people are.”

  They sat in silence and listened to the birds chirping. There were no traffic noises here, no concrete. Out of habit, she patted her pocket. No phone.

  She inhaled and released a deep breath and finally allowed herself the freedom to think about the man she’d been forcing herself to avoid obsessing over since yesterday. Hell, since she’d left him, standing in
a home that belonged to neither of them. “There’s a guy.”

  “Samson Lima.” Gabe smiled at her surprised expression. “I watch the videos. Not a huge football fan, but I know of him. He seemed cool and you were clearly into him.”

  “Clearly?” She’d thought she’d done a good job of maintaining a friendly distance between them on camera.

  “Clearly to anyone who knows you like I do.”

  That was a relief. “He . . . it’s a long story.” She ran through what had happened at Annabelle’s home.

  Gabe wrinkled his nose. “Gave him the old Rhi-Rhi dead-to-me treatment, huh? How do you feel about that decision?”

  “Not good. I mean, I was miserable about it before, but now I’m pretty sure he didn’t actually tell Annabelle about me and Peter. I jumped the gun and assumed the worst. Probably because I was already low-key freaked out about how close we’d gotten.” The first time she’d cut him out, he’d at least done the thing she’d accused him of doing, extenuating circumstances or not.

  Her stomach churned. The way she’d treated him at Annabelle’s hadn’t been fair.

  Gabe shrugged and bent his leg, resting his arm on his knee. “So tell him you’re sorry.”

  “He probably wouldn’t take my call. I’d never take anyone back if they treated me like that.” She twisted her fingers together. Why would he want someone as difficult and downright annoying as her? She’d watched the video Matchmaker had released last week, of Samson with a pretty young woman.

  He hadn’t told her he’d gone on another date, though it must have been filmed before they’d met up at Annabelle’s home, during that week when he’d been wooing her by sending her food. Sweet, kind, loyal. The girl had been a kindergarten teacher, for crying out loud, and their rapport had been excellent, both of them smiling, nice people. She couldn’t compete with that.

  “Even if there were extenuating circumstances for their behavior? I mean, your trust issues didn’t happen in a bubble, Rhi. You have a traumatic history. It’s not like you were being a dick for no reason.”