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“This afternoon.”
One brow slinked upward. “And you sent her away, yes?”
Hesitating, I pulled a face. “Not exactly.”
A hoarsely spoken curse flew out of his mouth. “Why would you agree to see her, Addison? And why the hell didn’t you call me?”
Uh, apparently there was something we weren’t straight on. It seemed best to rectify that problem now. “Where there’s a chance of physical danger, I will call you. Other times? No. I’m not some fragile creature that can’t handle her own shit.”
He clenched his jaw. “I told you that Mimi can get handsy.”
“I’ve got news for you—so can I. If she ever comes at me, she won’t walk away unscathed. So I suppose it’s fortunate for her that causing me physical pain wasn’t on her agenda today.”
“What did she say to you?”
“A lot. To summarize … she would never talk to the tabloids about you, she loathes herself for wanting you, she’s certain you’ll never love me or anyone else, she wants to understand why you married me, and she believes that only one woman from your past other than her sister really meant something to you.” My belly began rolling at the mere thought of the latter part. “Mimi talked about her quite a bit.”
His brow knitted. “Who?” he asked with complete bewilderment, as if he had literally not one idea who Mimi could possibly have named.
“Angel.” Careful to keep my tone even, ignoring the way my gut twisted, I added, “Mimi said you were obsessed with her. Very protective and possessive.”
His frown deepening, he gave a dismissive shrug. “Angel and I had a brief fling—nothing more,” he stated so firmly I couldn’t doubt him for even a second.
And once again, the world became a fabulous, most wondrous place.
My insides no longer churning, I said, “Either Mimi doesn’t believe that, or she just wanted to convince me differently. She certainly tried convincing me that you were still involved with Angel.”
His shoulders stiffening, he did a slow blink. “Say that again.”
“She showed me an old photo that she has saved in her phone—apparently her friend took it from afar and then sent it to Mimi to show her you’d moved on. It was a picture of you and Angel looking quite cozy together while standing outside the strip club you used to own. Mimi tried making me believe it was a recent photo. She was unsuccessful at that, which pissed her off somewhat.”
He stared at me, his jaw tightening, his expression chilling. “She insinuated that I could be cheating on you?” he asked, a rough quality to every word, as if he was fighting back a growl.
Nibbling on my lower lip, I nodded. “Yup.”
A cold rage swam into his eyes, icing them over. His neck corded, he smashed his lips together and dragged in a breath through his nose.
“I don’t know if she went to my office with the intention of playing that game. She claimed it was a spur of the moment idea that she ran with because I remained aloof in the face of her attempts to goad me.”
“Whether or not she planned it is irrelevant,” he gritted out, every word sharp as a blade.
“I agree, I’m just saying I’m unsure if she intended all along to tell such a tale. Whatever the case, she was set on making me feel how she feels—hurt, angry, jealous. But she couldn’t claim you cared forherto wrench such reactions out of me, so she chose one of your past bed-buddies instead.”
“You shouldn’t have given her the time of day.”
I jutted out my chin. “It was my opportunity to get the message across that I’m here for good and she needs to deal with it.” Not that she’d believed me. “I just want her to leave you alone. I don’t like that she does things that hurt you. I don’t like that she won’t accept what you want and don’t want. It’s no different from you wanting to communicate to Grayden that he needs to back off.”
Dax’s mouth set into a hard slash, his eyes flaring. He hadn’t yet told me what got said between him and my ex. All he’d said was that it had been “sorted.”
Shaking his head in incredulity, Dax turned his body slightly and pinned his gaze on a spot on the wall.
I pushed to my feet. “Her behavior can’t be that much of a surprise to you. Youhadto know before we got married that Mimi might make a nuisance of herself.”
“I didn’t suspect she’d go this far,” he replied without meeting my gaze. “Act out in petty ways? Yes. That’s always been her style. But try to cause serious problems in my marriage? No. That’s a whole other level of vindictive.”
“If it makes you feel any better, she didn’t do it to hurt you. That was an attempt to hurtme.”
His brows slamming together, he turned back to me. “That doesn’t make me feel better at all. Far from it. You’re mine. She has no fucking right to go anywhere near you. And it pisses me off that I wasn’t able to shelter you from her bullshit. I didn’t see it coming.”
