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48
Anna
“Fin…Fin, what are you doing?” I jerked my gaze over my shoulder as he pushed me through the doorway and into what looked like some kind of storeroom.
One flick and a light brightened above us, then he closed the door, leaving us alone.
“Anna!”Dad roared in the other room.
But it was a bit muffled now, locked away. I turned and took a step backwards, glancing at the blood on Fin’s shirt and the madness in his eyes. “Fin…talk to me.”
“Talk to you?” he murmured, and combed his fingers through his hair.“Talk to you?What the fuck do you want me to say, Anna? That I just…killed for you? That Ifuckingmurdered for you? That if my father knew what you’d planned all along, it’d beyourfucking body getting cold out there?”
I flinched with the hatred in his tone.
But it wasn’t hate…was it?
Not the kind I'd expected.
“Max would’ve told him.” His voice deepened as he lowered his gaze. “He would’ve told my father, then there’d be nothing I could do…” he met my gaze, “to protect you.”
Protect me…
I swallowed hard, staring at the blood shining black on his fingers. Fear gripped me, making my knees and my words tremble as I took a step forward. “But you did protect me, Fin.” He flinched at the words, watching me with those careful eyes as I came closer. “You did what you had to do.”
It was our lives on the line here…and my heart. A pang of agony tore through my chest. “You found me, you found me and you did what you had to do.”
Carefully, I reached for him, waiting for him to move. But he didn’t, just stood there with those unfathomable eyes. “You showed me how you truly felt.”
One flare of his jaw and he lashed out, grasping the back of my neck. “Showed you how I felt?Showed you how I felt?I fucking made love to you. I protected you…Itook care of you.”Rage sparked in his gaze. He drove me backwards with long strides, pushing me off balance…driving me toward the far end of the room.
Boxes lined the walls. There were heavy coverings over what looked like stored furniture. I reached out, grasping the corner of something to steady myself before hitting the far wall. Fabric slipped under my grip, sliding from the top of an ornate mirror. The light bounced in the reflection as Finley stepped closer. “I took care of you, even when I knew you were lying.”
My stomach clenched with the pain in his voice. But I couldn’t make myself move…couldn’t fight that cold caress of fear. He was changing, morphing into someone else right in front of my eyes.
“But all that is behind us now.Iput it behind us. Max is dead, Pavlov is dead, no one but me knows what you were planning to do.” He took another step closer, pushing me against the wall. The scent of blood filled my nose as he brushed his thumb across my cheek. “My father will never know…that’s why you won’t work for him anymore.”
My stomach roiled.
“You will work for me instead.” He lifted his gaze to mine. “You will launder for me, you will clean money for me. You will find new ways of hiding moneyfor me…and when the time comes, you will take my side.”
Take his side?“What does that mean, Fin?”
He stepped closer, lowering his hand to my shirt. Bloodied fingers worked the buttons, opening them one by one as he dipped his head. “We can take our time, plan out the rest of our lives. But make no mistake, there is no life for me without you in it.”
Thunder clashed overhead. “What are you saying?”
“I will own you. Iwillhave you,” he whispered in my ear. The brush of his lips at my neck made my heart race. But that sickening, heavy feeling gripped my stomach as his words finally took hold.
This was not agreement…this was coercion.
“Mine,” he growled. “You will be mine.”
I slid out from against him and stumbled away. “You want me to, what? Obey you? To lie for you? To…love you?”I sucked in hard breaths. “What do you want, Fin? Tell me, because I don’t understand this at all!”
“Lie, love, fuck, marry,” he growled through clenched teeth as he turned toward me. “I want it all when it comes to you. There are no boundaries I won’t cross, no lies I won't tell…no blood I will not spill.”
His gaze shifted when he said those words, as though in that moment, he understood the lengths he’d go to. Cold wrapped itself around me. I was frozen to the core, numb, and yet filled with burning hunger all at the same time. He didn’t look toward the doorway, didn’t draw my attention to my father’s life hanging in the balance…he didn’t have to.
