I couldn’t lift my head. I wasn’t sure I could ever look at him again.
“Wynn.”
“I can’t, Julian.” The trickle of a tear slid down my cheek.
His hand gently touched my thigh as he kneeled in front of me. “I need you to look at me.”
“Please leave me alone, Julian.” More tears fell, and I both wanted to push his hand from my leg and pull him closer and sob against him.
With a sigh, he rose and I heard the sound of metal sliding. “Talk!” Julian’s voice boomed.
“I…okay, but you can’t kill me, please.”
The jolt of awareness that Julian was going after Corey shook me to the present. “No!” I rushed over and yanked on Julian’s arm.
He didn’t budge. “Name!”
“F-f-fine. It was that cop or detective whatever.”
I froze. “Wait, a cop paid you to cause a scene?”
Corey was sweating, fear evident in his gaze, and he was shaking. “He said he’d kill me if I spoke.”
“You’ll die if you don’t,” Julian growled.
“So if I tell you, I can go free?”
“Yes,” I answered.
“Wynn.” I still couldn’t bring myself to look into Julian’s eyes.
“He won’t tell anyone.” I nodded at Corey. “I’m sure Julian can get you off the island. You leave, go far away from here.”
“Y-yes, okay.”
“That’s not how this works.”
I ignored Julian. He wasn’t going to hurt me and for some strange reason, I knew he’d listen to me.
“Who was the cop?” I asked Corey.
He licked his lips, his eyes darting between me and Julian. This was the only thing keeping him breathing. He’d witnessed Julian strangling a man and understood what the prince was capable of. I hoped I would be able to hold him back. Corey didn’t deserve the same fate as Bear.
“He approached me while I was on a bench, begging for money. I didn’t even know he was a detective at first. He was nice. Smiled at me and said he’d give me money if I did him a favor. Told me to go into the café across the street. Said there were two people with Prince Julian and if I made a fuss and scene with one of them, he’d give me the money.”
“And you did.”
He nodded at me. “But I never got paid because I was taken in. I really didn’t know the guy the police were asking me about. Then I saw him at the station. He got me alone and told me he’d kill me if I spoke. Said he’d make my life miserable more so than it was.”
“Ridgeway,” Julian hissed.
The surprise of that detective’s name finally brought my attention to Julian. His eyes were like obsidian, hardly any silver showing. It was as if I were face-to-face with a nightmare.
“Yeah,” Corey answered.
What the fuck is going on?
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
