Chapter 27
Twenty-Seven
Vicky
Iawake with the dawn light through the blinds, filling the room. Alex’s arm is around me, his hand on my breast. How does he manage to keep it there while we’re asleep?
I shift, and wince as my body protests. Everywhere aches, but my pussy is tender. It’s a dull throb that serves as a reminder… as if I could forget what he did to me.
Just the thought makes me clench, which in turn makes me wince. Damn it.
Alex stirs behind me. “Morning, beautiful.”
“You’re mean,” I mutter. “Do you know how sore I am? You’re a mean meanie who’s sadistically mean.”
He chuckles, a contented, smug sound. “Take a bath.”
It’s casually delivered, and he probably doesn’t even intend it like that, but I still tense. I still react. My nipples tighten, I clench, get wet, cringe as my body protests.
I don’t know if he notices or not, but his arm slips away, then he’s getting out of our bed. He walks past me a moment later, belting a robe. “I’ll make some coffee.”
He walks out, and I can’t help admiring the way the silk stretches over his shoulders, the narrowness of his waist, and the tightness of his ass. He leaves the door open behind him.
I roll onto my back, trying to get comfortable, and stare at the ceiling.
“I love you.”
“I know you do.”
My body isn’t the only thing that aches. My heart aches far more.
Why had I thought it would be any different?
Why had I thought his possession of me meant anything?
I’m just a toy to him, an object, something to own while it amuses him. Then discard, when he gets bored again.
This isn’t an engagement. At worst, it’s hate sex. At best, backsliding. It’s temporary, superficial, and I’m the only one at risk of getting hurt.
We’re not even at our home. We’re at his apartment, a bachelor pad, like I’m a visitor.
That’s what I am, isn’t it? I see it clearly now.
He wasn’t going to ever let me go, because he can’t bear to lose something he owns. But he doesn’t want me, he wants the idea of me.
Alex walks back in with two cups and the aroma of fresh coffee, and I sit up and somehow find it within me to smile.
I’m masking now. Keeping my thoughts private, until I can figure out how to leave again.
And go where?
One thing at a time.
I accept the cup and take a sip. It’s black, just like his. Either he has no milk, or after nine months, he still doesn’t know how I have my coffee. Both equally likely.
“Is it Sunday?” I ask, momentarily unsure.
He answers as I remember. “Yes.”
“Any plans?” Are you going to leave me alone?
“None. What would you like to do?”
He’s never once asked me that before. And now that he has, I don’t have an answer.
“I thought I’d go and see Carol,” I say tentatively, to see if he’d let me. Then mentally kick myself; now he’ll know where I go, if I do manage to leave.
“Why don’t you do that tomorrow, while I’m at work?” he asks. “I’d like to spend the day with you.”
I blink at that. First, no objection to me going somewhere alone, like I’m an actual adult. Second, the casual assumption that Carol will be around tomorrow, like no one else but him is busy in the working week. And third… the active interest in me.
Just a toy to own, I remind myself. Because it’s all too easy to fall for him, all over again, every minute of every day. Be strong.
“What would we do?” I ask. “Buy me underwear?”
It was a throw-away flippancy because I didn’t think he’d agree, but his eyes smolder. “That sounds fun.”
Shit.
He reaches for his phone while I hide my consternation in my coffee mug. Thank God for his inability to go a few minutes without checking his email.
“Booked in for La Perla at eleven,” he says a minute later.
Double-shit. Not his email then.
“And there’s plenty of places for a nice lunch on Madison Avenue,” he adds.
It can’t be too late to get out of this.
“Alex… I’m not sure I want to do that today,” I try. “I’m still sore from last night.”
“You’ll be fine,” he says bracingly, trampling over my concerns. “I’m looking forward to it now.”
Great. That’s our day fixed, set in stone, as consensual as everything else we’ve done.
Maybe I can throw his mood off with the other things we need to talk about.
“So… um… how did you know that Van Wyk was going to take your finger?”
There’s no hesitation, no unguarded tensing, but he does drink some coffee before he answers. “What do you mean?”
“When you saw the knife there was no reaction. And your next words were, ‘the desk or the table.’”
He tilts his head. “When were you going to tell me you investigated Northbridge Capital?”
I go still, my pulse jumping.
He’s just deflected a question about his secret to ask another about mine—but it’s not even a secret. He thinks it is, that’s why his mind went there. I’d have told him if he wanted to know. Hell, I assumed he did know: it was for the arbitration where we met.
But that’s not the point. The point is that he’s accusing me of… what… being disingenuous?
