All Khalil said to that was “Lower.”
“You don’t—”
Khalil’s hand moved with lightning speed, wrapping around my uncle’s neck and lifting him off the ground. “Lower.”
It’s all I can do not to laugh when my uncle flails his dangling feet and claws at Khalil’s hand. “You don’t…have any authority…here,” my uncle chokes past lips that are already turning blue.
Satisfied, Khalil sets him on his feet and removes his hand. Nearly half a foot taller, he looks down at my uncle while the man who’s ruled me with an iron fist coughs and drags in air.
“Good. Keep it right there and not a decibel higher and I won’t have to fuck you up.” Khalil pats my uncle on the cheek hard enough to look more like a slap and then he returns to my side like a dutiful boyfriend. When our gazes meet, he shrugs. “I tried it your way, but then he threatened you. End of story.”
It was hardly a threat, but I know better than to argue. Especially when I’m fighting a grin after seeing him make my uncle his bitch. Khalil is already wound tight and a hair trigger away from exploding. It reminds me of the day we met and how I could feel all the energy packed away inside of him just waiting for an outlet.
He hasn’t been this way since we first fucked, but that violent energy is quickly returning now.
My uncle glares at us both while rubbing his neck. I make a show of examining my nails like I didn’t see a thing and try not to cringe at how bad I need a manicure.
“You were saying, Uncle?”
Uncle Mars takes one last gasping breath and says, “I think you should leave.”
“Oh, now he wants us to leave,” I whisper to Khalil. My boyfriend’s only response is to smirk and run his knuckles down my arm. “Out of curiosity, whose money bought this house?” When my uncle simply glares back, I smile.
So mine then.
“I’m guessing my name is on the deed as well?”
More silence.
“I’m surprised you even bothered since your plan was to have me killed. It would have been one less asset to transfer once you proved my death and took everything.”
The bitter expression clears from my uncle’s face, and his next words come as no surprise. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Aurelia. You’re my niece. My blood. Of course I’d never harm you.”
“So you didn’t hire Finnegan and his men, who tried to kill me?”
“Of course I did. I thought you were dead. You can’t imagine how hard it’s been thinking you were out there alone and without a proper burial. I promised your father I would take care of you, andthatisexactlywhat I havealwaysdone.” He waves away the obvious hole in his story. “Obviously, Finnegan and his men got a little overzealous in getting the job done. I certainly didn’t permit him to take you against your will or harm you.”
Yeah, and pigs fly.
“I’ve never known you to be overly sentimental or religious,” I say.
“What is your point, Aurelia?”
My gaze narrows. “I think you know, Uncle.”
“This is ridiculous. I don’t know what these men have been filling your head with, but I will not stand here and be vilified after all I’ve done for you.” Even after all of that, he was still careful not to raise his voice just as Khalil had warned him.
“They haven’t been filling my head with anything.” As for the rest of me… “I came to the conclusion that you were a monster all on my own.”
“Ungrateful as ever. I can see some things haven’t changed.”
“And some things never will,” I confirm. A little catty and a little bratty, but at least I’m free.
My uncle’s phone starts to ring and since he never misses a call if he can help it, it doesn’t surprise me when he snatches the phone from his pocket. “I have to take this call, and since you insist on staying, when I get back, I want to know the exact nature of your relationship with this man.”
“I look forward to enlightening you.”
Actually, I’m already wishing I’d listened to Khalil and had gone back to the cabin. My uncle would have left in another day or two, and I wouldn’t be battling nausea from being in the same room with him again. Now that Uncle Mars saw for himself that I am alive, I know he isn’t going anywhere. My uncle isn’t the kind to be defeated so easily. One way or another, he isn’t going to return to the States empty-handed.
