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“Looks like you do. It looks like Ed fucking owns you,” I whisper, barely getting the words out as my gaze searches his. He keeps the closeness between us, making my thighs shift against his with anxious energy.
“I stopped accepting money from Ed the day he took you away.” His gaze flashes from my lips to my eyes, and once again I’m tempted to throw myself at this unhinged man just to calm my racing hormones down a notch.
I can’t deny the way my heart softens instantly at his words.
His fingers brush back my hair, and I hate that my head tilts the slightest bit to lean into his attention there.
“I chose you, Little Bird. Even before you knew I chose you. If anyone owns me, it’s you.”
God, my knees just went weak, and I have to force myself not to lean into him. I keep my back firmly against the wall.
“Why are you still in contact with him? Why does it sound like you’re keeping tabs on me for him?”
“It’s quite the opposite, Little Bird...” A smirk kisses his lips then, and confusion sinks in slowly.
“What do you mean?”
“I was hoping you’d like to make a change in our lives.” His smile turns sick and sadistic. It’s an expression that puts my anger on pause.
“What do you mean?” I ask once more, slower, quieter.
“Your mother still resides in a private mental health facility in Athens, Ohio. It’s a private institution that Ed owns.”
I nod, not daring to interrupt the moment he mentions my mother and that dreadful place.
“Did you know Ed had your mother assign himself as her legal guardian and power of attorney when they were together?”
I shake my head slowly. “The institute just keeps saying she’s not stable enough to be released. They won’t talk to me.”
“Because Ed keeps it that way. He blackmailed her decades ago.” Rowan whispers. “I want to get her released. I want her to be here with you. And I want to fuck Ed’s entire world up in the process.”
My mouth parts but I can’t respond. The information swirls wildly in my mind, and it all feels out of reach. Impossible.
Never in my wildest dreams could I conjure up this fantasy he’s painting. It always seemed like something completely out of reach, and I trained myself to believe that there was absolutely nothing to be done about what Ed did to my mom. Standing here now I feel a surge of hope. For the first time since it happened. And I have zero doubt Rowan Stone is exactly the kind of man who can make it reality.
“How?” I finally ask, and that single question only makes his manic smile grow larger.
“I thought you’d never ask, Little Bird.”
Twenty-Six
Rowan
The two of us are running on around three hours sleep when I send her into the back of the Ripped Seam with the little woman holding a pile of sparkling gowns and lacy material that’s stacked so high, only her glasses shine from over the fabrics.
“These will all look so lovely on your figure, dear,” the woman says as she shuffles behind Atlas. “Your hourglass figure is to die for.”
I eat up the sight of that fucking “hourglass figure”. Every curve of her body is maximized, full, fucking delicious. I’d bury my face in the perfect roundness of her thick ass if she’d let me.
But I doubt the little woman helping us right now would appreciate that gesture.
The woman walks into the fitting room first, and the clank of the hangers resounds through the empty store. While the woman sets her up, Atlas shoots me a nervous smile that clearly screams she feels like an inconvenience for coming into the store before they even open at ten. It’s not an inconvenience when they charge a five-thousand-dollar consultation fee just to open the door for us. Not that Atlas will ever know that.
“Now you slip into the first one, and I’ll sneak in to zip you up, dear,” the woman says before ushering Atlas in. She gives me one more wide-eyed look before the door is closed securely behind her.
She’s so out of her element.
I fucking love it.
