time for you to be dragging this shit out. We’re in the middle of closing a massive deal with Ross Winthrope. Would you really deny your parents their lifelong dream?”
For a second, he looks almost human. Then the illusion disappears in a grin with teeth too sharp.
“Fuck her and her shitty hotel! She disowned her only child—all over that dumbass and the stupid boat. Let the world beat off over it until the sun goes out. I don’t have anything to hide.”
“She disowned you because you killed a man. Not because her boat sank.”
“Ward, I didn’t kill that jackass. I just sank the yacht.”
“With him on it. Unconscious. Did he still have a pulse, or were you too high off your ass to check?”
He shrugs coldly. “Your mom and I had to jump off when we did. Anything else, that was his fault. He was younger and in better shape than us. We thought he could make it. God, after he talked up that stupid deal, we thought...never mind.”
How is this piece of shit my father?
I’m glad Maria changed her mind, and my relationship with Paige is fake. No one else should be subjected to this clown show of a family.
It almost makes me sick to imagine continuing this psycho’s bloodline.
“Whatever. Just name a price to get you out of our lives before you give Grandma another heart attack.”
“I don’t care. If she wants me to give two shits about her dream of designing a hotel, maybe she should consider me for once.”
I sigh. “Joke’s on you. I have the trash you sent to the museum.”
He glares at me, his eyes going watery with rage.
“So you came to gloat, then? That’s just fine. I have plenty of other options if the museum doesn’t want to play ball. I’ve never had a hard time getting press, and I’m good at kicking up dust. I know low people in high places.”
Enough!
My hand flies up and snags the bastard’s neck in a chokehold. I slam him into the wall hard enough to shake the whole room.
“Last warning. Stay the fuck away from my family. Leave us alone.”
I storm out the door while he’s still coughing, slamming it so hard it bounces open again.
I’m downstairs and back in my car before I realize I didn’t do the one thing I came here to do.
I grin. That piece of shit didn’t get the one thing he wanted.
My checkbook is still in my pocket, no bribe written.
Guess that’s what happens when you’re such a colossal fucknugget people won’t even pay you to shut your yap.
Paige wears a black and gold thin-strapped dress with a cowl neck.
My eyes are in flames.
The way it dips between her breasts drives me crazy. If this weren’t a business arrangement—if it weren’t expiring—I’d be the luckiest man in the world and I’d damn sure have her in my bed.
A hand slips around her hip and I pull her closer, holding in a lustful purr. The move feels normal after doing it the past few days.
Like Nick said, we have to act the part. Happily engaged. Blissfully gliding on everything but the agonizing ache in my balls.
“You’re beautiful. I mean that sincerely. You always are, but the way that dress fits you today...fuck. No one’s going to be able to rip their eyes off you, Paige.”
Her green eyes shine when she smiles and bites her lip. “Well, thank you.”
“She is beautiful and no one ever takes their eyes off of her,” Reese says.
How did I forget we have an audience?
She’s right, though. The way Nick stared her down when she started working with us, I thought she’d end up another notch on his bedpost. I would have strangled him.
“Ward, you’re cruising with a lady way out of your league. Be good to her,” Reese chimes in again.
I roll my eyes for the thousandth time. Why did Grandma hire such an annoying driver?
“And you’ll be jobless if you keep up the rolling commentary,” I growl.
“Just trying to help you out, man,” she says with a shy shrug.
Paige hasn’t broken eye contact with me yet.
Her smile deepens. “I’m not sure he’d be that easy to replace.”
Shit.
Does she mean that, or is she just playing nice?
“Sure, he is,” Reese says. “It’s Chicago. Billionaire bad boys are a dime a dozen around here.”
“But they don’t all have Poseidon eyes, right?” Paige says, twining that sunshine hair around one finger.