“Cal,” she gasped, breathless as they entered a dark and stuffy hallway. Fern’s vision spun. Her heartbeat drummed in her neck, and as he opened a door and hurled her inside his familiar room, her ears muffled. The bed. The washstand. The green drapes. Fern’s legs turned to jelly as she spun around. Cal shut the door and slid a bolt into place.
“I told youneverto go with him,” he seethed, his voice low and raspy. He was furious.
She kicked off her remaining shoe. She needed balance if she was going to put up a fight. “Let me out.”
“You don’t want that.”
“Don’t tell me what I want!” A knot of panic strangled the words at the base of her throat.
He went still again, the same way he had at the bar. Then he blinked. “You’re a fucking disaster.”
Cal took a step forward; Fern shuttled to the side out of his reach. He pulled up short again and stared at her. “You think you’re in troublenow? If I hadn’t been here, seen you come in… Jesus, I told you to never go with him. Your ears broken, princess? Or are you just a few beans short?”
“I didn’t have a choice!”
“Quiet down.”
She saw it then: Cal’s own frustration. He paced away from her toward the window. Once there, he tugged the curtains shut.
“I was out. With my cousin and her friends, and then he was just there…he sat down at our table, and Rodney, he… I couldn’t risk my cousin being hurt.”
Cal lips pressed thin. A thread of tension released from his shoulders. Only a thread. After a few seconds, he paced to the other side of the room.
“He said my father had been in contact.”
“Yeah.”
“Then why did Rodney bring me here?”
Cal ran a hand through his dark hair, glancing over his shoulder. He wouldn’t meet her eyes.
“Did my father agree to what you wanted?” Fern had no idea what that might be. What did criminals do with judges in their pockets? Maybe Rodney was in trouble with the law, and her father could exonerate him somehow. Or did he only want a judge in his pocket to have more political power and protection?
“We’re talking,” Cal answered.
“So, the photographs won’t be released?”
When Cal shook his head, Fern leaned against the wall, feeling feather light. But her other question still hadn’t been answered. “Then whydidhe bring me back here?”
Cal paced to the foot of the bed, a narrow single, the drab green blanket neatly tucked. He freed the top buttons at his throat and loosened his collar. “I can’t tell you everything. It’s none of your business, anyway.”
She pushed off the wall. “I was forced to come here. I deserve an answer.”
Cal came at her so quickly, she didn’t have the chance to scuttle away. He crowded her against the wall until her shoulder blades were pressing hard into it.
“You want to know why he brought you here? To fuck, Fern. Whether you wanted it or not.”
Shock lifted the hair along her neck and arms. And then, just as suddenly, every nerve inside her deadened. Her mind went quiet as Cal yanked his black tie from around his neck.
“But…why?”
It had nothing to do with Rodney wanting her or being attracted to her. She knew that much, at least. He’d been brimming with suppressed anger, planning to hurt her all along. She couldn’t understand why.
Cal went back to the bed and tossed his tie onto the blanket. “He’s got his reason.”
“One that you hadn’t discussed yet,” she said, remembering what Cal had said in the bar. Remembering how he’d grabbed Fern from behind and held her close and tight. Away from his brother.
“He’s impulsive. He doesn’t think ahead to the consequences.” Cal released the next few buttons on his shirt.
