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She nodded, then returned the gun to the wall.
“Anyway, I showed up just as you were leaving, and Shane—”
Eloise scowled at him. “I don’t want to hear anything you have to say about Shane. He’s shown his true colors, and I just want him out of my life.”
“You really shouldn’t be so hard on him,” Marc said.
“Oh? Why’s that?” Eloise remained standing, unwilling to allow Marc to talk her out of how she was feeling. She needed to let the fury burn through her—to scorch everything bad that had happened so the way she felt about Shane didn’t come back even stronger.
“Because it’s not his fault.” Marc sighed. “It’s really hard to talk to you about this when you’re over there. Can you just… I really shouldn’t even be talking about this at all.” Marc jumped to his feet and paced in front of the couch. “If Madeline knew—” He snapped his mouth shut and then stared at her, pain emanating from his gaze. “Madeline is manipulating Shane. She found out something about your family—I’m not sure what—and threatened to tell everyone. It’s gotta be pretty bad because Shane agreed to give Madeline fifty percent of his business and break up with you, even though he can’t stand her.”
He stopped his pacing and blew out a long breath.
Eloise couldn’t move. She had so many questions, and at the same time, she didn’t want to believe a single word he’d said. Her heart fluttered and heat rushed to her face. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that Shane is only trying to protect you from my sister. I’m really sorry.”
“Why are you telling me this? I thought you and your sister were close.” It was so much harder to find her voice than she thought. Each word took great effort to produce.
Marc moved closer to her, small step by small step. “Because I realized that I don’t want to enable her anymore. She’s not the kind of person I want to be around.” He rubbed one arm and looked away. “It’s like I said. I admire you, Eloise. You’re a good person. I’m not willing to let Madeline hurt you like this. You deserved to know.”
She shook her head vehemently. “No. That’s not good enough. You can’t just come here and drop a bomb like that. We can’t let her get away with this. Shane doesn’t deserve this either.”
Marc’s expression faltered. “You don’t know her like I do. She’s not going to go down easy.”
“You’ve got to know something that could help. We can’t just sit around and do nothing.”
He glanced at her once more, and she was taken aback by the anguish she read in his eyes. “You’re right. I think I know what I have to do.”
25
Shane
Afull week and Shane hadn’t heard from Eloise or anyone in her family. He had half-expected Zeke Callahan to come by his office and demand to know what was going on. But then he reminded himself that the man likely had no clue about their relationship.
The relief from knowing he wouldn’t be getting a visit from the most intimidating man in town was overshadowed by everything else he had to deal with.
He sat in his office chair, trying to focus on his work, but that was proving impossible with Madeline pacing while speaking to someone on her Bluetooth device.
“I don’t care how you do it. You’re going to make it happen.” She glanced in his direction. Oh, how he wished he could wipe that smug smile off her face.
It didn’t matter how many times he ran the scenarios in his head; they always came out wrong. He wasn’t going to be able to stop Madeline. She’d started this train and had it going full steam ahead. Any feet-dragging on his end would prove disastrous.
Madeline got off the phone and pulled the Bluetooth from her ear. “Can you believe it? These people are acting like we can’t completely destroy them with a snap of our fingers. They need to get it in their heads that money is power.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose and took a calming breath. “I’m not going to help you ruin anyone, Madeline. You can’t just expect people to fall in line because you wave a wad of cash in their faces.”
She pouted, wandering toward him, around his desk, then sitting on it beside him. Her fingertip trailed along the desk and tapped a few times. Her fingernails were like the talons of the birds of prey he saw on those nature documentaries as a kid.
Shane flinched from the closeness, and she leaned down closer to his ear. “You’ll do everything I say or suffer the consequences.” She pulled back as she let out a laugh. “When are you going to understand that I own you? And all because you don’t want your precious little friends to have their feelings hurt.”
He pushed out his chair, shooting to his feet. His mind went blank. Anything he might have said would only rile her up more. All he could do was glower at her as he took his jacket from the hook and stormed toward the door.
“Where are you going, Shane? You can’t run from me,” she called after him. “I know this place pretty well now. You can’t hide either.”
Oh yes, he could. He might not be able to find sanctuary on his own property or with the woman he loved, but he could clear his head at one ranch where Madeline wouldn’t find him.
* * *
