Chapter 36
I’ve heard that there is a thin line between love and hate but I don’t love Juliana. All I can have for her is hate. So what is my problem right now? My eyes haven’t left her lips or body even after I kissed her. It was for show…wasn’t it?
Fuck.
“You’re watching her like a fucking hawk, tone it down.” Cassius whispers in my ear as we stand at a high table mingling with other people.
“I’m not watching her.”
“Don’t insult my intelligence, you are watching her. You’ve been doing it since crazy Mia showed up.”
This makes me chuckle even though I know Cassius is being serious. Breaking my eyes away from Juliana is hard but I do it to prove a damn point to myself and to look at Cassius.
“Crazy Mia? I thought you moved on from her little incident?”
“That crazy little white girl ruined my favorite car with her drunk bullshit because you moved on and found Carmen. She blamed me as if I forced Carmen and you to love each other. Now, she’s prancing around thinking we can speak to each other.”
“Hmm, maybe she was trying to get your attention?” I lift my brows to him suggestively.
“I don’t do crazy. That’s all you.”
“No I don’t. Carmen wasn’t crazy at all.”
“Oh, she was crazy, you just never gave her a reason to be crazy. Which I respect but you have a special attraction to women who are fucking bonkers.”
“Juliana isn’t crazy.”
I regretted the words the moment I said them.
Cassius arches a brow and a smirk forms on his face. “I wasn’t talking about her but again, proving my earlier point, you’re like a fucking stalker hunting its prey when it comes to Juliana. You can’t even keep your eyes honest because every two seconds, it scans the room for her.”
Glaring at Cassius doesn’t help the situation and he certainly doesn’t give a damn.
“Just make sure you don’t end up falling in love with her.”
“I could never. She killed my wife.”
“And you replaced your wife with her. It’s sick and twisted but that’s who you are, Ric. I accept that but,” he takes a step closer and looks me dead in the eyes. “don’t you dare fucking fall in love with her.”
Everyone who knows me, especially Cassius, knows I don’t respond well to threats so I know he’s pushing me.
“Are you fucking threatening me, Cassius?”
“No, I’m warning you. If you fall in love with her, I’ll kill her like she killed my sister. Anyone else but her, man. Anyone else.”
I do understand Cassius. I get it but at the same time, I don’t like this.
“Don’t threaten her,” there’s a certain defensiveness in my tone that I’ll have to correct later.
“If I want Juliana to die, I’ll kill her myself.
She’s my wife, not yours, not society’s.
Everything on her belongs to me. She’s my possession, my claim, and my right to do whatever the fuck I want with her. ”
Cassius’s eye twitches… he wants to hit me but he doesn’t. His hands are balled into fists by his side yet he doesn’t make a move.
“She’s your obsession and she’ll be your end if you don’t straighten the fuck up. You’re obsessed with her and while you say you hate her, that kiss didn’t look like you wanted her dead.”
This causes me to smirk.
“Are you jealous, Cas? Did you want her all to yourself?”
His resolve drops for half a second but I see it. She’s his type and while he doesn’t do anything or say anything, he’s always spoken for me to let her go. He says he’d kill her but would that be before or after he realizes that he’s taken a liking to her.
“Fuck you, Ric.”
“That’s what I thought.” I say and instead of engaging in more bullshit, I take my drink and walk off towards the empty foyer.
Before I can leave the grand room, my arm is grabbed and I don’t have to guess who it is.
“Sweetheart, are you okay?” Mia asks.
My eyes turn to hers and I know she knows I’m not in the fucking mood.
“Fuck off, Mia.”
Snatching my arm out of her hold, I leave for the foyer needing some peace and quiet.
To think and to hate.
Juliana is to blame for the falling out of my best friend and I.
She’s the reason my pregnant wife and kid are dead.
She’s the problem that I can’t get rid of.
And she’s my hate. My fury. My rage.
Fuck… I hate her.