Page 52 of Return to the Island

27

Tack

“Juliet.” As many times as I said her name, she hadn’t looked at me. Her body still trembled against mine and only the relief I had was she still allowed me to touch her.

Rory. What a cocksucker. I don’t know how he’d gotten into the club, or where he came from, but in my attempts to play it cool, I hadn’t kicked him out. Then I saw the horror on her face and everything rushed back to me. I don’t know what I was thinking bringing her to Consequence. The club wasn’t a place I visited often myself and I owned the property. And as for my parents. Like I told my dad, I wanted his approval but I didn’t know why. I’d hardly had it for anything I’d done in life. The only person I wanted to approve of me was Juliet, and she sat like a quivering pebble next to me. My hand rubbed up and down her bare arm in this beautiful dress that took my breath away the moment she entered the room. I wanted to rip it off her and burn it knowing he’d had his hands on her.

I’d murmured so many I’m sorrys into her hair, she eventually closed her eyes, shutting out the sight of me. She hadn’t spoken.

Different but the same. I’d promised and I failed. After the conversation I’d had with my father that morning, I was shaken. I’d made another huge mistake in assuming he’d stop judging me if he could just see that I was happy, and she was the reason. Instead, he snapped.

How can you be with that harlot? he had barked into the phone.

Women like her aren’t for marriage, he’d added after she excused herself from the room. I hadn’t noticed Rory slip out, as I was too engaged in arguing with my dad. Granted, the bombshell of announcing her as my fiancée hadn’t gone how I had planned, but I figured ripping off the bandage was the best way to break the news to them. I didn’t realize I’d break Juliet instead.

Broken was exactly how she looked sitting next to me. Her skin cold. Her eyes closed. Her fingers gripping the car’s seat. Henry was driving us back to my place in Baltimore. Juliet was strong inside and I told myself she just needed time to work through what happened. I didn’t have the patience to return her to St. Michael’s and The Mouse Trap. We needed to be alone and soon.

“Where are we?” she asked, when we arrived at my condominium.

“Home,” I replied and she blinked at me, the first moment she’d acknowledged me.

“I don’t live here.” She drew in a deep breath. “I don’t belong here.” Panic filled her voice and she leaned forward, her hand reaching for the door handle.

“You belong wherever I am. We belong together,” I told her, reaching for her wrist and pulling back her arm. “Henry drive,” I barked, rapping on the window between us. The privacy window went up and the car pulled back into the lane as Juliet tried to scramble away from me.

“What?” she snapped, shifting to face me. “Now you’re going to trap me in this car?”

“I just want to stay here until you calm down.”

“Calm down? Calm down!” she yelled. “How could you do this to me? Of all the people who knew how difficult it would be to go to that location, be on that floor, how could you take me there?” She paused, huffing out a breath. “And your parents? Your father is vile. And your mother, she’s like the walking dead. She’s not only afraid of him, she’s afraid of you. She warned me against you.”

“When?” She’d shifted to face me but my eyes remained forward, taking her harshness like a blow to the cheek.

“When I met her. She told me I was brave and then she looked at you with fear.” I swiped a hand through my hair. I’d brought Juliet to show my mother I could be a gentleman, that I was doing the right thing by her, and she still didn’t believe in me.

“You know what, fuck them. I don’t need them. I only need you.” My voice fell on the last statement as I reached for her hand. She pulled back, and I let my fingers fall to her thigh. She brushed it away, tugging at the dress, which was shorter when she sat. She looked so beautiful, but so angry.

“How can you touch me?” she asked. “How can you touch me after him? How could you let him touch me?”

I spun to face her, gripping her arm with rough hands. “I would never let him touch you. I didn’t even know he’d followed you until I came in search of you myself.”

“He said you would share me. He said you share everything.”

“Never,” I hissed. “Never again.” The clarification cost me. Her eyes opened wide but she already knew my sins. “Do you think so little of me?”

“I don’t know what to think. I don’t know who you are. That isn’t the you I know. The you I trust. The man I love.”

My hands slipped down her arm in defeat. I didn’t even recognize myself. I’d tried to fall into the role I’d held before—Tack Corbin, club owner, business mogul, son of Terror—and bring her with me. It didn’t work. That wasn’t me anymore, and it wasn’t right for her. I was a better me with her.

“I can’t do this,” she said. “Let me out of this car.”

“What are you saying?” She banged on the privacy window and Henry lowered the glass.

“Take me home,” she pled with him. “Get me out of here.” Henry’s eyes met mine through the rearview mirror. I nodded and he replied, “As you wish.” He turned onto the interstate heading for her apartment.

+ +

When we arrived at her home, I followed her.