“Seven million dollars in exchange for mysilence. I saw that article—I know people are already talking. You’re the biggest scandal this town’s had since your father’s trial.”
“People always talk,” Nicholas said indifferently.
“I’m sure they’d talk a lot more if they know what you were up to when you were younger. Damon told me some things before he died.” A disgusted laugh left her lips. “I didn’t believe it at first, a little prude like you, but you didn’t waste much time trying to steal my husband from me, either, so why wouldn’t you sleep with your barely-legal stepbrother, too?”
Jay’s mouth fell open. “What?”
“He told me you came onto him that night at the resort when you were eighteen while you were hanging around the bar dressed like a little tart.”
She sounded as if being eighteen were a crime, Jay thought. Perhaps, to a woman like her mother, it was. The sour tang of bile rose in her throat. “That’s a fucking lie. He tried to—”
But she couldn’t finish. All she could taste was that cheap acidic wine.
He wanted to own me.
“You see? You can’t even deny it. Just like this thing you have with your brother—” Her mother jabbed a pointed fingernail at her. “When did this start? Because Damon told me that you’ve been fucking him since he was only fourteen.”
Jay’s vicious cry of denial was lost to a deafening thud, followed by the sound of splintering wood. Nicholas ignored both of their startled shouts and rammed his shoulder into the locked door again, causing it to jump off its broken hinges.
“Howdareyou,” Jay’s mother shouted, but she sounded terrified. As if she hadn’t realized how strong Nicholas really was, and how easily he could turn on her.
Or that he might want to if she pushed him far enough.
Nicholas walked into the room, and Jay heard a shout, followed by what appeared to be a loud scuffle and then a curse. She saw her mother’s eyes dart to her phone on the kitchen table, but Jay beat her to it, dropping the battered old iPhone with the cracked screen into her purse.
“Give that back,” her mother snapped. “Now, Justine!”
“I will, when we leave. Nicholas isn’t finished with his marching orders yet.”
“I am yourmother,” she seethed. “You listen to me right now andgive me my phone.”
“If you’re my mother,” Jay said, still riding that wave of eerie calm, “you should act like it.”
Pain lit up the side of her face and Jay blinked in shock at her mother’s uplifted hand.
“You have a lot of nerve—you vindictive,twistedlittle—”
Her mother jumped back from Jay as Nicholas reemerged from the bedroom, holding a struggling Jake by his shirt collar. In his other hand was a camera.
“He was listening at the door.” With a display of strength that made Jay jump and her mother scream, he flung the camera onto the floor so roughly that it shattered, denting the linoleum. “He was recording, too. Which is illegal, in case you were wondering.”
“You ruined my floors!”
“My floors, actually,” Nicholas said, but her mother, who was working herself up to one of her tantrums, didn’t appear tohear. Jay did, and looked at him; he gave her a smile that she knew well, because she had been on both sides of it.
The fuck-or-get-fucked smile. And clearly, her mother was on the wrong side of the table.
Then he did a double-take and his eyes went to her reddened cheek, before swinging sharply to her mother and narrowing.
“That’s destruction of private property and assault,” Jake snarled, oblivious to the murderous expression on the other man’s face. “You want to talk aboutillegal. If you think you can keep me from pressing charges, you’re so fucking wrong. I won’t be bought off.”
“Isn’t it an election year?” Nicholas’s fury was no longer visible but Jay, who was far more familiar with his moods, could see it in every rigid outline of his body. “I think it is.”
“The view from your ivory tower must be pretty rosy if you think you’re that above the law.”
“Do you? I have your license plates and photographic evidence of you being places you’re not supposed to be. I know your dad isn’t going to go for that. He’d sacrifice you in a heartbeat.”
Jake scoffed. “You don’t know shit. Now, let go of me.”
