16
Kills.
Kills.
What the fuck?
The saddest thing is, if someone asked me if I thought Dallas was capable of killing someone, I wouldn’t hesitate to say yes. Of course, I’d add caveats to that. He wouldn’t do it for the sake of killing, but to save a life or to protect someone. Like me. He’d kill for me in a heartbeat. The gun I’ve seen him carry gives credence to that, plus the pocketknife I’ve seen him pull out of his pocket casually when he doesn’t care to look for a pair of scissors to open another package he’s ordered for me.
But this.. this makes it seem like killing is hisjob.
My hands poise over the keyboard. I don’t even know what to look up yet, afraid of what else I might find. However, before I can start to type again, I heard the doorknob rattling, and a muffled female voice saying, “That’s weird. It was open when I left it.”
Moving quickly, I just make it to the other side of the desk before the door shoves in and I watch as two people walk into the office with all the comfort of someone who is used to this space.
One of them—the one with the earrings and the suit—I know. That’s Dallas’s cousin, another tidbit confirmed in the profile I read, though the name listed said he was Adrian Heller and not Adrian Collins like I believed. The other is a slender woman with a pretty face whose wearing a soft yellow blouse, a dark grey pencil skirt, her strawberry blonde hair pulled up in a twist. She has freckles dotting her nose, and a pair of warm hazel eyes that light up when she sees me.
Adrian, however, frowns, as though he knows I’m not supposed to be here.
His wife—and I’m assuming it’s his wife considering his hand is on her ass as he guides her into the office—seems delighted to see me.
“Oh, hi! You must be Lucy. I’ve been dying to meet you.” She hurries forward, heels click-clacking against the hardwood floor as she comes closer to me, throwing her arms around me in a welcoming hug. “I’m Loni. Dallas talks about you constantly, but he’s so overprotective, I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to say ‘hi’.” She throws a look over her shoulder at Adrian, a teasing smile tugging on her lips. “Not like I can complain. If you knew what it took for me to convince Adrian to let me take this job at the Fortress, you wouldn’t believe it.”
Adrian snorts softly. “She lives with Dallas, princess, one floor above us and this is the first time she’s come down here. I’m sure she has an idea.”
Loni grins at me, like we’re sharing a secret between us, knowing how possessive the Collins—or, in her case, Heller—men are. “True. Unless Dallas didn’t give her permission.” Her eyes twinkle mischievously. “What do you say, Lucy? Does the boss know you’re here?”
All along, I thought Adrian was the boss. After what I just saw… yeah, no. It looks like Dallas is, and I have no idea what to think about that.
What to think about any of this.
But I offer her a pale mimicry of her own grin, make up an excuse that—from their expressions as they glance at each other—neither one of them believes, then hurry from the room before either of them can stop me.
Partof me wanted to huddle in the elevator, take it all the way down to the lobby again, and run out into the night. It’s not raining, so it’s a safer bet than it was the last time I felt the urge to flee, but I know better now. The security in the Fortress alerted him to my escape last time. They already know I’ve been wandering around the building today. Even if that man I ran into doesn’t immediately snitch to Dallas, I know damn well that Adrian and his lovely bridewill.
So I don’t leave. Thankfully, Dallas finally trusted me with the passcode that allows the elevator to go up to the penthouse floor. I take the short ride, letting myself back into Dallas’s place.
The bareness of it all is stifling. The weight of his lies—his continued betrayal—has me hunching slightly as I trip over the floor. He told me that I could trust him. That I couldbelievehim. That the truth of the Order of the Owed was the last big secret he kept from me… and that was just another lie.
So heisDallas Collins. He’s not Julian. He’s not the man that I married five years ago.
He’s not my husband.
So who the fuck is he?
I can’t return to his room. I refuse to go to the one he gave me when he first brought me home, either. Instead, I go to the living room, staring blankly across the way at the oversized windows as I perch lightly on the edge of one of the couches.
That’s where he finds me no more than fifteen minutes later. His hair is windblown, as though he was outside when he got the call that there was trouble with his ‘wife’. His cheeks are ruddy, his green eyes glassy and wild, and there’s a heaviness to his step as he stalks into the penthouse, calling out my name as though he’s sure that I’m already gone.
I swallow the lump in my throat. “In here.”
He finds me in the living room, a flash of relief crossing his features before he notices the look of determination on mine. Something inside of him tightens in that moment, and by the time he’s standing opposite of me, he’s locked down all of his emotions.
“Dandelion.”
I wince. To hear him use that name so easily, knowing that it means something to him, something so important that hetattooedone on his throat… remembering that night by the fountain, and how I felt like I was finally home again… I fuckingwince.
