I glanced back at him.
The crease in his brow eased, replaced by something gentler.
“Anything you need,” he murmured, brushing a kiss to my shoulder. “I’m here for you.”
I made a face.
“Well… right now? I need a shower.”
He laughed and began to pull back, fingers skimming down my thigh as he withdrew.
Chapter 13
Silas
Everly kept insisting she was fine, but I couldn’t stop worrying. The way things had gone down with her mother—it had to leave a mark. You don’t just walk away from that kind of history unscathed.
My own fury at Eris’s betrayal had cooled. I was forty-three—old enough to recognise manipulation when I saw it. But Everly? She was barely twenty-two. Still young. Still learning what it meant to be chosen after a lifetime of being dismissed, belittled, ignored.
So, I swallowed my pride. I kept my voice level. I stayed calm—for her.
And for a while, it worked.
Until Eris reared her head again.
This time, I didn’t involve Everly. This time, I handled it myself.
While she settled into her new role at BLM, I called Conrad and brought his PI back on retainer.
I’d locked Eris out as soon as she was on the plane back from Edinburgh.
I froze every credit card. Cut her monthly allowance. Changed the locks and all security codes to every one of my properties. She’d been reduced to the contents of her wardrobe and whatever overpriced jewellery she hadn’t pawned yet.
The latest report confirmed she was staying at a dingy bed and breakfast. Shared bathrooms. Threadbare towels. A long fall from her previous perch.
But instead of quietly fucking off into the sunset, Eris did what she always did—made herself the victim.
She tried selling an exposé to a bottom-feeding tabloid, claiming I had groomed Everly. Said I’d targeted her daughter from the start. That I’d waited for her to turn legal so I could divorce Eris and marry Everly.
It was desperate.
Insulting and infuriating.
I’d barely seen Everly as a child. Her own mother had shipped her off to boarding school the second she could. Hell, there were years I forgot she even lived with us. We were never close—until recently. And even that was more circumstance than conspiracy.
But that didn’t stop Eris from spinning her fiction.
She painted herself as the grieving mother, betrayed by both husband and daughter.
Conrad responded with a cease-and-desist so fast it should’ve broken the sound barrier. We included travel logs, business trip records, school transcripts. For once, her shitty maternal instincts worked in my favour. Her neglect was the strongest evidence I had.
Still, I wasn’t done.
I wanted the knife to twist.
I wanted to make sure she couldn’t claw her way back to anyone with money or influence.
That meant going through Steven.
