But he couldn’t let himself be controlled by love.
He was about to pour himself another drink when the door to Gabriella’s room opened. His wife entered, and his exhaustion fled in the wake of rising lust. Given the success of her ballgown, he’d helped her to choose a new wardrobe, one designed to show off her magnificent figure. At present, she wore a sleek robe of sapphire silk. The garment revealed the deep crevice between her breasts and clung to her curves. With her fiery tresses cascading down her back, she looked every inch an exotic queen.
His prick throbbed with anticipation. Maybe what he needed wasn’t to stay away from his wife but to ride her good and hard. Maybe that would clear his head.
“I heard you come home. Why didn’t you stop by to say good night?” she asked.
Her tone had an odd edge to it…but he was tired. He could be imagining things.
“It was late, my dear, and I didn’t wish to disturb you.” He set down his glass with a click. Prowling over to her, he ran a finger over her shoulder, the beast in him savoring her shiver. “Since you are awake, however, I would be happy to entertain you.”
“We need to talk,” she said.
He dropped his hand. He hadn’t imagined it then. Gabby’s voice and expression had a hardness that was foreign to her nature and therefore impossible to miss.
“What about?” he said, with the wariness of a man who isn’t stupid.
“The fact that you’re bribing my trustee to do your bidding.”
Her words sliced like a scalpel. Shock bled through him. Cornered, he reacted on instinct.
“Where did you get that idea?” He shaped his lips into a quizzical smile. “Has your father been spouting his paranoia again?”
“I know about Mr. Isnard’s debts to you,” she said steadily. “I know that you want him to call in Mr. De Villier’s debts and destroy Billings Bank in the process. Whatyouneed to know is that I will not allow that to happen.”
Shock turned into something else. If she’d come to him in another way, if she’d asked him why he’d done what he’d done, he might have reacted differently. But she was confronting him,threateninghim. Threatening to take away the one thing that he’d worked for his entire life, that defined him, that kept the chaos at bay.
His already tenuous grip on his self-control slipped. He responded how he always did to intimidation: he pushed back.
“How do you propose to stop me?” he asked with silky menace.
“It’s already done.” She folded her arms over her chest; the belligerence that flashed in her eyes was a lightning rod to his own volatile emotions. “Mr. Isnard has been removed from his role as my trustee. That role now belongs to Harry Kent.”
Her words sunk into him like a knife between the shoulder blades. The betrayal momentarily cut short his breath, his vision turning red. His wife—the woman he loved and who professed to love him in return—had ruined his chances of achieving his life-long goal?
Nobloodyway would he allow that to happen.
“We’ll get it changed back,” he said through his teeth.
“You can’t. The deed is done, with three witnesses testifying to my father’s sound state of mind. Whether or not you like it, Mr. Kent is now my trustee, and he will take his direction from me, acting in my best interests. And you know as well as I do that you cannot bully or intimidate him into doing your bidding.”
Lungs straining with rage, Adam knew she was right. If there was one person in the goddamned world whom he couldn’t buy, it was Kent. Not only was the bastard morally incorruptible, he was married to the King of the Underworld’s granddaughter and brother-in-law to a host of powerful aristocrats. He was protected, out of Adam’s reach.
If this were a game of chess, Gabriella would have claimed checkmate.
Fucking hell, Adam had been beaten…by the person he had least expected to betray him.
But that was the best type of deception, wasn’t it?
Unholy fury blazed as he took in the tight seam of his wife’s mouth, her composed blue gaze. Where was the sweet, biddable wallflower he’d married? His adoring queen who’d pledged her loyalty to him? In her place stood a woman he didn’t even know.
Once again, he’d let love distract him, deceive him. Now he was paying the price: the woman he loved had single-handedly ripped away his control and demolished his life’s work.
That bastard De Villier got one thing right: only a fool lets himself be blinded by love.
The darkness in Adam swirled, his vision blackening with wrath.
“Why did you do this? To preserve your father’s legacy?” Adam asked tightly. “Your first loyalty should belong to me, yourhusband. All your talk of love is meaningless otherwise, you traitorous bitch.”
