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“Look at me, Eloise. Do you see any sign of me giving a single, solitary fuck?” He smirks at me. “You’ll wear the dress. You’ll fucking smile when I tell you to. Understand?”
“Whatever.”
I turn away and walk to the window, staring out at Central Park before suddenly Massimo strides over. The air leaves my lungs in a whoosh, and I gasp sharply when he roughly spins me, slams me against the floor-to-ceiling window, and grabs my chin in his hand.
“The next fucking time you decide you’d like to mouth off to me, wife, perhaps it won’t be Destiny’s throat that I come down. Am I clear?”
I swallow thickly, feeling my stomach turn to acid.
“Am. I. Clear,” he growls again.
“Yes,” I mutter.
Massimo’s hand drops from my chin. “Get out. I have business to attend to.”
When I’m back in my room, which I don’t share with Massimo, I lock the door and sink against it. I really should eat something, because I haven’t all day, and the champagne is making my head swim. But instead, I walk over to the credenza by the windows and pour myself a large vodka.
Swallowing the room-temperature shot with a grimace, I turn and let my gaze settle on my open closet door and the dress hanging pristinely on a hanger on it. As Massimo mentioned, it’s green, which really is not my color, and short. Like, stupidly, scandalously, short. It’d be skanky looking even at a club. For a business meeting at a world-class legal firm, it’s a fucking joke.
But the dress quickly goes into the “who cares” file in my head—the place I keep all those little things I know should bother me, but that I also know I have no control over. The file’s pretty thick these days, being married to the sadistic asshole that I am and all.
The scene I just witnessed with Massimo and Destiny gets pushed aside too, along with my crushed dreams, my alcohol-numbed existence, and the depressing thought that this will be my life until I die.
Because something else has taken root in the forefront of my head, occupying every single one of my thoughts.
More like someone.
Ten years ago, Alistair Black broke me.
Broke my heart. Broke my will.
Broke us.
Or maybe there was never any “us” to break at all.
I’ve seen Alistair once since moving to New York, at a gala event Massimo attended.
He didn’t see me. Or if he did, he ignored me, and made sure we never crossed paths the entire evening.
But tomorrow, ten years after he was my bully and I was his, I’ll be face-to-face again with the man who left me standing in the ashes after the spark between us went up in smoke.
And this time, there’ll be no escape, for either of us.
3
ALISTAIR
The doors to the boardroom have barely shut behind Charles’ exit before Taylor jabs her middle finger at them.
“No offense, but your grandfather is a real fucking prick.”
“Taylor,” Gabriel sighs, dropping his head heavily against the back of his chair. “I think I speak for Alistair as well when I say we will never, ever, under any circumstances, be offended if you call Charles Black a fucking prick.”
“Or worse,” I mutter darkly.
Taylor blows air through her lips, puffing out her cheeks as she stands and runs her fingers through her long red hair. “It’s the fucking entitlement. I mean…my God.”
“Are you clear now why our parents didn’t involve him in our lives?” I grunt, kicking my feet up on the boardroom table. “Not to mention that the bastard retaliated by not sending us, his own grandchildren, Christmas or birthday presents. The man redefines petulant narcissism.”
