43. Nyah #2
MacGregor shrugged a shoulder. “More like the prize for winning the fight.”
Carlos cut into his steak, slowly and deliberately, without lifting his gaze. “We’ve already discussed the terms. Two million was the agreed upon amount.”
Dax made a choking sound. “Two million?”
MacGregor snorted at him. “Don’t get excited, son. If I know Carlos, you’ll be lucky to see ten K of that money.”
Dax got himself under control. “I’m very happy with the arrangement I have with Mr. Guerra.”
MacGregor cocked his head. “Are you just? I don’t think I’d be happy with a ten K payday when he’d be pocketing the rest.”
Carlos put his knife down very deliberately, his anger only evident in the flush of red creeping up his neck. “I’ve suddenly lost my appetite. So why don’t you cut the shit and tell me why we’re here?”
MacGregor eyed him. “You have something I want.”
“And what’s that?”
“Your wife-to-be.”
I blinked.
Everyone turned and stared at me. Or at least everyone except MacGregor and Carlos. They only had eyes for each other. The two men stared each other down, but it was Carlos who eventually said, “She’s not up for negotiation.”
MacGregor chuckled loudly and stroked his beard. “Come now, Carlos. Everything has a price.”
“She doesn’t.”
MacGregor turned to me. “How does that feel, sweetheart? To know the old man thinks you’re priceless?”
I said nothing, because he didn’t actually expect a response.
He’d already turned back to Carlos. “Her father owes me a rather large debt of money.”
I closed my eyes and breathed out through my nose, cursing the fact I couldn’t choose my parents. Because if I could, mine would have been the absolute last people in the world I would have chosen.
“Join the club,” Carlos said.
MacGregor smiled at that. “The thing is, I know he can’t pay that debt. And so I said I would take it from him in other ways.”
“Then kill his sons,” Carlos said flippantly.
My blood ran cold. I wasn’t particularly close with my brothers, but that didn’t mean I wanted to see them dead either. “No!”
Both men ignored me.
MacGregor shook his head. “See, that was my original plan. When I was in Providence, I took a little trip to the Matishes’ place to do exactly that.
But then Jeremiah begged for his sons lives and offered me his wife instead.
I didn’t want her, but his daughter…his daughter I had already met at your place and was intrigued, to say the least. His claim is you stole her from him and that she’s not actually yours to keep. ”
Oh my God, my father would say anything to save his precious boys. My heart hurt for my mother, just for a second, because really, she was no better than he was, but he’d offered to sell her without a second of hesitation.
Was it any wonder I’d always been so bad with relationships? With such a shining example in my parents’ relationship?
“You’d believe the lies of a snake oil salesman if you believe a word that comes out of Matish’s mouth,” Carlos said.
MacGregor shrugged and chewed his steak carefully, swallowing it before he spoke again. “It seems to me Matish made us both a promise. And since you haven’t married her yet, I think my claim on her is just as valid as yours.”
The feet of Luca’s chair scuffed against the floor, drawing all eyes to him.
And for the first time since I’d sat down, I realized how angry he was. His eyes burned.
“This is fucking pathetic,” he spat out.
Lynx’s eyes widened in surprise, and I went stiff all over, waiting for some sort of backlash for Luca’s interruption.
And indeed, MacGregor’s men all rose to their feet, but he waved them back down.
“Sit. Sit. The younger Mr. Guerra has something he wants to say. Clearly.”
Luca’s angry gaze turned on him. “You do realize she’s a fucking person, don’t you? And that she’s sitting right there next to you while you argue back and forth about whose property she is?”
MacGregor’s reddish-blond eyebrow shot up.
And then he grinned, sitting back again and crossing his arms over his chest. “Well. Didn’t this just get interesting?
Carlos, did you realize your lad there has his dick hard over his future stepmother?
” He eyed Luca again. “Is that you I can smell all over her?”
Carlos’s gaze snapped to his son’s.
Luca said nothing. No confirmation.
No denial.
MacGregor wasn’t done. “Your virgin princess reeks of sex, Carlos.” He kicked my chair hard enough it sent me toward Carlos’s side of the table. “And she’s wearing the underwear I sent her. Red with a little bow right in the middle of her tits. Panties that match.”
Carlos glared at me; his rage barely controlled under the surface of his skin.
MacGregor tossed Carlos something from across the table. “Here. Go on. Check for yourself.”
Carlos caught it on instinct and then opened his hand to reveal a silver switchblade.
I jerked away from it, standing fast.
But MacGregor was just as quick. He moved faster than I would have thought a man of his size could, catching my arms and jerking me down onto his lap.
Lynx, Luca, and Dax all shoved to their feet, but the guards at their backs had guns to the backs of their heads in seconds. Slowly, they raised their hands, but all three of their gazes burned.
But we all knew there was nothing they could do to help me.
Carlos stood, moving around the table, shoving my empty chair out of the way so hard it clattered to the stone floor.
Nobody righted it. MacGregor’s men all faced off with Carlos’s, but we were severely outnumbered and we all knew it.
This was MacGregor’s show. His game. And we were just his puppets.
Carlos stared down at me, a tremble in his fingers, his face red with rage.
MacGregor let go of one of my hands, and I struggled to get free, fought against his grip, but it did no good. The man was twice my size, and he held me with a viselike grip that would leave bruises.
Carlos came at me with the knife, and I screamed, my blood rushing in my ears so loud the scream only mingled with the sound instead of piercing it. I waited for the plunge of sharpened steel into my chest. Closed my eyes and held my breath for it.
The blade sliced through my shirt, leaving it in tatters, the tip of it kissing my skin just enough to leave a thin trickle of blood down my chest that dripped onto the blood red of the underwear MacGregor had bought me.