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“I won’t have you running back to him with every little detail of what I’m doing. You will tell him exactly where you stand by staying here. That way, I can keep a fucking eye on you.”
“You aren’t requiring this of the others.” His voice rises with panic, but I don’t care.
“The others didn’t betray me.”
“I didn’t—”
“You weren’t honest with me.” I step closer to him, and he moves back a little. My hands fist the front of his shirt, lifting his toes off the ground with the force. “I won’t be a fool again. If you are on my side—and you’d damn better hope you are—then you will do what I fucking say.”
Lucas’s eyes grow furious. He’s tired of being pushed around.
Too fucking bad.
But he won’t say anything. He knows I have him.
The more I think about it, the better the idea is for me to keep him close. You know the whole saying,Keep your friends close and your enemies closer? That’s my entire life.
“You are staying.”
“What about Arie? I can’t leave her there alone. She was a part of this too.”
Geo shifts again. He’s going to have to get it under control.
“She can stay here too.”
“My father will never let her leave. Or me.”
“That’s not my problem,” I tell him.
If he wants back in my good graces, he can figure it out. I turn to walk out and then pause at the door when I hear Geo speak. But he’s not addressing me.
“Who is she marrying?” he asks Lucas.
I grimace. He’s showing too much emotion. It’s not the time for that.
“Hell if I know. Someone my father picked, I’m sure,” Lucas says.
I can’t see him with my back to them, but his voice is angry.
“When?” Geo asks, and there’s a pause.
“I don’t know,” Lucas says.
I step outside, waiting for Geo. As soon as he follows me out, I shut the door and push him against the wall. I hold his chest and level him with a glare.
“Now isn’t the time to be getting sentimental,” I tell him, and his eyes narrow in anger. “You know you can’t put a bid in for her. They would never accept you as a second son. You have nothing to offer. Not to mention, you are in league with me. They wouldn’t let you within a ten-mile radius of her now.”
“You are the one who invited her and her brother to stay here.”
“They won’t. He will never have the balls to leave Daddy. It was a bluff.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Geo says, and we glare at each other.
I don’t think Lucas is really on our side. And with that, he’s going to take Arie down with him. But right now, there’s nothing I can do about it unless they do decide to come here. I can’t save everyone. When a war is coming, choices can make or break a person, and everyone is having to make them right now, Lucas and Arie included.
“You could extend the invitation to her personally,” he says.
“I’m not taking that on.”
