Page 7 of The Knight (Endgame 2)
“Because they’re in your pocket.”
A small nod of acknowledgment. “Maybe so. Or maybe your family name doesn’t hold any weight in this city since he was indicted for fraud.”
I absorb the blow without any outward sign. My hopes and dreams may lie in ribbons on the ridiculously thick carpet, but he’ll never see me flinch. “Yes, my father did those things. I didn’t cheat you.”
“Didn’t you? I seem to recall paying for a full month of your services.”
My cheeks heat. “You sent me away.”
“And if I want you again?”
Too late. That’s what I want to tell him, but I can’t afford to lose the escrow. Not when there’s a chance I can buy back my mother’s house. “My mother never did anything to you.”
“What does Helen St. James have to do with this?”
I narrow my eyes at the sound of her name on his lips. “That was my mother’s house. She gave it to me. Not my father. Me. It was in my trust. And I don’t know how you stole it—”
He makes a tsk sound. “Steal is such a strong word. Especially when you don’t have any proof.”
“And even if I did have proof, no one would care. Because my family is the black sheep of this entire city now. We’re nothing and no one.”
He takes a step closer, only one foot away. Close enough to see the striations of deep bronze in his eyes, to see the short dusting of hair on his jaw. “Oh no, Avery. You’re someone. The toast of the whole fucking town. The girl who captivated Gabriel Miller with her pretty little hymen.”
And then I do flinch.
It should hurt the most that he ruined my father, that he took my mother’s house. But I can’t deny the searing shame inside that he sent me away only minutes after taking my virginity.
Bitterness spikes my voice. “I don’t have anything left to captivate you with now, do I? I have to beg at the secretary’s desk like some stranger off the street. And then have her turn me away.”
“And yet here you are.” Silk on top of steel.
“You can’t get mad at Charlotte for that.”
“Still giving orders, little virgin? Is that something you’re born with in the St. James family, or did they teach you that along with your ABCs?”
Rage tightens a knot in my stomach. “I’m not a virgin.”
“No?” he asks, lifting a hand to my face.
I stand very still as he captures my chin between his thumb and forefinger, torn between wanting to wrench away and wanting him to kiss me. How can he make me feel alive when I’ve been sleepwalking for months, years? What sick twist of fate let the hands of this man bring me pleasure?
“You made sure of that.” I mean the words to come out cold, unhurt. Instead I sound breathless and somehow inviting. The white carpet may as well be streaked with red. We’re both back in his bedroom, both flushed and sated and ripped to shreds from what he’s just done.
He lifts my face, almost tender. “I put my cock into your warm little hole. Pushed right through that thin hymen to do it. It felt like fucking heaven to break you open.”
I’m a tuning fork in his hands, and the sound I make is pure arousal. “I despise you.”
“You were so wet,” he says, almost thoughtful. “But some of it was blood, wasn’t it?”
“I’m going to find a way to get my house back.”
He bends his head slightly, enough that our lips are an inch away, the words a tickle of breath against my lips. “I got off on the slide of your blood on my cock. I came that way, spilling salt into the fresh open wound.”
There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to him, no line I wouldn’t cross in this moment. My anger takes an unholy shape, rearing back with all the fury and fear of a wild horse ready to trample his enemy. “And God help me, I’m going to ruin you. The way you did my father. I’m going to break you.”
He nudges my chin higher, exposing the vulnerable line of my throat. His mouth drops to the tender skin, a whisper of a kiss. “Do you want to make me bleed, little virgin?”
The violence takes me by surprise. My swing is wild, aimed straight for his face with all my strength. He catches my wrist midmotion, the abrupt stop shooting pain down my arm. We’re frozen that way, him holding me, breathing each other’s air.
“Don’t call me that,” I say between clenched teeth.
“Little virgin.”
“I’m not. You saw the proof of it. You paid a million dollars for it.”
“Actually,” he says, voice deceptively mild. “I paid a million dollars to use you for a month. And as that month isn’t over yet, I think I’d like to collect.”
