“I asked you a question. Why?”
“Why do you think? I need to know where you are at all times.”
If I didn’t already throw up everything inside me, I would do it right now. I have to lean on the doorframe since my body is too weak, and I’m too dizzy to stand up without support. “How can you say that?”
“It’s the truth. Do you want me to lie?”
I wish I could understand what I see flash across his disturbingly handsome face. He’s just as smug and sure of himself as he was the night he took my life and shook it like a snow globe until nothing looked the same. When I think back on that, I shouldn’t be surprised at the way he’s acting now. I know he has it in him.
I guess maybe, just maybe, I hoped he cared a little more about me than this. Just because he didn’t kill me for running away and everything that came with it doesn’t mean we’re friends. He’ll fuck me while I’m half-conscious. We’re about as far away from being friends as two people can get.
“You might as well come back to bed. Being upset isn’t going to change anything.”
I genuinely can’t believe what I’m hearing, and that’s my fault. I need to be ready for anything from him, right?
Still… “I’m not getting in bed with you.”
“Yes, you are, unless you want to play a little game where we find out which of us can stay awake longer. Hint: it won’t be you.” Again, he’s so sure of himself.
“You’re the one who put this new security system in. Don’t you trust it?”
His jaw ticks once he lowers his brow. His icy gaze chills me from a distance before he growls, “Get in bed, unless you want me to force you down and shackle you. I’m giving you a choice now.”
Am I supposed to thank him? I don’t know what’s more sore by the time I cross the room and get into bed without saying a word. My back? My pride? He violated me, and he couldn’t care less. Just another man I mean nothing to.
Only this time, it hurts. It really does.
26
LIAM
After two days, it’s clear I’ve discovered something else Aurora has in common with her bloodthirsty prick of a father: she knows how to hold a grudge.
I’m not going to apologize. She brought it on herself. If she didn’t want a tracker implanted, she shouldn’t have murdered two of my men and gone on the run like some half-assed heroine in a boring movie. I refuse to apologize for doing what I needed to do for the sake of protection. And she can go to hell if she feels otherwise.
All I have to do now is rehearse those lines until I believe them. The sad fact is, I don’t enjoy knowing she feels this way. All this time, I relied on the differences between Donovan and me. I was better than him. I might have hurt or even killed, but I always had a reason. Something deeper than greed, at least.
Two days spent getting the cold shoulder has me thinking twice. The silence is a gift—that’s not what I mind. I’m fine with being able to hear myself think.
It’s the haunted look in her eyes whenever we cross paths that’s a knife to my chest. The accusations she doesn’t voice but might as well scream night and day. I’m a better man than herfather could ever dream of being, but something tells me my defense would fall on deaf ears if I tried it out.
Anyway, I doubt I would believe myself.
“Good morning.” I won’t play her game. I’m going to treat her the way I always have. It’s up to her if she wants to make the rest of her time here miserable as hell.
All I get is a cold, silent stare before she pushes her way past, heading for the bathroom once I’m showered and shaved. She’s damn lucky I’m skilled at controlling my emotions, or she would be in serious trouble. I’m so fucking angry I can hardly see straight by the time she slams the bathroom door hard enough to make the mirror over the dresser rattle.
I can’t believe how much I care what she thinks. Soon, she won’t be my problem anymore. I have an agreement to fulfill, unless I feel like inviting another lifetime’s worth of headaches. This part of my life will only be a memory.
Why doesn’t that feel true? If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s to be honest with myself. Anything else is a waste of time, not to mention dangerous. If I can’t trust myself, who can I trust?
That’s why I force myself to look at the situation honestly while I finish drying off and dress in a pair of charcoal slacks and a black button-down. The reason I can’t shake my lingering guilt—which is what it is, I can’t pretend otherwise—is the same reason why the thought of handing her over to Russo makes my throat close up until breathing takes conscious effort.
I don’t want to give her up. I want her to be mine. Not Gabriel’s, not anyone else’s. Which means she very much needs to go. Gabriel is not the kind of guy you want as an enemy. It would be unforgivably stupid to cross him or his brother.
But I’ll be damned if the idea hasn’t been swirling around inside my head. It’s even there now, at the front of my thoughts while I finish tucking in my shirt, the way it was there while I shaved, while I washed my hair. It was the last thing I thoughtof before I fell asleep last night, and the first thing on my mind when I opened my eyes. I hear a clock ticking in my head all the time, signaling the inevitable, and I would give anything to stop time.
I care too much, bottom line. She was the one variable I never saw coming. A variable with a death stare which she doesn’t waste, glaring at me again once she emerges from the bathroom.
