“It was.”
She rubbed at her eye. “What happened?”
He sped up to beat a yellow light. “Did you know Annica was the leak to the paper?”
“N-no, what?”
“Yeah, she came to me asking for a promotion. But she tried to throw you under the bus. Then she went to the newspaper when I didn’t give it to her, complaining about our hiring practices, feeding them all that bullshit about our homelife.”
The petty little cunt.
Jay rubbed at her hands. “How would she know about our homelife? She told me she grew up in Ridgeview.”
“Because, like your mother, she wasn’t working alone.” Nicholas turned down a familiar street and Jay sat up when she realized that they’d missed their turn off.
With a crunch of gravel, he pulled up in front of a big house with a marble bird path and a row of agaves leading up to the wraparound porch.
“This is Michael’s house,” Jay said.
He hated that she remembered that.
A look of sudden comprehension dawned over her face. “Nicholas, did he—”
Not wanting to hear her finish whatever that sentence was—because the answer was almost certainly yes—he got out of the car and headed for the driveway.
With a curse, Jay scrambled to unfasten her seatbelt. “I don’t like that look on your face. Whatever you’re thinking of doing—please, don’t be hasty—”
“It’s just business,” Nicholas said grimly. “Just like our fathers used to do.”
He rang the bell. Jay hovered conspicuously at his side. When the door opened, he half-expected some uniformed member of the help to answer it, so it was a surprise to see Michael himself appear in the doorway. He must have been hurting. His wife seemed like the type of woman who would think it was gauche to answer her own front door.
“Nicholas?” His eyes bounced from him to Jay. He looked scared—but not scared enough. “What are you doing here? I just got a call saying you cancelled our fund—”
Nicholas clocked him in the face.
“Nick.” Jay tried to grab for him but he sidestepped her, grabbing Michael by the front of his green Lacoste shirt and using his body to shove the door the rest of the way open before throwing him against his tasteful mahogany credenza. Several equally tasteful pieces of pottery shattered and fell to the tiledfloor, causing a fluffy Pomeranian to appear out of nowhere and start barking.
Nicholas nudged the dog away, swinging one leg over Michael’s torso to straddle his chest. He was heavy enough that the other man began to wheeze. “I warned you.”
His next punch caught Michael in the mouth and he felt the bite of teeth in his knuckles, busting them up. There was pain, too, though he barely felt that—he was too angry. “I told you not to fuck with her. And what did you do? Pay off my employees to talk shit, just to—” his words splintered into a snarl and he slammed the man’s head against the tile. “You littlefuck.”
“That’senough.” Jay gripped him from behind, hauling him backwards beneath his arms. Michael took advantage of his distraction to lash back, hitting him on the nose. It was a glancing blow, really, but something cracked and Nicholas swore, lunging forward in a way that had Jay falling against him. “Nicholas, stop—”
“I never touched her.” Michael’s voice was clotted.
“I know,” Nicholas said coldly. “That’s why I’m hitting you and not cutting your dick off.”
“Nicholas.” Jay shrieked when he lunged again. “I saidstop.”
She wasn’t strong enough to hold him back and she knew it. They both knew it. But her shaking arms reminded him of that terrible night that she’d left him for good.
Because she wasn’t strong enough to stop you then, either.
He sagged, giving Michael one last half-hearted swipe before allowing Jay to pull him away.
“Jesus,” Michael said, in a choked and miserable voice. “Fuck.”
“We’re through. The whole project’s through. I’ve got you for breach of contract. Nobody in this town will touch you with a nine-foot-pole when they find out that you tried to season your development plan with a little bit of extortion.”
