Page 36 of Arranged Marriage to the Brutal Bratva King
I don’t need to be told twice.
I grab my tablet with numb fingers, stumble toward the door on legs that barely hold me. My hand slips on the handle twice before I get it open.
“Janice.”
I freeze, can’t help looking back.
Dimitri stands exactly where I left him, gun held loosely at his side, expression unreadable.
“This isn’t over. Not even close.”
I run.
Down the hallway, into the elevator, through the lobby. I don’t stop until I’m three blocks away, ducking into an alley where no one can see me collapse against a brick wall, sliding down until I’m sitting on dirty pavement.
My whole body is shaking. Tears I didn’t feel starting are wet on my face. Every nerve ending feels stripped raw, exposed.
He could have killed me. Should have killed me, probably, for what I did.
Instead, he’d let me go with a warning I’ll never forget.
My phone buzzes.Update. Now.
I can’t answer, can’t form words that would explain what just happened.
Another buzz.JANICE. ANSWER ME.
I’m okay. On my way back.
The lie feels enormous.
I’m not okay. Don’t know if I’ll ever be okay again.
Underneath the terror, underneath the rational fear of a man who’d just pressed a gun to my throat, there’s something else.
Heat. Want. The traitorous pulse of desire that flared when his hand tangled in my hair, when his body crowded mine, when his eyes promised things that should horrify me.
I’m broken. Have to be broken to feel anything except fear after what just happened.
I push myself upright, smooth my clothes, and wipe my face clean of tears and mascara. Then I walk back toward the office like a functional human being instead of someone who just stared death in the face and felt their body respond with want.
Diana is waiting when I arrive.
One look at my face, and she knows. “Conference room. Now.”
I follow, grateful when she closes the door behind us.
“What happened?”
“He knows about the exposé. He knows it was me.”
“How?”
“I told him.” The admission sounds insane even to my own ears. “He confronted me, and I—I just admitted it.”
Diana stares at me. “Are you crazy?”
Maybe. It would explain a lot.
