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“You have her,” I said quietly.
He nodded, and I felt a trickle of cold sweat run down the back of my neck. I glanced toward the closed door to the bedroom of the suite.
“Is she here?”
“No.”
I looked back to him. His finger still rested on the trigger of the Glock in his hand, but he didn’t raise it. It was nothing more than an insurance policy in case I decided to be unreasonable.
“Why?” I asked.
“You pissed him off,” Landon said with a shrug. “You embarrassed him by not being able to control yourself in an official meeting.”
He leaned forward and pointed one of his fingers at me.
“Do you know how much he wanted you dead?” Landon asked.
“The other day or from the beginning?”
“Not in the beginning,” Landon said as he shook his head. “He loved you back then. You made him a shitload of money and never got yourself into too much trouble outside the tournaments. That bullshit with Jillian was the start, and then you turned on him in the worst possible way. Now he’s decided to give you another chance, and you fuck it up.”
Franks has Raine.
It occurred to me that in his hands, she might actually be worse off than in Arden’s.
Holy shit.
“I’ll apologize,” I said, barely able to form words in my tightened throat.
“I don’t think he’s interested in your apologies,” Landon said simply. “He wants your mind on the game. He wants to make sure you’re going to win and not let other shit get in your way.
“She’s not in the way.”
“She’s not now.” He continued to stare at me. It was a challenge and a warning. He wasn’t going to hesitate to shoot me if he needed to, but he also knew at this point that I wouldn’t make a move on him. Not when I didn’t even know where she was.
“I want to see her.” My words came out with a low growl.
“No.” Landon sat back in his chair and waited.
This was it. This was the impasse I couldn’t overcome. I could feel my heart pumping in my chest, and the start of the anger and fear inside of me threatened to block all my sensibilities. I took a step forward as I curled my hands into fists.
“If you touch me, you know what will happen.”
To emphasize his point, he laid the gun on the table and picked up his drink with his right hand. That action alone was enough for me to realize how fucking helpless I was when it came to him, Franks, and their conniving.
I’ll have to kill them both but not now.
“She’s alive?” I asked. I knew she was; I just needed to hear him say it.
“Very much so,” Landon said with a nod. “Sit down a minute, and let me tell you how things have changed.”
In the interest of keeping my head free of holes, I dropped my ass to the plush chair several feet away in the room. I lowered my head to my hands and attempted to breathe normally.
“Trying to keep tabs on her is a distraction,” he said. “I can’t let you have any distractions, so I removed that one from the equation. Franks’ ordering it just made it happen a little sooner than I had planned. Regardless, she’s perfectly safe—safer than she would be under your care—and actually providing a bit of a service to Franks himself.”
Service?
All the worst possibilities threatened to send me into a blinding rage.
