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I just run.
And I don’t stop until I’m sure he’s not coming after me.
A CURSE RIPS FROM my throat as Siena drops the ice pack into my lap, sending pain splintering through my groin. I hiss through my teeth and clutch the arms on my chair, squeezing my eyes shut.
Part of me knows she’s acting out because of how I treated her the last time we sat in my office, but she was the only one available when I limped inside. A smarter man wouldn’t let yetanotherwoman scorned anywhere near him, but this day only proves how stupid I truly am.
“Can you fucking watch where you put that?”
She lifts one shoulder, clad in one of the red, silken robes we keep on-hand for Crimson’s dancers, moving to adjust the gauze strapped to my chin. “That bitch really got you good, huh?”
“Don’t fucking call her that.” I glare at her from narrowed lids as she dabs at the coagulated blood decorating my lip. “And you don’t have to sound so damn smug.”
The harsh overhead light enhances the freckles on her angular face as a soft grin spreads. “Sorry. It’s just not often someone puts you in your place.”
“She didn’t put me in my place.”
“The bruise on your jaw begs to differ.” She cocks an eyebrow, turning to toss the damp paper towel in her hand into the wastebasket beside us.
“I don’t need a reminder, Siena.” Especially when my pride’s just been wounded.
After Caroline cold-clocked me and left me writhing on the sidewalk, afraid of my ability to produce children in the future, a few people from theGazettetrickled out of a cafe and snapped pictures.
Benny helped me inside the SUV and destroyed as many cameras as he could. But the foreboding sense of dread that someone still has photos settled in my stomach hours ago.
At least, that’s what I’m telling myself the dread is about. I don’t want to connect it to the fact that I don’t know where Caroline disappeared to; she ditched her phone at the house, and I’ve yet to bug any of her underwear.
I know she has that list memorized; I just haven’t figured out what the hell she’s doing with it.
But I don’t care. She can get herself butchered, for all the shits I give. Kieran’s been quiet lately, but I’m sure he’d be willing.
The fire in my balls agrees, even if the pinch in my heart says otherwise.
“I just can’t believe she’s still alive.” Siena wipes her hands off with an alcohol pad, and I reach down to move the ice pack over an inch. “Imagine if any of your men pulled this stunt.”
“My men are trained to kill, not wound. If they did something like this, I wouldn’t expect to live to tell the tale.”
“So, you’re letting her off the hook because she’s a dainty little girl?”
“Who said she’s off the hook?”
Siena rolls her eyes. “Jesus, I called you by your first name, and you put me in a chokehold.”
My jaw ticks, irritation bubbling in my stomach. Her voice is beginning to grate on my nerves like nails dragging down a blackboard. “Siena.” She glances over at me as I lift my head. “Shut the fuck up.”
She does, mouth clamping together, but I can hear the hurt in her breathing. It’s soft, stuttered, like she’s actively trying not to annoy me—which, naturally, pisses me off further.Where’s the fight? The fire?
This is why we’d never work beyond sex; she’s already broken, malleable, and there’s no thrill in sculpting her.
Not like there is with my wife, whose fire burns so bright she fucking blinds me just by existing.
The door to my office swings open, my father’s bulky form filling the frame. He stalks inside, slamming the door with his heel so hard the glass windows behind me rattle. Stopping just short of where Siena sits perched on the edge of my desk, he tosses a folded newspaper down, his face turning a deep shade of red.
“Christ, Pops, are you having a heart attack?”
“I fucking must be, because what I see on the goddamn front page of theStonemore Timesis an abomination. I’m so disgusted with you; I could spit.”
Sitting up, I reach and grab the phone he shoves toward me. I’m immediately met by a picture of Caroline’s knee lodged in my groin, followed by a shot of her running off and leaving me in the fetal position on the sidewalk.
