“Semantics, yeah?” I retorted, rolling my eyes.
He watched me with dark eyes, looking straight through me. His hair was still tousled.Messy.I remembered I’d run my fingers through his curls. He’d hated that, but I still wanted to do it.
“Something like that,” he admitted slowly, looking down at my hand. My ring finger—the one with the jagged scar. He disapproved of the ring that was already on it. “Rosalie, if anyone can provide you the future you need, it is me. I’ll be so good to you. I promise.”
Damn this man.
“Forgive me, but I don’t exactly trust your word. It isn’t worth much these days.”
He shifted in his seat. “You’d better learn the value quick,” he said. “I’ll be needing your trust. This is all pointless without it.”
“Well, you can’t expect me to just hand it over,” I shot back.
“Yes, I can.”
We were already arguing. We would never forgive each other. Why was he asking for a chance?
“Well, I’m not going to.”
He glared at me from across the table. “You haven’t even tried. You ran the second things got hard.”
“I ran when I learned you’d lied to me,” I countered, my voice tight.
“I never lied to you, remember?” he said, certain of his words.
“You didn’t exactly tell me the truth, remember?—”
“Semantics,” he said in a flat, demanding tone. “Do you want to talk about what you did? Faking your death was a bit dramatic, even for you.” He changed the subject, shifting the blame onto me. “You have no idea what you’ve put me through.”
My mouth fell. “Are you mad I had the courage to keep myself safe fromyou? I would’ve married the world’s worst man if it meant I was far away from you,” I shot back, not letting him off the hook.
“You don’t mean that,” he said, his expression softening slightly, but not by much.
“I do, actually,” I mumbled, the admission heavy on my tongue. It wasn’t a complete lie, but the truth was a tangled mess I didn’t have the time to unravel right now. “Plus, there’s no way our families would be okay with it. My family wants to kill you. That is, if you haven’t hurt them already.”
“Are you asking me if I hurt your family?”
It didn’t seem beyond him. The man was all charm and easy smiles, but that didn’t make him any less of a killer.
“Did you?” I asked, the question escaping me before I could rein it in.
“That depends on your decision. I’m willing to put aside my differences. Marry me to stop the war.”
“Or ...?” I whispered, already knowing the answer.
Things were still quiet between our families, but it wouldn’t stay that way for long. If I didn’t agree to Max’s terms, that would mean war between the Romanos and the Clarkes. That would only drag in the Americans and the Russians.
“There are no alternatives,” he said, his eyes narrowed. “Not if you want your family safe.”
The ultimatum. Another “decision” I had to make. Except there wasn’t one at all. Marry Max and give up on myself or leave and risk my entire family. The choice was obvious.
“You haven’t hurt any of them yet, have you?”
“No,” he said, his voice softening again. He smiled as if he’d done me a favor. “How could I win you over if I’d killed your family?”
How sweet.
“You did kill Lucas. You’re not exactly off to a great start.”
