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He sputtered out a sound. “Trust me, man. I’m not laughing. But I am curious. Are you pissed to hear her name because you blame her for what happened or because you’re upset to learn how she turned out?”
My fingers tightened in his shirt as I narrowed my eyes. “Why would I blame her for anything?”
He blew out a breath. “You shouldn’t. And it’s a relief to hear yo
u say you don’t. Now back up off me so I can breathe. Then I’ll explain everything. I never lied to you.”
I let go of his jugular and lifted both hands as I took a step back. “So, what? You just forgot to mention she works here? She fucking works here? Did you never hear what happened to us?”
The fucker took his sweet time answering as he straightened his shirt and wiped a palm over his face before drawing in a deep breath. Then, all he said was, “Oh, I heard. It was the big talk in our neighborhood months after you were arrested.”
That’s when I lost it. My breathing had picked up and my core temperature broiled off the charts. Even my fingers tingled with the urge to curl them into fists and start swinging. But learning she worked here—with me—was more than I could take.
“How can she work here, the daughter of a millionaire? She should be off at some Ivy League university getting a doctorate in fucking psychology while she’s engaged to some rich son of a bitch, who showers her with love and affection and all that shit. She should not be here, slaving as a waitress in some seedy-ass bar with all kinds of scumbags grabbing her ass whenever she brings them their beer. What...the fuck?”
Glowering, Pick folded his arms over his chest. “Okay, I’m going to ignore the fact you just called my highly classy nightclub seedy, and I’m going to tell you Felicity cut ties with her family the day she turned eighteen. She never went to college…because she couldn’t afford it. She struggles just to make ends meet.”
The air felt socked from my lungs as I stared at him. I couldn’t quite understand what I was hearing, because it made no sense at all. “No.” I shook my head, confused. When Pick opened his mouth to say more, I banged him once more against the wall. “Why would she do that? Why?”
She had to have gone to college. It’d been her life goal. Her dream to be a child psychologist. I’d spent the last six years surviving hell and convincing myself it’d been worth it because at least she’d been able to follow her dream. That was the only thing I’d ever wanted. I couldn’t bear to hear otherwise. I couldn’t handle learning she’d suffered through one miserable day.
Except, shit. If she hadn’t gone to college as she’d planned, then she hadn’t become a child psychologist, and she hadn’t done anything she’d really wanted to do. She was stuck working as a fucking waitress, while some douchebag had cheated on her?
I felt sick to my stomach hearing how she’d moved on to someone else, but Jesus, learning she wasn’t even pampered and cherished and spoiled rotten by the fucker twisted the knife deeper.
“Why do you think she left them?” Pick asked, reminding me I still held his shirt in my hands and had his back once again rammed against the wall. When he lifted an eyebrow as if I should already know why she’d abandoned her family, I growled.
“Because of me?”
When he didn’t answer, I spun away from him and ran my hands over my head, letting the stubble on my scalp scrape against my palms. My stomach heaved, and I worried I really might be sick. So I bent at the knees and rested my hands on them.
But the rage and overwhelming helplessness from what I’d just learned consumed me. With a roar, I straightened and kicked the first thing in my path—which happened to be Pick’s desk—with the flat of my foot. It flew over onto its side and crashed to the floor, sending papers and his computer flying.
When the glass in the screen broke, shattering across the floor, I stared in amazement, unable to believe what I’d done... until the urge to do more flooded me.
“God...damn it!” I roared at the top of my lungs.
She was supposed to be taken care of, protected, spoiled, happy.
Not this.
The fury and need to destroy took over. I spun toward the wall and reared back my arm, slamming my fist into sheetrock. Absorbing the pain in my knuckles as they split open and bled over the backs of my fingers, I hit the wall again, relishing it.
“What the hell?!” As the office door burst open, I whirled toward Noel and all the others spilling in behind him, my thirst to punch more peaking.
But Pick stepped closer, lifting both his hands in a placating manner. “He’ll be fine, guys. Just give us a minute.”
Except it was obvious to everyone gaping at me and past me toward Pick’s ruined desk and computer that I was anything but fine.
Noel shook his head. “No way, man. We’re not leaving you alone with this psycho. What’s going on?”
I stalked toward him. “Are you deaf? He said leave us the fuck alone.” I swung at him, but he ducked.
And my fist connected with the jaw of the guy behind him.
Ten immediately howled, clutching his face. “Shit, man. What’d I do?”
Instantly contrite for catching him and not Noel, even though Ten had annoyed the hell out of me the first day I’d met him, I took a step back, my fingers uncurling. The red disappeared from my vision, and as I blinked it away, the fury subsided.
