Collateral Legacy Trilogy, 2
River Reed doesn’t lose in court.
Especially not when the client is family.
When Johnson Petroleum Group launches a fabricated whistleblower attack against Scout Drilling, River knows exactly what it is—corporate warfare dressed up as procedure. She’s ready to dismantle it piece by piece.
Then she meets Julian Price.
A private investigator embedded deep inside JPG’s legal machine, Julian is everything River should avoid. Charming, compromised, and impossible to read. Trusting him could destroy her case. Not trusting him might be worse.
As forged evidence surfaces and the opposition escalates from legal pressure to outright sabotage, River realizes this fight isn’t about winning—it’s about survival. Someone is trying to bury the truth, ruin her brother, and take her down with him.
Forced into an uneasy alliance, River and Julian walk a razor’s edge between justice and disaster, desire and betrayal. Every move brings them closer to exposure—and closer to each other.
Excerpt:
River sat in the far booth of The Double Drip, a twenty-four-hour coffee shop that smelled like burnt espresso, old paperbacks, and poor life choices.
Her green dress drew glances. No one commented. This was D.C.—people survived by not asking questions after midnight.
She wrapped both hands around the chipped mug and focused on the heat.
Not because of the coffee.
Because of him.
Even now—even after seeing Julian Price with the enemy—his face wouldn’t leave her head. That flicker of guilt. The infuriating possibility that part of her hadn’t wanted to be wrong.
The bell over the door chimed.
River didn’t turn.
“Figured this was safer than chasing you into traffic,” Julian said quietly.
She didn’t look up. “If I find out you had me followed—”
The pause made her glance up.
He looked … surprised. Not defensive. Not amused.
“I didn’t,” he said. “I bribed the venue’s doorman. Fifty bucks and honesty. If you’d gotten into a car, I’d have let you go.”
She leaned back. “But I didn’t.”
“No,” he said. “You walked.”
“And you followed.”
“I caught up,” he corrected, sliding into the booth across from her—too close. These tables weren’t wide enough for distance.
The light caught his face hard—etched the stubble, shadowed his eyes. No tie. No apology.
“You’ve got five minutes,” she said.
“I’ll be efficient. You saw Greer,” he said. “I saw your face. So, let’s stop pretending.”
“You mean stop pretending you’re not exactly what I thought,” she said coolly. “A plant. A fixer with good cheekbones.”
Something dark moved behind his eyes. “I never lied to you.”
She leaned forward. “You just downplayed the part where you’re in bed with the head of JPG’s legal team.”
“I didn’t know where I stood,” he said. “With them. With this case. With you.”
“With me?” she scoffed. “You don’t get to make this personal.”
“It already is.”
That stopped her.
No smile. No charm. Just truth, heavy and inconvenient.
“Yes,” he went on. “I started digging into Scout to find leverage. That’s my job. But all I found were holes. Timelines that didn’t line up. Evidence that wanted too badly to be believed. And then I saw you in court.” His voice dropped. “You made me look closer.”
“And?” she asked.
“And I realized they’re setting you up.” A beat. “And that I helped them start.”
River blinked once.
“I’m not here to excuse it,” Julian said. “I’m here because if I walk away now, I become exactly what you think I am.”
“And what’s that?”
He didn’t hesitate. “A coward with a paycheck.”
Silence settled between them—thick, electric.
“I don’t trust you,” she said.
“I know.”
“I might never.”
“I’m not asking you to.”
“Then what are you asking for?”
He leaned closer, voice low. “One chance to do something right.”
The espresso machine hissed. A car passed outside. River’s pulse roared in her ears.
She didn’t plan it.
Neither did he.
They leaned across the table at the same moment and collided—heat and frustration and too many unsaid things. His hand came up to her face, steady and sure. Hers fisted in his collar.
She pulled back first, breath unsteady.
Julian’s voice was rough. “Was that part of the five minutes?”
“No.”
“Good.”
He kissed her again.
****
Julian sat on the edge of his couch in near-darkness, the only light in the apartment coming from the cold blue glow of his laptop and the rain streaking the floor-to-ceiling windows.
The city moved without him—headlights skimming wet pavement, sirens somewhere far below. Up here, everything was still. The kind of quiet that settled into your bones.
The same quiet River had left behind when she walked out of the coffee shop after their second kiss without a word.
The bourbon on the table sat untouched. So did the second glass he’d poured without thinking.
He hadn’t meant to follow her.
He told himself that again.
If she’d gotten into a car, he would have let her go. Let the night end the way it was supposed to—with her angry, and him pretending it didn’t matter.
But she hadn’t.
She’d walked. And when the doorman said she’d gone into the café across the street, Julian’s feet had moved before his brain caught up. He still didn’t know if that had been the mistake—or if everything before it had been.
His laptop chimed again.
A secure message from JPG’s internal server.
Status on exposure mitigation plan?
ETA on local firm analysis—Reed?
He didn’t answer.
Instead, he opened the file he was never meant to see.
Buried two directories deep. Timestamped days before the Ghana report had ever “surfaced.” A draft narrative. Approved language. Talking points about doubt, containment, competitive buyout potential.
Julian’s stomach turned.
This wasn’t litigation.
It was a blueprint for erasure.
He dragged a hand down his face, jaw tight, eyes burning.
And then her voice surfaced—not memory exactly, more like it was still sitting across from him.
I don’t trust you.
He’d expected that.
What he hadn’t expected was the question that followed.
And what do you think I think you are?
He’d answered without meaning to.
A liar. A coward. A suit who sold his spine for a paycheck.
He’d seen it then—the flicker in her eyes. Like she’d hoped he’d say something else. And hated herself for hoping at all.
Julian pressed his fingers to his mouth.
He could still feel the heat of her kiss. The scrape of porcelain on the table as they leaned in. Citrus and coffee clinging to her skin.
And now he didn’t know what to do with any of it.
His phone was in his hand before he consciously decided to pick it up. Tessa Shelley’s name glowed on the screen. Recruiter. Handler. The woman who expected loyalty without conscience.
He hesitated.
Then he hit CALL.
She answered on the second ring. “Julian. I was just about to—”
“I think I made a mistake,” he said quietly.
Silence.
When she spoke again, her voice was smooth. Measured. Dangerous.
“You’ll need to be more specific.”
Julian stared out at the rain-slicked city, lights bleeding into one another.
But all he could see was River.
And the look she would give him when she realized the truth—that he might not be the villain.
Or worse.
That he might already be too late.
- Series:
- /series-collateral-legacy-trilogy/
