I should’ve shot him. I should’ve done so, so many things instead of ending up at his mercy all over again. God, I’m such a fool. A fatalistic little fool.
“Familiar, little Evie?” He pushes his erection against my backside.
“Get off me!” I struggle, but he pulls my arm up higher until the pain forces me to go still.
“Look out there, past my house, over to the right. See that line of oaks? Remember that?”
“Shut up!” I scream.
“That was the estate’s grand driveway. And there at the end, that was the chateau. I remember when it was in flames, a beautiful sight.” He presses his lips to my ear.
I shiver at his touch. “You murdered all those people.”
“I’d do it again. All those people. Your family. Every last one of them, if it meant my family would be free. If it meant the fucking bullshit pageant of the Acquisition was never held again. You should be dead, Evie. You know that, right? Red lost. He lost. He didn’t fight hard enough for you.”
“He loved me!” I scream as hot tears well in my eyes. “I don’t care if he hurt people. I don’t fucking care! He loved me! He protected me. He always did. He was all I had. He loved me, and you took him away from me.” I can’t stop the sob that bubbles up, and now I can see Red again, the look in his eyes when he died. The way his gaze held mine as Lucius took his life.
“I don’t deny that, Evie. I know he loved you.”
“Wh-what?” My eyes swim, blinding me until I can’t see Lucius’s house or the dark trees beyond. Maybe the ghosts are there now, flitting through the grass, only visible through tears of anguish.
“Red begged us—Sinclair and me—for your life. Even if he lost, he wanted you to survive. So, yes, I agree he loved you. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t a monster.” He loosens his grip on my arm but doesn’t let go. “It doesn’t mean I was wrong to kill him, Evie.”
“You’re the monster.”
He sighs and holds onto me, his hand still at my throat, his thumb moving back and forth across my skin in a caress. “I have to agree with that, too. I know exactly who I am, Evie. Do you know who you are?”
“The woman who’s going to take your empire and then your life.” Even I can hear the shake in my voice.
“It doesn’t have to be like this.” His voice is a low rasp in my ear. “I can take away that hurt.” He slides his hand from my neck to my chest. “I can make you feel so fucking good, Evie.” When he cups my breast, my breath hitches.
“Stop.” I grip his wrist, but he pulls my twisted arm up higher behind my back, forcing me to arch.
“Are you sure you want me to?” He twists my nipple through my shirt and bra, his fingers adept at their task.
I can’t think, can’t stand to feel so many emotions all at once. He’s tearing me apart with nothing more than a touch, and I hate him for it.
“Let me go.”
He sighs, then releases me.
I turn and back away from him. “This is never going to happen.”
“It already is.” He watches me, his gaze hungry.
“Stay away from me.”
“No.” He says it so simply.
I pull out my gun and train it on him, my hands shaking. “I mean it.”
“Maybe you think you do.” He shakes his head slowly. “But I can feel you, little Evie. Your body shivering for me. I know what you want from me, and it’s not Magnolia. It’s not an apology for Red—which you’ll never get from me. You don’t want any of those things, no matter how much you lie to yourself.”
“Shut up.”
“You want me.”
“I want you dead.”
His cocky smirk is infuriating. “No, you want me inside you.”
“You’re crazy.”
“And you’re wet.”
I should pull the trigger. For my sanity. For my soul. I should end this devil with a bullet to the face just like I said.
“Wet, hot, wanting—I bet if I ran my finger down your pink slit, it’d slide right into your tight cunt, wouldn’t it?”
His filthy words seem to have taken the breath from my lungs. What’s worse is that it’s true. I’m fucked up, so damaged that I confuse lust with loss, the wires irrevocably crossed.
“I hate you,” I whisper in a trembling voice.
“Keep telling yourself that, darlin’. Now run along home, little Evie. I’ll see you soon. And then we’ll finish this dance you’ve started.” He turns and starts whistling as he trudges across the lawn to his house.
I lower the gun, finally feeling like I can breathe again.
But then he stops.
I can’t take my eyes off him as he turns to face me.
“Be careful in those woods, little Evie. They’re dark and deep, and you’d never know someone was after you until they had you.” He flexes his hands as he stares me down.