Sadie, bless her soul, acts as my gatekeeper. All three Wilders are huge, powerful-looking men but none of them are getting past my bestie without a fight, even though she’s at least a foot shorter than they are and probably weighs around half of one of them.
“Amelie doesn’t want to see you and she doesn’t want to talk to you, Dallas. You need to leave.”
“She’s going to want to hear what I have to say.” Dallas isn’t looking at Sadie when he says it. He’s only looking at me. And I can already tell by that steady, commanding tone to his voice that he has no intention of leaving.
“You need to stop it with all this toxic masculinity right now!” My girl is riled. “You can’t control her. You’re a prick and a liar! You need to leave her alone.”
“Let me talk to her, Sadie. There’s been a misunderstanding. Let me explain. To both of you, so you can see for yourself.”
“No.You’ve hurt her enough already.” At that exact moment, Sadie’s irate glare slides from Dallas to the brother on his left. And that’s the exact moment she realizes who he is. She happens to be a huge fan. Like, arabidfan.“Oh my god.Apollo Wilder?”
Apollo Wilder grins down at Sadie and I can’t blame her for basically melting into a puddle on the floor. She’s only human, after all.
Dallas uses her open-mouthed distraction to ease past her. He sits down next to me—not touching me, which is good because I’d move away from him and my head is throbbing.
Sadie, to her credit, corrals her infatuation and rushes over to me as soon as she realizes her fangirl glitch. The brothers join us and now we’re all jammed into the booth together, with the two of us trapped between these big, hulking men.
Dallas pulls a wrinkled stack of stapled papers out of his pocket and places them—with emphasis—onto the table in front of me. “Amelie, Sadie, meet Boone and Apollo.”
Both brothers are watching me, then Dallas, with rapt interest. “Absolutely charmed,” the one who must be Boone says, grinning at me.
“H-hi,” I barely manage. I’m too distracted by the papers. It’s the evidence. The proof that he’s not who he said he was, staring me directly in the face.
Name of Purchaser: Dallas J. Wilder
Name of Establishment: The Hotel Thibodeaux
Bourbon Street
The French Quarter
New Orleans
“I already saw it. And I don’t know why you’d want to show it to me again. Let me out.” I want to move but I would have to crawl over both Dallas and Boone to make my escape. And I’m still feeling woozy.
When I don’t reach for the papers, Dallas flips to the second page, sliding it closer so I can see it clearly. “It’syours, Amelie. Not mine. I get why you would jump to conclusions, but your conclusions were completely wrong. Yes, I’m listed as thepurchaser. But I’m not theowner.One percent is in my name so Ican deal with the paperwork and act as a trustee.Youown it. Free and clear.”
I’m trying to listen and read at the same time but my vision still feels off and what he’s telling me is having trouble absorbing.
“What?” Sadie’s shock is mildly buttered up by the fact that Apollo Wilder is now sitting right next to her, close to her, reading over her shoulder like they’re working on a team project together. She reads aloud: “Name of Owners: Amelie S. Thibodeaux, ninety-nine percent. Dallas J. Wilder, one percent. Cash payment in full.” She looks at me. Then she looks at Apollo. Then she looks at Dallas. “Is this for real?”
“Legal, binding and signed on the dotted line.” The deep, graveled edge to Dallas’s voice brings back a flood of memories.Of him growling my name as we came so hard together. Of him whispering sweet and dirty words as he fed me promises and took me to the heights of pleasure I still haven’t recovered from. I’ll never recover. The reminders, along with the words he’s saying, are making my head spin again.
“You mean … Amelieownsher hotel?” Sadie splutters.
“That’s exactly what I mean,” Dallas confirms.
“But …how?” I hear myself murmur. It was such a long, agonizing, drawn-out process.
“One thing about Dallas is he knows how to get shit done,” Boone offers.
“And my cut-throat brigade of lawyers also know how to get shit done,” Dallas adds. “Everyone has a price. Including that asshole in Houston.”
“But …when?”
“The sale of the hotel was finalized on Wednesday,” Dallas says. “A few of the other details were finalized yesterday. I wanted to make sure everything was in place before I told you about it.”
“You were wrong, by the way,” Apollo bumps his shoulder against Sadie’s playfully and she practically swoons. “About the second part, at least.”