Which means he is.
“It was a while ago,” I say carefully. “Before we met.” And I hadn’t even given it any thought. It was dry, just the necessary process to understand the opponent. That’s all I was hired to do, through Dalton Reed Consulting, my previous company. Franklin gave me that job.
Why has it even come up?
“What are you investigating now?” Alex asks, all casual, when he’s never in his life shown an interest in my work.
I pull the duvet up higher, balance my coffee cup on my thigh, and keep my tone level.
“A construction company. They have an expenses fraud case.” That’s twice I’ve used that lie, but I never thought I’d be talking to Alex the same way I spoke to Van Wyk.
I’m not sure why I’m even lying, save that Alex’s line of questions concern me. “Why are you asking?”
“Just curious.” He gives a disarming smile, but I know him too well. That’s his negotiating smile, when he’s trying to obscure his real intent.
Someone has put him up to this. It’s the only thing that fits.
And once I’ve made that connection, everything becomes obvious.
He had absolutely no interest in my work yesterday morning, or the day before, or the week before that.
But a trip to Fournier… to Van Wyk… and he’s asking questions he’s never asked before.
Van Wyk knows. He knows I’m investigating him. It wasn’t merely a suspicion—or if it was, his suspicion is strong enough to use Alex to dig too.
Or maybe it’s Fournier. He’s the one that gives the orders.
What did they talk about on their oh-so-civilized walk outside?
I see my mistakes laid out before me. The paper trail to the medical examiner’s office.
Is that trackable? My questions of Amelia, in a room that I suspected was bugged.
I was careful, yes, but careful enough? And immediately after I’d thrown Van Wyk off—or thought I had—by playing na?ve to his questions.
Walking straight up to his wife and confirming I was doing exactly what he thought I was.
Now Alex is their tool. What happens if he finds out I’m investigating Van Wyk? That I’m certain—even if I can’t prove it—that Van Wyk is a murderer? Do Alex’s loyalties to them trump his fleeting interest in me? Does his work, and all its millions, hold higher value than my life?
It’s pretty fucking obvious what the conclusion is.
But I still need to hear it, even though I already know.
“You didn’t answer my question,” I say, the words coming out more terse than I intended. I make an effort to relax my voice. “I answered yours.”
“I saw a man at work with a missing finger,” Alex says, his gaze steady, watching me. I know he’s looking for my reaction. “It was a reasonable assumption.”
No, it wasn’t. Not from that alone. Someone loses a finger—for any reason—and Alex immediately assumes he’s offering one up?
He’s not so dumb as to think I’d miss that logical fallacy. It would seem strange if I didn’t pick up on it.
“How did that happen then?” I ask dryly. “Did he close it in a door?”
“He lost it at work,” Alex replies, neutral. Yet the subtext is there: he lost it through work.
Shit.
What kind of company takes a finger in payment?
One that rewards in millions.
What is Alex into? How has he earned his fortune?
And what will he do to keep it?
To hide my thoughts, I take a sip of coffee, not tasting it, struggling to swallow, my throat constricting.
That murderous look in his eye. Who was it directed at? Fournier? Van Wyk?
Or me.
Would he go so far, if they ordered it?
Surely not.
I want to believe that. I’m just not sure I can.
He willingly put his hand on the table. He offered his finger, in place of my night with Fournier.
Unless it was all a game.
It was a sick game, as it turned out. But I can’t believe Alex knew that, going in.
Not with the reaction I saw, that flare of rage, the blankness that followed so swiftly.
Still the scariest expression I’ve ever seen in my life, and it doesn’t belong to Van Wyk, the murderer.
It’s Alex’s, the man who sits beside me, on our bed.
He wasn’t willing to trade me for a night, but is he willing to give me up to save his job? His fortune? His life?
How far would it have to go before his choice wasn’t me?
Alex pats my thigh through duvet. “It’s almost ten. You should get ready.”
For what?
Damn, we’re going to go and buy lingerie together, after this?
I don’t know if I can. I don’t know if I’m that good an actor.
But I’d better learn fast.
My life might depend on it.
“This one has potential,” Alex says, pulling out a diaphanous silk and lace camisole in black.
I own T-shirts that are longer.
We’re in a private room at La Perla, and Alex has dismissed both the staff and the offer of a bottle of champagne.
We have a comfortable chair he hasn’t touched, a sturdy table for what purpose I don’t know, racks of extremely expensive lingerie with no prices, and more mirrors than anyone would find awkward.
“And this one.” It’s a bodysuit with cutouts, the material thin enough that it will show everything.