His immediate apology doused some of her ire. Some of it, not all of it. “What kind of messed-up family do you have?”
Dev’s sigh was so weary, she might have felt bad for him if she hadn’t been very much caught up in this. He replied, “A more messed-up one than I previously imagined.”
“How old is your cousin? Is he a child?”
“Only in maturity. He’s thirty.”
She racked her memory. Why hadn’t she cared more about Bollywood movies? “It’s... Arjun. Right?”
“Correct. You’ve seen his movies?”
“No, I don’t care for college sex romps.”
His laugh was strained. “I shall make sure to remember that phrase when I speak with him next. It will make him extremely angry.”
Thank God she hadn’t said anything particularly intimate or sexy in those texts. Blech. “This was a terrible thing to do.”
“I agree.” Dev’s tone hardened. “I will figure out some way to ensure Arjun never does something like this again. He will not get out of this without consequence. In the meantime, Ms. Ahmed...” He reached into the inside of his jacketpocket and pulled out a check and a pen. He leaned forward, placed it on the coffee table, and wrote on it. He slid it over to her, across the table. “Please take this as a token of my family’s regrets.”
Jia looked at the zeroes, and a deep, inescapable anger flared to life in her belly.The heroine is aghast, that the villain’s cousin thinks she can be bought off.“This is in dollars?”
“Yes.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and sat back. She was actually pretty proud of herself. A year ago, she would have jumped on him and ripped his hair out by the roots for this insulting offer. “What are the conditions on this check?”
“No conditions.”
“So I can take this money, deposit the check, and then go tell a tabloid about what your brother and cousin did to me?”
He blinked. “I trust you’ll be discreet about this.”
So it was hush money. “I want a million.”
His fingers rested lightly on the check. “Dollars?”
“Yes.”
“Impossible. I do not have that kind of money. I barely have— This is all I can afford right now.”
She scoffed. A part of her was really loving this cold rage. It was a nice change from her usual flailing anger. “Your family is obscenely wealthy.”
“I no longer share in my family’s wealth. Everything I own is from my own sources.”
She might have found that admirable, if it weren’t for thefact that he wouldn’t have any of those sources without his family name to begin with. “Too bad. Everyone has their price, and a million is mine.”
“A million is an outrageous sum for—”
“For hush money?”
“It is not anything as sordid as that. The money is merely my way of apologizing on behalf of my family,” he said coolly.
“And in return I don’t do anything, like, say... leak the texts, right?”
“If that was my concern, I wouldn’t need money for that. Leaking the texts would hurt you as well.”
Her temper fired hotter, partially because he was right. If any of this ever came to light, she’d get made fun of mercilessly. It took a second for the internet to turn against someone. Not to mention how her family would react when they found out she’d been catfished.Shamed and cowed, the heroine returns to her family’s home, because she cannot be trusted to be on her own.“That sounds like a threat.”
“It’s not.” He leaned forward and spoke, and every calm word only made her madder. “I am trying to be as nice as possible. Please accept the gesture.”
