“Just my pride.” She takes it, and I pull her up. She’s so close now that I notice how she catches her breath.
I should let go of her hand. I don’t.
“Thanks,” she says quietly.
“Anytime.”
We finish the run and head back to the lodge. She’s quiet on the walk back, and I wonder what she’s thinking.
We reach the main entrance, and she turns to me. “Thanks for today. I needed that. See you at dinner, Kai.”
I watch her walk toward the guest wing, and something shifts in my chest. Not the tightness from my condition. Something else entirely.
I’ve never cared about the women Logan dates. Never even noticed them beyond surface pleasantness. They come and go, and it doesn’t matter because none of them matter to him either.
But Samantha’s different. She’s sharp and funny and holding something back that makes me want to know what it is.
I head to my room and pull out my phone. I have calls to make about the missing shipment. But all I can think about is the way Samantha laughed in the snow.
This is going to be a problem.
5
SAMANTHA
I’m still smilingwhen I open the door to my room. My cheeks hurt from laughing, and my legs are pleasantly sore from skiing.
Kai made the afternoon fun in a way I didn’t expect. Easy and natural, like we’d known each other for years instead of days. But the whole time, part of my brain kept drifting back to that room. To him on his knees while his father and brother?—
I push the thought away. Again. For the hundredth time today.
It doesn’t matter what I saw. It doesn’t matter that I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m here for Logan. For the plan. For revenge.
My smile dies the second I step inside.
Logan has Chelsea bent over the desk by the window. Her skirt is bunched around her waist, his pants around his ankles.
I’m frozen in the doorway, watching my boyfriend fuck his assistant in his family’s home like I don’t exist.
Chelsea’s head is thrown back, her mouth open in pleasure. Logan’s hand is fisted in her blonde hair, and he’s saying things to her I’ve never heard him say. Dirty things. Passionate things.
Like I never existed.
This is the fifth time. Fifth time I’ve caught him. Fifth time I’ve had to swallow my rage and humiliation and pretend it’s fine because breaking up isn’t part of the plan.
But standing here watching him with her, I realize the plan is falling apart anyway.
Ten months of playing the perfect girlfriend and convincing myself it will be worth it when he finally proposes, when I finally get access to the Hale family fortune and can make them pay for what they did to Mom.
If he doesn’t propose, I’ve wasted a year of my life for nothing.
Robert is going to ask what I have to show for my time here. What proof I’ve gathered. What leverage I’ve gained. And I’ll have to tell him I have nothing.
Fury burns through me, hot and sharp.
I turn and walk out, slamming the door hard enough that they definitely heard it.
I grab my coat from the hallway closet without thinking. My hands shake as I shove my arms through the sleeves. The side door is closest, the one that leads to the grounds, and I push through it before I can talk myself out of leaving.
