Chapter 13 | Preston
THIRTEEN | PRESTON
Iprefer my hand cupped around that beautiful throat instead, but the collar will do.
Kate’s eyes are little balls of fire, meant to burn me alive, yet I’m too distracted by the way she’s awakened my cock with the curve of her ass and the thin gold chain gleaming against her lightly tanned skin.
The gold lock I fastened there, hiding a tracking device, rests between her collarbones. I made sure it’s tight enough that she can’t slip it over her head. I lift the key between us so she sees it, then tuck it back into my pocket for safekeeping.
“What is this?” she snarls, hooking her fingers through the chain that looks like it should belong on a feral dog.
The kind of chain that chokes them when they're misbehaving.
“A gift.” I fold my arms over my chest. “And a way to keep track of you while I’m gone. Not that you’d be able to escape anyway. Just wanted to take extra safety precautions.”
“It has a tracker?” Kate claws at it frantically. “You’re insane if you think I’m going to keep this on!”
“You don’t have a choice.”
The high-pitched rumble in her chest is swallowed by a heavy exhale. “You can’t expect me to sit in that room for the next month with nothing to do, Preston.”
It’s the first time she’s said my name, and it rewires my brain. I short-circuit. Instantly, I’m hit with all these ideas for how I could get her to repeat it as I brand her with my cock. My mouth. My fingers as they follow the rhythm of my tongue.
Brand her as mine.
Well, fuck. It’s only been a few days since I first saw her. This girl is already nestling under my skin. My empire isn’t the only thing she’s infiltrating, and that’s a problem. The reason for her being here pierces through the haze of desire.
She thinks I’m a villain, but little does she know the man she might be working for made me one.
My throat clears. “Which brings me to another reason why I’m here. You’ll have free rein of the estate when you're not working.”
She sputters a laugh. “I’m sorry, did you say working?”
“I’m going to put you to use. How do you feel about working in the medical unit?”
Her laughter dies instantly.
“Last night you mentioned you have a medical background, did you not?” I press.
Her lips roll in deliberation. “I mean, yeah. Before Lachlan Park, I was a nurse.”
“Perfect.” I grip onto her arm, dragging her out of the alcove.
Her eye roll is audible in her scolding tone. “You don’t have to keep dragging me everywhere, you know. If you were a little more approachable, I might listen. A please can go a long way.”
“In my line of work, people don’t respond to approachable.”
“Well, I’m not in your line of work.”
“You’re about to be.”
Her heels dig into the marble floor, making me halt. I drop her arm, crossing mine over my chest. She narrows her eyes at me, looking for me to elaborate.
A look of disgust bathes her face right before I calm the oncoming hurricane of questions by saying, “I don’t work in organ trafficking.”
As I said, I’m not sure whether she’s working with Luciano or not.
I’m hoping a month of surveillance will provide enough evidence to prove she was in the wrong places at the wrong times.
Until then, I’ll keep her busy. For her safety and my own, because if my father finds out why she’s here and that I lied to him, we’ll both be dealing with his wrath.
Those light green pools clash with mine. “And you think I should just believe you after everything you’ve done?”
“Would you rather sit in your room alone and bored for the next thirty days?”
Her chest rises and falls heavily, making the gold chain with the lock glisten and sparkle in the light above us. “No.”
My tone is firm. “Then it’s settled. You’ll start on Monday.”
She huffs out a breath, peering up at me with indecision. She doesn’t want to accept it, but she also doesn’t want to be bored. There is something else swirling there, too.
When she doesn’t speak, I leave her with one last warning. “And I suggest you act like working in the medical unit is why you’re here. Other people are living on the estate who are more unforgiving than I am. Your life doesn’t rest only in my hands, darling.”
The tremble bolting through her body tells me she heard me loud and clear.
I don’t know why a part of me is hanging onto hope that she might be harmless.
Yet there’s a possibility she is a rat, trained and conditioned to slip in and gather information to destroy us.
If she is involved with the Calco Cartel and is a reason our product has been going missing, she already knows everything about the Megalley Syndicate.
However, if Kate is as oblivious as she pretends to be, Carter is right. She’ll learn a lot about our mob in a month while she’s staying on the estate. Letting her go with that kind of knowledge carries the same weight and is just as dangerous.
Honestly, at this point, I don’t see an ending where she gets to keep her life.