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CHAPTER7
ALLEGRA
I’m not sure why I blurted out my darkest secret like that. I’m such an idiot. Now what? He will make it so much worse, whatever this is.
I think back to when it started. A note through my door one morning that I passed off as a prank. It said.
I know your secret.
I shrugged it off, but then the calls started. A rasping husky voice whispering filthy things in my ear. I blocked the number, but they rang with a different one every single time.
The threats became obscener, deranged even, and I set all my calls to voicemail. Then the emails came, and I reported them. They kept coming. There was a note on my car promising I would die in a horrific crash. There was the letter sent to my parent’s home telling me I would be kidnapped and sacrificed to the devil.
Then I got the letter saying that unless I paid ten thousand pounds, my brother would be framed for murder. Rafferty knew about the other stuff, but I didn’t want to burden him with that as well because the woman who was murdered had spent the night before in bed with him. He was so freaked out about it anyway, I didn’t want to increase the pressure, so I raided my savings and that’s where this began.
I stare at the man opposite and wonder if I can trust him with this. The trouble is, he’s hardly a superhero, more like an anti-hero and I should be more terrified about the imminent danger I’m in rather than what’s waiting for me back in New York.
However, despite everything turning to shit in my life, one sentence has me more worried than anything else. Seven days and seven nights. What the hell does that mean?
We finish our main course in silence. I wish I could be happy about that, but he spent the entire time staring into my eyes while he ate, and it was kind of unnerving.
As soon as the dishes are cleared and the wine once again topped up, he leans forward and says huskily, “What is your answer?”
“No.” I shrug. “It will always be no.”
He nods and for one foolish second, I think he’s accepted defeat and I jump when he stands and moves to my side of the table, reaching for my hand.
He pulls me to my feet and for one terrifying moment, I believe he’s going to toss me to a watery grave. I jump as he pulls me into his arms, hard and tight, and whispers, “Wrong answer.”
I struggle to move, but he has me in some kind of super hold, and I hate that he must feel my terrified heart beating against his black one.
He dips his lips to my ear and whispers, “Seven days and seven nights is a small price to pay for my help.”
“Only you think that.” I hiss back and he chuckles softly against my ear and says in a low voice, “I will treat you like a queen. You will want for nothing, and I will show you a world you will never believe.”
“My answer is still no.”
I am fading fast because he is overpowering my senses. There is something so desirable about a dangerous man. I never appreciated that before, but I am falling hard for his charm. I want to sample the forbidden fruit so badly, but I am terrified of him and the fact I may fall so hard I’ll crack.
He whispers huskily, “There is something I forgot to mention.”
I still as his hand wraps around my hair and tightens his grip, and the tears spring to my eyes.
He pulls my head back to face him, and the dark expression on his face sends shivers down my spine.
“You have no choice.”
There he is. The man I guessed he was. No different to the man he murdered, reaching out and taking what he wants regardless, and it makes me so angry I can’t even see him through the red mist of anger.
“You don’t scare me.” I lie in a futile attempt to gain the upper hand.
“Are you sure about that, princess?”
He smirks and tugs my head back and brushes his lips against mine.
“You should be scared.” He whispers as that infernal string quartet keeps playing as if their lives depend on it and they probably do.
My eyes water with the pain, but there is something so compelling about those eyes that stare at me with a chaotic madness. They contain a broken beauty that hides a thousand secrets.
