“Rule four: My approval on anything that affects this household. Guests—” I look at Ivy. “That means your friend Dave isn’t welcome here.”
“Why? Jealous?” she spits back.
I don't dignify that with an answer, because fuck if she isn't right. “And rule five..." I meet Madison's eyes directly. "This arrangement ends the day your three months are up. Not a day longer. Don't get comfortable."
No one moves. No one speaks. Even Lillianna is quiet.
Then Madison speaks. "So basically we don't exist. Don't be seen, don't be heard, don't be a burden." She swallows hard. “Youarejust like Dad."
My last thread of patience snaps. “Yet, here I am letting you live in my house. He tucked you and your mother away, his dirty little secrets across town. Neither she nor you were ever important enough to him to be more.”
She sucks in a breath, then pushes back from the table and flees. Her retreating footsteps echo down the hallway.
I stare at the empty doorway, unable to look at either of them.
Fuck. I drag a hand down my face. The little bit of bourbon I drank turns sour in my stomach.
Ivy stands, her hand tightening on the back of her chair. “You know what scares me about you, Thorne?” she asks rhetorically. “It’s not that you’re cruel. It’s that somewhere underneath all that armor, you actually understand pain and you still choose to inflict it.” She takes off after Madison.
“She’s right, you know.” Lillianna taps her fork against her plate. “Dad’s hurt us all, but in high school, something changed. You went from protecting others from his pain to inflicting it. Why?”
I don't answer. Because I don’t want to admit that I was stupid enough to believe honesty mattered, that doing the right thing would be rewarded instead of punished. That's a humiliation I'm not ready to share. Not with her. Not even after all this time.
My senior year, I discovered Dad was cooking the books. Fraud on a massive scale, funneling money through shell companies, putting everyone—employees, investors, our familyname—at risk. I thought I was protecting the company. Thought if I quietly went to the right people, we could fix it before it destroyed us.
I was seventeen and stupid enough to believe doing the right thing mattered.
Instead, those I told went to my father. Sure, he cleaned up the fraud. He couldn’t risk me going public I suppose, but he made sure I paid for my disloyalty.
Sebastian became the heir. I got acquisitions, important, sure, but safely away from the legacy. Away from real power.
And Dad? He just found new crimes. Moved from financial fraud to environmental violations.
Which I should have caught. I should have known. Should have kept watching. But my anger made me blind.
Lillianna sets down her fork and stands. The mischief has drained from her eyes, replaced by a look I like even less. Quiet understanding. She doesn't push. Doesn't joke. Just leaves me with it.
The dining room is silent. Just me, the remains of a dinner nobody finished, and the empty chair where Ivy had been sitting. I reach for my glass, then stop. Set it back down.
But none of this has anything to do with how I'm treating Ivy. Sure, Madison's blackmail brought this mess to my door, but Ivy's caught in the crossfire. And I've been making it worse. Not because of Madison, not because of the situation. But because every time I look at Ivy, I remember that train compartment. Her soft skin and heavy moans. The way she came apart, shaking and clinging to me.
I don't know how to be around her without wanting more. So yeah, I've been a bastard. Because apparently that's easier than dealing with whatever the hell this is. But making her miserable isn't going to make me want her any less.
Time to find another strategy.
Chapter Eight
Ivy
I can't sleep.
The fight at dinner keeps replaying in my mind. Thorne's words. Madison's tears. My own helplessness as he destroyed her with thoughtless precision.
I'd sat with her for hours afterward. Held her while she cried into my shoulder, her whole body shaking with the kind of sobs that come from somewhere deep and raw.
"He's right, isn't he?" she'd whispered against my neck. "Dad didn't want me. And now Thorne doesn't either. I'm just... nobody's."
"That's not true."
