She got up to retrieve the printed version of the “interview,” handing it to Paddy.

He read it over, his affable nature burning away into anger.

She felt horrible for ruining their night with her drama.

“I’m sorry.”

“What the f**k are you sorry about?” He nearly snarled it, and she started. “He’s the one who should be sorry, Natalie. He will be sorry by the time I’m finished with him. Don’t you dare apologize for him and his crap.”

Paddy pushed to his feet and began to pace. “He can’t continue to be allowed to manipulate and hurt you this way.” He shook the paper. “This mentions your mother. Again, he uses it to hurt you. And why didn’t you tell me about this yesterday? And you said Ezra told you Jeremy wouldn’t wait? How is Ezra involved?”

“I had lunch with him yesterday. He showed me this before I saw it elsewhere and someone brought it up for my comments. He didn’t want me blindsided.”

He went still, staring at her. “So you let Ezra fix it when I should have?”

“What?”

“How long did it take you to give me your trust? How hard did I work to gain it, and you just let Ezra have it?”

She blew out a breath, not expecting this at all. “I didn’t just let anyone have it. Ezra told me. And then I came here. To you.”

“That should have been my job. I earned that place in your life.” She sucked in a breath. This was one of his buttons obviously, and she’d pushed it, so she needed to make it right.

She tried very hard to figure out what to say next. “I don’t know why you’re upset. I mean, I’m hearing your words, but they don’t make sense to me. I need you to help me understand.”

“Ezra did my job. I should have showed you that interview. Fuck that, I wouldn’t have shown it to you. Ezra had no right to make that choice for me. He should have contacted me before he showed it to you. I’m your boyfriend, not him. Not only was it not Ezra’s place, you don’t need that emotional shit from your father. You don’t need to struggle through any of this shit. You were better off not knowing. As for Bob? He needs a punch in the face.”

“What?” Not only was she still confused, he was starting to piss her off. “I don’t like that for your own good stuff. I make my own decisions because I’m a grown-up. I’ve been dealing with Bob my whole life. I decide if or when I deal with Bob. No one else gets to make that choice for me.”

“For once in your life, you might let yourself be taken care of, Natalie. Ezra took that from me. And you let him. When it came down to it, you trusted him with it and not me.” He looked at his phone and then made a call.

“What are you doing?”

“Calling Ezra.”

“What? No!” She moved, but he turned his back, shutting her out.

He’d never done that before in an argument and her world shifted a little.

Ezra must have answered because Paddy started speaking into his phone, “Yeah, I’d say sorry I woke you up, but I’m not. What the hell, Ez? You kept this stuff with Natalie and her dad from me? Why would you do that?”

Natalie walked around him so she could look him in the eyes. “Paddy, you need to stop this now. I’m not kidding. This is spinning out of control and we need to work it out. Not by yelling at your brother.”

“She’s still taking your side. Do you hear that?” He wouldn’t look at her, further shutting her out.

She touched his arm. “What side? There are no sides here. This happened to me. To. Me. If anyone gets to decide how to handle something or how to feel about it, it’s me.”

Paddy focused on her. “He took that from me, Natalie. I should have been the one to help you through this.”

He wanted her to trust him by fighting with him? Okay then. “You’re not even making sense. A bad thing happened to me and what did I do? I came here! To you. God, you’re being such a self-centered ass**le right now. You’re making this about you when it isn’t. And you’re waking up your brother to yell at him for what? Being kind? Reaching out to me to tell me something awful? Something I could have found out by being blindsided by a reporter? You like to talk about how it’s normal for couples to fight, and I’m trying to, but you’re pulling Ezra into this, and he doesn’t need to be.”

“It is about me, though. If this gains speed, it’s my girlfriend who looks like a dope-fiend skank. Sort of the opposite of what the rebranding push was about, no? Your father using me to get himself some attention. He’s got himself a little bit of spotlight. You didn’t trust me to handle this, and now it’s f**ked. Your need to always have control has wrecked everything.”

Everything inside her went really still at his words. Even through the rest of this, she knew they’d get past it and work things out. But those sentences made a wound in a heart she’d trusted him with. How many times in her life had she been blamed for things other people did? All those voices threatened to swallow her up.

She heard Ezra yell at Paddy to shut up but the words were out, hanging between them. Slicing her open.

She managed to swallow her anguish and speak calmly to him. “I’m sorry you see it that way.”

He and his brother continued to argue as she went into the bedroom and got dressed, leaving the T-shirt on the bed. She had to wall it out. Build a big moat around it and not feel. Not look at it because it hurt so much that if she spent even a second more on it, she’d break down.