Taking a threatening step toward her, Ethan let go of a malicious chuckle. “You don’t have the nerve.”
His words might have been soft, but she felt the oppression behind them. The manipulation he’d always wielded over her. She’d just been too numb from the loss to recognize it.
“You wouldn’t go and do something so foolish, would you?” He tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.
Nausea spun in her stomach. She wanted to run. Hide the way she always did.
Instead, she lifted her chin. “Phil is missing. I…I know you were involved.”
Ethan’s business partner. An affable guy Daisy had always assumed ran the straight and narrow. Believed was legitimate. She’d once thought the same about Ethan, too. She knew better now. She held the proof of his dirty dealings, though with Phil, it was only her gut telling her something was very, very wrong.
“Why don’t you do yourself a favor and not stick your nose where it doesn’t belong? You’re a little too simple to be delving into things you don’t understand, aren’t you?” Though his tone was coated in affection, Daisy knew it was a taunt. A warning.
She had the urge to fight him. To let the tears free as she smacked and slapped and pounded her pain and anger out on his chest. Years of submission. The numbness. The turning a blind eye.
“Tell me,” she demanded.
“And what are you going to do with the information?”
“I…” She choked off, not even sure how to respond, just knowing she couldn’t sit idle.
His laughter was pure menace, and he cocked his head as he leaned in close. “Don’t fuck with me, Daisy. Your usefulness is running dangerously low.”
He turned on his heel and stalked down the hall, the door slamming behind him. Daisy slid down the wall, her arms wrapped around her knees as she hugged them to her chest.
Searching for courage.
Exhaustion weighed her down. The emotional damage she’d carried for so long.
She shifted and basically crawled to her room and into bed.
Her eyes closed as she tried to reach out for the memory. For the face of the boy who made her believe she could be so much more.
Hazel eyes flashed. An easy, handsome smile. His faint breath on her cheek, the feel of his hands roaming over her, the way they’d never really done.
Her mind spiraled into fantasy. The dreams she’d had of him.
If only she could go back and change it. Stop him from leaving.
She could almost smell him, but she guessed she would never forget his presence.
His impact.
Her eyes blinked open to the darkness. His presence was so thick he might as well have actually been there.
His overpowering silhouette standing across the room at a dresser.
A towel wrapped around his waist with his back to her.
Bare and rippling with strength.
So strong.
So terrifyingly beautiful.
He quietly slid open a drawer and bent down to pull some clothing out.
Need pounded through her bloodstream. An anguished throbbing between her thighs.
