My blood boils at his crude words, the sound of my wild heartbeat echoing in my eardrums as my fingers dig into the table in front of me so hard my knuckles have turned white.
I’m going to kill him.
Fuck putting him behind bars.
I’m going to throttle him so there is no way he’ll ever be able to talk about Jessica like that ever again.
Anger, hot and all-consuming, burns inside me, dulling everything else around me, so it takes me a moment to catch Nico’s question.
“—dated Jessica?”
“Yes.” That smug smile falls. His eyes narrowing at Nico, calculating. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Let’s sit down and chat.”
The asshole sneers. “I’m not talking until I have my lawyer.”
“Sure thing.” Nico walks around the table and casually starts for the door. “I mean, if you really don’t want to know why we brought you here in the first place…”
“I didn’t do shit,” Damien hisses, but Nico doesn’t take his bait.
“If you didn’t do shit, then you would talk to me and clear this up in a few minutes instead of waiting for your lawyer to arrive. You know as well as I do that can take hours, but you know your rights, and I can’t do anything if you’re determined…”
Damien’s eyes narrow, but for once, he doesn’t complain. Instead, he leans against the back of his chair, legs sprawling wide, as if he doesn’t have a care in this world. “Fine. What am I doing here?”
Nico turns around and takes the seat opposite him. “There was a break-in at Jessica Richards’s house.”
There is a beat of silence as Nico lets his words settle in. I watch Damien process what was said. His eyes narrow slightly, furrow deepening between his brows. Either he’s an Oscar-winning actor or he’s genuinely surprised.
Damien curses under his breath and jumps to his feet, the sudden motion making the chair fall back.
“Oh, no.” He shakes his head and points his finger at Nico. “No, no, no. You’re not pinning this on me. No way, no how. That bitch ain’t worth this shit. I wouldn’t take her back now anyway after she whored herself out to a pig.”
Fucking asshole.
“But you wanted to get back together,” Nico points out. “Jessica said you’ve had altercations a few times since youbroke up, including at The Hut a few nights before the break-in happened.”
“Couples have disagreements; ain’t nothing new about that.”
Disagreement, my ass.
“And you have a tendency to send her flowers afterward? A little apology?”
“Flowers? I didn’t send her any fucking flowers!”
Nico raises his brow. “People said you gave her flowers when you were talking at the Reading Nook.”
“I did. I wanted to pay for her coffee too, but she was being a bitch about it. I’m not spending any more money on her ungrateful ass.” The frown on his forehead deepens. “Listen. Yes, I wanted to patch things up, but she wasn’t interested. Was I pissed off? Yes. But I ain’t gonna pant after her like a dog when she ain’t worth it.”
Nico tilts his head to the side. “Pissed off enough to slash her tires?”
Damien freezes for a moment, his eyes widening, before he shakes his head. “I didnotbreak into her house.”
That isn’t a no.
“When did it happen, anyway?”
“Monday night. Can?—”
