Page 22 of Obsessed Mr. O’Brian

My pathetic voice betrays me.

“Don’t lie to me, Millie. You’ve looked horrible all evening.”

My father’s words echo in my mind.

My daughter. She might be a bit older, but she’s pretty and clean.

Red-hot fury streaks through me, stripping me of the protective numbness and flooding my nervous system with all the pain and fear from seeing my father again, and my mouth responds before I give consent.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize pretty was in the job description. Excuse me, Mr. O’Brian. I apparently need my beauty rest,” I snap and spin on my heel.

Thick fingers wrap around my injured wrist. I yelp in pain and grab his forearm.

Golden orbs gleam in the dim lamplight.

“You’re hurt,” he accuses.

“I’m fine. Let me go,” I manage through gritted teeth.

With terrifying ease, he ignores my attempts to pull away, shifts his grip to my upper arm, and slips my sleeve up to reveal the bruising on my wrist.

“Who did this? Who hurt you?” he snarls.

The fury in his eyes drops the floor out from under me.

Artur O’Brian is too handsome. Too strong. Too tempting.

I’m locked in a hotel room with the grown version of the boy who stole my heart and ripped it to shreds thirteen years ago. He’s so much more handsome and intense now than I ever could have imagined. Even if we were only passing by on the sidewalk, I’d be captured by his charisma and physique alone, but every time he softens for his daughter, he steals deeper into my soul.

I want him too badly to trust myself, but the tiny lump under the blankets in the crib prevents me from lunging toward the exit.

I need this job to protect my mother, provide for my brother, and pay my father’s debts, so I turn my face away and do what I must even though I know I suck at it.

“It was an accident. I almost fell down the stairs of my apartment building, but a guy caught me,” I lie. “I’m fine. Let me go.”

When he stares at the side of my face with unwavering intensity instead of releasing me, I curse my braid. Lying would be so much easier if I could hide behind my hair.

“You almost fell down the stairs,” he deadpans.

I nod and try to hide my wince as my collar brushes against my sore nape, but the narrowing of Artur’s gaze warns me of my failure.

“At your apartment,” he rumbles.

I nod again.

“And a guy caught you?”

I don’t understand the warning in his tone but don’t dare meet his eyes for fear of revealing my lie, so I nod again and tug at my arm.

He pulls me into the bathroom by my upper arm, shuts the door, flips on every single light in one swing, and crowds me against the sink so fast my head spins.

The fan hums above our heads.

“For someone who has so much practice, you really are a shit liar,” he snarls.

With my heart in my throat and heat throbbing between my legs, I fight to free my arm from his grasp, but he’s too strong.

“I’m not—”