“Because I love the art too, Charlotte. It’s why I pay millions of dollars to acquire it legally. It’s why people all over the world buy and make and trade it—because we love it, because it tells a story, because it makes us feel less alone.Notbecause we want people like you to steal it from us, and then sit back and talk about it like it’s a bloody thing of reverence.”
“I’ve kept things from you,” she said. “A lot of things—really important stuff. But what I shared with you… That was real. You’re the first man I’ve ever… No one else knows those things about me. Before you, no one else had even asked.”
The admission left her naked, but Dorian seemed unaffected.
“Is this the part where you tell me I’mdifferent?” he asked, making air quotes around the word. “That what we had wasspecial?”
His mockery burned to the core.
“Itwasspecial,” she said. “Say whatever you want—I deserve it. But my mistakes don’t change what we shared. It was real, Dorian, no matter how quickly it happened, no matter what circumstances brought us together. You can’t go back and undo it.”
Especially after the way you looked at me in the dining room…
“You undid it for me,” he snapped.
“But I—”
“I know. You didn’t have a choice. Right?”
“I grew up thinking this was normal. And by the time I figured out it wasn’t, it was too late.”
“Newsflash, love. It’sstilla choice. One you make again every time you wake up and decide to stay in the business another day.”
Charley huffed, her defenses rising. “Likeyouwake up every day and decide to remain a vampire?”
“Idon’thave a choice about what I am.”
“Rudyownsme,” she said. “Not only is he my sole source of income, but he’s also made it very clear that this is my job for life. If I try to leave him, if I make any more mistakes, if I don’t follow through on my end of the deal, he’ll kill me. He’ll kill Sasha. So fine, maybe Idohave a choice about whether or not to commit a crime. But when it comes to staying alive? To protecting my sister? Sorry—that’s not a choice.”
Dorian’s eyes blazed again, but then softened, and he looked away, taking a slow sip of scotch. Charley suspected he was thinking about his own brothers—what he might be driven to do if their lives were at stake.
No matter how much he’d bickered with them—even with Gabriel—Charley knew he cared for them. She could see it in his eyes.
After a long pause, Dorian said, “So the money… How exactly does it work?”
Charley told him about the hierarchy, the payouts, how Rudy took over after her father’s death.
“He became the new boss, and he put himself in charge of everything—the books, the assets, the whole operation. We liquidated most of my father’s personal collection, but because I was so naive, a lot of that money went straight back into the operation. I live in my father’s penthouse, but I’m not paying for maintenance and upkeep—that’s all Rudy. I don’t manage my own credit cards. As pathetic and impossible as it may seem, I don’t even have a checking account.”
Charley’s face burned.
Thirty-two years old, and I’m as dependent as a child.
Dorian stared into the fireplace, his jaw clenching. “What transpired this morning? Why did your uncle attack you?”
Charley looked at him through glazed eyes, her breath catching. They were getting closer to the specifics—to her role in the planned heist of Dorian’s estate. Even after everything she’d shared, the idea of voicing those particular details left her burning with new shame.
“I screwed up my end of the deal,” she said. “Rudy wanted me to convince you to take me and your brothers out of town next weekend, leaving Ravenswood clear.” Dorian’s eyes widened, but Charley pressed on. “I wasn’t going to, Dorian. I told him it was too soon—that you’d get suspicious.”
“Obviously, he didn’t like that response.”
“No. He accused me of… of having feelings for you.”
Dorian raised an eyebrow, but Charley would neither confirm nor deny. What was the point? They were done. Hadn’t he made that clear enough already?
“That,” Dorian said suddenly, jabbing a finger toward her collarbone, where Rudy’s handiwork still throbbed. “That’s the kind of man you work for. The kind of man your father left you with. The kind of man who thought nothing of harming his own flesh and blood just because he didn’t get his way.”
She nodded. He wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t already know.
