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“My brain doesn’t work right.”
“Your brain is just fine.”
She shakes her head. And this time, when she looks at me, I finally get the feeling she sees me. “I need to go back,” she says, with more focus than I’ve heard since dinner.
“There’s no way in hell Gage Rider’s letting either one of us back in that club.”
“No. Not the club.”
I wait.
“I need to go to Herzog’s house.”
“What the actual fuck do you think—”
“That’s where I lost it.”
“Lostwhat?”
I see her test answers in her mind. I can practically hear all the things she doesn’t say:My dignity. My value. My mind.But out loud, she says, “Take me there, and I promise I’ll never ask for another thing again.”
“Goddammit, Alix—”
I see her knees twitch beneath that fucking green dress. I watch her hands lift, on their way to her head. She fights back. She stops herself. But she’s shaking from the effort.
I don’t want to be the man who tortures her. Not tonight, when she’s already been through so much. Not ever. “Alix…”
“Please,” she begs.
And God help me, I do it. I lower the screen between us and Charles. I give him the fucking address. And I lean my head back, close my eyes, and try to believe I’m doing the right thing.
33
ALIX
* * *
Trap’s given in, but he’s angry with me. Emotions vibrate off him like heat. His knuckles are bruised, and I wonder who he punched. I hope he hasn’t burned his bridges with Gage Rider. The freeport shouldn’t lose another top-ten client over me.
After fifteen minutes of silence, Trap mutters something under his breath. He leans forward and breaks into the limo’s well-stocked cooler. When he passes me a bottle of water, I shake my head, but he says. “Take it.”
I do.
And I have to admit, I feel better after I drink it.
I’m trying to remember everything that happened at the club. Everything’s crystal clear, right up to the moment Jonas Herzog clicked his tongue. After that, it’s like I’m watching myself from a drone that hovers near the ceiling. I can see what the Herzogs did. I watch how I reacted. But I don’t remember anything about how I felt.
I’m tired. So tired. I think that if I fall asleep, all of this will drift away. I won’t even have the drone view anymore. I’ll be back in the penthouse, sad that Trap stepped out for a business meeting. I’ll be ready for bed after a fabulous dinner at a world-class restaurant.
I lean my head against the window, but the vibration of the moving car keeps jolting me upright. Trap swears again and wriggles out of his jacket. He thrusts it at me, but I don’t reach out. Once again, he orders: “Take it.”
I fold his coat neatly and use it as a pillow. I’m asleep before we pass Newark Airport.
When I jerk awake, I can’t figure out where I am. The car has stopped. I’m shivering, like I’ve been walking to the North Pole. My entire body aches, but there’s a special pain flaring deep inside my armpits. My dress feels like it’s flayed the skin off my chest, like it’s rubbing against the bare bones of my sternum and ribs.
“Where are we?” I ask, peering out the window.
“Herzog’s house,” Trap says. He sounds like his throat is lined with shattered glass.
