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“Then we’ll get it and go,” Ezra said. “Or send your little helper here to play fetch and I’ll take you home.” There was just the barest hint of a slur. But he was not drunk—I’d seen Ezra drunk. Endured his drunkenness. What was he doing…?
“Did the King send you?” Milo asked. “I noticed he stopped bidding there towards the end. Did he want you to keep Mayhem from getting the painting?”
Ezra’s jaw tightened and he cut his glare from Milo briefly to me then back again. Son of a bitch. The so-calledkinghad sent him. Milo and Emersyn’s deadbeat father who had been playing all these games behind the scenes—and for whom Ezra and Adam had been working all these years.
“Pretty Boy,” I said, fisting my anger. “Would you please collect my painting?” I handed him the card. Rage poisoned my veins bleeding hot then cold. Both extinguished the desire Ezra had been feeding earlier.
“Are you sure?” Milo frowned. He didn’t want to leave me with him.
“You’ll be quick,” I assured him. “And I’m not going anywhere.”
But I did want a word with Ezra. Privately.
“I’ll be right back.” Aggravation scored those words and I had a feeling that we would be revisiting this in bed later.
Fine.
I could live with that.
As soon as Pretty Boy walked away, I faced Ezra. Not an ounce of repentance reflected in his expression. If anything, Ezra looked angry withme. “You need to stop,” he told me. “I know you think you’re more than capable of swimming in these waters, but you’re not.”
I opened my mouth, but Ezra dragged me to him and wrapped his hand around my jaw, holding me right there.
“Your freedom came at a price, Kotyonok. You have to stop or I’m going to have to stop you. Neither of us has Adam to rely on anymore.”
The last sentence was a punch to the solar plexus. He fused his mouth to mine and seemed to suck all the air from my lungs. The earlier heat licked up through me and left me burned as he yanked his head back.
“Stop,” he whispered, touching his finger to my lips. “Or it won’t end well for anyone…”
Then he pivoted and walked away, leaving me breathless and flushed. The intensity in him was as wild and unpredictable as a summer storm. It also seemed just as violent. Movement around me reminded me that once again, I wasn’t alone, and I searched the faces of those who glanced at me. More than one smirked, at the inappropriate display most likely.
Julius King, however, stared at me for a long moment then looked toward the front where Pretty Boy took possession of the painting in a sealed case. Just behind King was the woman Milo had danced with and she spoke to another man I didn’t recognize. The mixture of unfamiliar sprinkled amongst those I’d known for years reminded me that I was traveling in different circles.
Or maybe it was the circle that had changed. Old families fell out of favor and new ones clawed their way in. Some would look to make their names by knocking out a vulnerable family, the old money versus the new.
I had no friends in this room.
“Lainey…”
Pretty Boy frowned as he studied me. Had he seen Ezra kiss me? I wasn’t sure if he had or not. He hadn’t charged across the room to “save me” but he’d also been playing this game with me tonight. Letting me take the lead—maybe he still was.
“I’m ready to go,” I said and my voice only shook a little. I had one friend in this room.
I had Pretty Boy.
“Take me home?”
ChapterFive
LAINEY
Leaving the event seemed almost anticlimactic after the auction and Ezra’s antics. Pretty Boy kept a firm grip on the case with the painting in it and I moved next to him. While he moved his free hand to my lower back periodically, he didn’t try to take my arm. It didn’t faze me. His watchfulness wrapped around me like a security blanket.
It was easy to forget his rougher background at events like this. Pretty Boy’s gorgeous face gave him this—damn near angelic air but I had zero intention of telling him that. He wore custom suits like he’d been born in them and demonstrated a near effortless restraint I could almost envy.
Wood waited for us with the car. The older man nodded as we descended the steps. When he offered to take the case from Pretty Boy, Milo shook his head. “I have it. Thank you.”
Since Milo rarely let him carry anything, it rolled right off my driver. Once we were in the car and secured, Wood took his place behind the wheel. “Home, Miss?”
