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“Kitten.”
I blanched, put my fingers to my lips. “Don’t… don’t take away Steaming Hotties.”
Tears filled my eyes, and I didn’t see him step right in front of me. He set his hands on my hips. “I wouldn’t.”
I shook my head and a tear slipped down my cheek. “You already have. You have the power here. You said you had people working on growing the business. In less than two days, you’ve already got control of my coffee bean distributors. You had lawyers draw up contracts for God knows what else. We’re married. You can take it all away.”
“You need to calm down.”
“Calm down?” I shouted, then started to pace. “I can’t calm down. I was so stupid. I cammed instead of taking the loan. I should have taken it and then none of this would have happened.” I spun away, shook my head. “I’m an idiot. Why do I always do this? As if getting married was going to solve everything. A fake marriage got me my trust fund back, but you’ll just take the business.”
“I’m not taking your business!” he practically shouted. “As for fake, there’s nothing fake about how I feel about you.”
“Our marriage isn’t real, Silas.”
“It’s real,” he growled.
“It’s based on money, just like every other relationship in my life. My parents, they don’t love each other. They stick together because of greed. My mother dresses me and wants me to play along to whatever the menfolk say, regardless of what I want.Be a good girl, wear my pearls and get a massage.She’s never once heard me. My father doesn’t give a shit about me, only that I, again, fall in line and that’s for me to be married to Cheney. And Cheney, he doesn’t love me. He wants me as arm candy. Oh, and my money. To try and take control. To stop him, Imarriedyou.” I shook my head, refusing to look at him. “Turned out, it wasn’t control I got. While I made the choice to marry for money, I don’t want it. It was never really about the money.”
“Kitten, fuck. No.”
I was outright crying now, and I swiped angrily at my face. “We got what we wanted. You, the deal. Me, the trust fund. I didn’t beg Cheney when he had power over me, but I’m begging you, as my husband. Leave me and Steaming Hotties alone.”
I ran out of the room, ignoring when Silas called my name.
50
SILAS
What the fuck just happened?
I wanted her for her money? That I would take Steaming Hotties from her?
Shit. Shit! I needed to make this right.
I took off after her but didn’t make it ten feet past the office door.
“Silas.”
I stopped, turned. “Mr. Hyport.”
He stood there, hands in his pants pockets. Shit. How much had he heard?
“Son, I think we need to have a talk.”
All of it. He heard the whole thing.
51
EVE
“Why isn’tTheo helping with this?” Bridget asked Mallory, cutting out probably her hundredth feather.
I was at Mallory’s house, down the street from mine. Bridget got wrangled into helping Mallory cut up construction paper pieces of turkeys for her first graders’ Thanksgiving craft projects. And since she got wrangled, she got me involved. She called me a few hours after I got home and buried myself in my bed to wallow in self-pity. Told me Bradley called her and said I was home and that I needed wine.
To Bridget, that didn’t mean the bar or a girls’ night with a box of red and a carton of ice cream. It meant I had a pile of red construction paper in front of me and I was in charge of cutting those wobbly turkey jowls. Mallory said the real term was a wattle, but they were jowls to me.
I didn’t really care. I didn’t care my face was splotchy or that I was in the sweats I wore when I cleaned my house. I didn’t care about anything.
