His for Now (His #2) Read Online Free PDF Page B

arrangements for you to stay someplace safe until the threat passes.”
    “What?”
    “My father is a self-serving bastard,” he told me.  “I haven’t made any secret of that fact.  But what you don’t know is he’s dragged me into his mess.  I thought the situation was finally under control.  I thought I could finally live my life.  But I was wrong.  Now that you’ve been associated with me, your life could be in danger.”
    “That doesn’t even make sense,” I retorted, raising an eyebrow.  “What’s this mess of your father’s you’re talking about?” 
    He ducked his head.  “I can’t tell you.  The less you know the better.”
    “Oh please,” I muttered, turning around to head back to my house.  “Stop wasting my time.”
    “Daniella, wait!” he said, reaching for me.  He missed, instead pulling my shawl off.  I let it fall to the pavement, not bothering to stop to retrieve it.  “I understand you’re mad at me but you can’t just walk away.”
    “I can and I am,” I informed him.  “If you come after me, I’ll scream.  And then I’ll kick you in the nuts.  Go away, Hayden.  I don’t want to see you or hear from you and I’m not interested in you stringing me along with ridiculous stories about being in danger.   You’ve wasted enough of my time already.”
    With that, I marched back into my house, slamming the door behind me.  Hayden didn’t follow.
    It had been quite the night for giving idiot men a piece of my mind.  When I’d told Mark off, it had felt kind of good.  But when I’d told Hayden off, it had felt like a piece of me was being ripped out.  As I locked the door and pulled the blinds, I noticed my hands were shaking. 
    I hated that Hayden Slate had such a profound effect on me.
     

Chapter 04
    Life went on. 
    After that unnerving encounter with Hayden, I tried to push all thoughts of him out of my mind , though I couldn’t help but look over my shoulder more often.  Sometimes I felt like I was being followed, but that was probably my imagination.  I hadn’t thought it possible, but I was even angrier with him now.  How dare he reinsert himself into my life and try to scare me?
    Trying to make sense of Hayden’s crazy talk would only be an exercise in futility and I had a career to protect.  I couldn’t control what Hayden said or did, but I still had a horse in the race as far as my spiteful ex was concerned.  So I threw myself into my work and my budding plan to discredit Mark any way I could. 
    Maybe it would have been easiest to fight fire with fire.  Mark had lied to the department about me , unfairly portraying me as incompetent.  I supposed I could make up a lie or two about him…even if I was passed over for the promotion, I could at least see to it that he wouldn’t get it, either.  On some level, that would be satisfying.
    But I wasn’t going to lie.  That didn’t feel right and I didn’t want to sink down to Mark’s level.   I hadn’t worked my butt off all through college and made countless sacrifices for my career just so I could throw it all away.  Professional integrity was important to me and the only way I wanted to discredit Mark was with the truth.
    I’d already compromised my ethics a bit.  I’d snuck into Mark’s office to retrieve his emails.  I felt slightly guilty about it, but I was nonetheless glad I’d done it.  It had served me well.  In the days and weeks afterward, I’d poured over his recent correspondence with a fine tooth comb, hoping I’d find something incriminating in there.  And I did.
    There were numerous messages in there to and from Clancy Thomas, the head of the Sociology department.  Most of them were innocuous enough, arranging times and dates for weekend poker games or nights out.  But one of them caught my attention and made me wonder what the two of them could possibly be hiding.  It read:
    Mark,
    I told him we don’t have the money.  I’ve made arrangements to