Owned: A Mafia Menage Romance(208)

“He’s fine,” came a low voice over his shoulder.

Auger shook his head angrily. The nerve! “You really shouldn’t sneak up on me,” he snarled without turning, his muscles still itching to be used.

“Oh yeah? Still have a lot of energy left over from the bout?”

Auger spun around and met Winsor Cooke’s cocky stare. He was far too close again, but the fighter refused to back away and held the billionaire’s gaze until Callie’s blonde head bounced into the corner of his vision. She shot him a warning look. He barely resisted the urge to drag her off the boat by her elbow.

“He wasn’t really a match for you, now was he,” Winsor taunted, dragging his attention back.

Auger shrugged. “Not really.”

“You should have taken my offer.”

Auger shrugged, squinting suspiciously at Callie. Why was she standing behind this guy like they came here together? He tried to read her expression.

Nothing. I have no idea what she’s thinking, he realized with a cruel awareness. As usual.

“I don’t fight,” he finally snarled back. “This was a one-time thing. I gave it up.”

“Gave it up?” Winsor repeated blandly. “That’s a pity. You’re impressive.”

“Eh, I got lucky,” he said. His body still twitched and ached for more conflict, some release of all the energy he had left over from the match.

Winsor cocked his head to the side slightly. “Well, happily for everyone,” he purred, “the sponsorship is still yours.”

Auger rocked back on his heels, barely restraining himself from the uppercut blow that seemed cocked and read in his right arm.

“I told you: No.”

Winsor shrugged, either now realizing or not caring how close he was to someone that deadly. “Do I look like the sort of person who accepts that answer?”

Auger ground his teeth together, silently begging his body to calm down, move past the fighting urge that seeped from every pore. “I don’t want it.”

“You absolutely earned it,” Winsor said, his voice low.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Auger muttered finally. His shoulders visibly slumped as he forced himself to release the tension in his muscles.

What am I supposed to say to this guy? He just will not let it go!

Auger kept trying to catch Callie’s eye but she wouldn’t look at him, not even for a second.

“Sure you do,” Winsor nodded arrogantly, sensing he had made some kind of forward motion in the argument. “You say you don’t want anyone to own you… But somehow I think that’s a lie. I think you would love to be owned.”

“Fuck you, man,” Auger shot back automatically.

Winsor chuckled and Auger vividly imagined smashing his teeth in. “There now. That’s the spirit! Just come round the house. Both of you.”

“What?”

“Ten grand,” he said slowly, as though Auger was too stupid to understand. “Just come round the house and we will settle up. So glad that’s out of the way. You see, Callie?”

He turned to face her as her eyes widened in shock.

“I told you he would take it,” he said to her, his voice smug and oily.

What the fuck?

Instantly Auger was as taut as a wire again and ready to snap. He glanced between Callie and Winsor, trying to measure their interaction, to understand it. Though it wasn’t all clear, he could understand one thing. Winsor was laughing at him, and Callie was in on it.

This is a trick!

“Fuck you!” he muttered again and forced himself to take a half step back. He felt suddenly cold and exposed, and every muscle trembled with the effort to not unleash the beating on Winsor that he so richly deserved.

“It was a pleasure to meet you,” Winsor purred to Callie, picking up her hand to kiss it as Auger watched, seething darkly.

“It’s twenty,” Auger snarled before he knew he was going to say anything.

“Excuse me?” he said, turning to face Auger with one eyebrow raised.

Auger constrained his voice to a commanding growl. He stared into Winsor’s mocking, hazel eyes and refused to even blink.

This asshole is going to pay me. In a hundred ways.

“You offered me twenty.”

Winsor nodded slowly. “Thank you for reminding me,” he said softly, nodding. He stood for a moment too long in Auger’s personal space, just to show that he could, then tugged smartly on his suit lapels and walked away with a smug grin.

Callie realized her mouth was hanging open and snapped it closed. She lunged at Auger with her palms up, her face a shocked, apologetic mask. “I did not know he was going to—”

“Oh save it, princess,” Auger snarled at her, somehow happy when she flinched back.