The Years Between Signing and Seeing novel Chapter 360

Suzie desperately wanted to add, If you have a problem with me, come at me directly and stop dragging innocent people down.

But Jamie cut her off before she could.

"I don't assume the worst. I rely on evidence."

Suzie bit her tongue. She was so sick of that word. Evidence. Evidence. If he loved evidence so much, why didn't he just marry it?

The room fell into a heavy silence, the quiet sound of their breathing filling the space.

Finally, Jamie's voice broke the stillness, soft and vulnerable. "Suzie, will you come see my grandfather? He misses you terribly."

Suzie's heart gave a painful thud, but she quickly masked it with ice. "No."

It wasn't that she hadn't thought about the old man over the years. But after the disastrous paternity test debacle, she had no idea what he thought of her. Between his old-fashioned values, Jamie's absolute conviction that she had cheated, and Margaret's toxic meddling... her reputation in the Baylor family was in tatters. They probably all thought she was a shameless gold digger.

And it was all Jamie's fault.

But then, a jarring thought hit her. The second paternity test. The one she had never seen the results of.

Did that test also say he wasn't the father?

Hayden had mentioned it once, but she had refused to listen. A petty, vindictive part of her had actually hoped the second test would fail too.

Jamie stood up slowly, looking down at her. His tone remained maddeningly calm. "Are you really going to treat me like a stranger, Suzie? Was hiding from me for four years not enough?"

Suzie met his gaze flawlessly, slipping effortlessly into corporate speak. "As your contractor, I wouldn't dare. But I must insist we keep our focus on the project, Mr. Baylor."

She didn't blink. Beneath her thick lashes, her striking eyes—which used to look at him with such warmth—now held nothing but a freezing, bone-deep defiance.

Jamie's brow furrowed. His lips parted as if to argue, but he clamped them shut into a tight line.

Suzie waited, assuming he was mulling over his next move. But as the minute hand on the clock ticked forward, Jamie didn't say a word. He just stood there, staring at her with an impossibly complex expression in his dark eyes.