“Where the fuck did you go?”
“Don’t start with me.” The look I gave him was pure venom, my whole body a poison. “I’m not in the mood.”
He brushed past me. “You and your moods. Everyone living at your whim. You’re like the goddamned queen sometimes, Shelly.”
“I’m a queen?” It was so ludicrous, a laugh puffed out of me. Resigned, I locked us inside, lest Ella get the idea to check on me after all. Can’t let the kids see Mommy and Daddy fighting. Or fucking, if that was what we were going to do here. I recognized the gleam in Philip’s eyes along with the bulge in his trousers. So he’d finally decided to collect, which felt like a relief. Why shouldn’t we fuck? No reason. Let it wash over me.
“I work my ass off to keep you safe here,” he was saying, “and come to find out, you run off at the first opportunity. No one knows where you are, except Allie.”
“Your sister-in-law,” I said, just to annoy him.
“My soon-to-be sister-in-law, who apparently doesn’t give a damn about your safety either, because she helped you. I mean, fucking hell. I told Colin—”
“Ooh, you told Colin how to handle Allie, didn’t you? I would have loved see his face when you did that.” I grinned, though it felt more feral than amused. I wasn’t sure why I was needling him this way, except that the only thing that sounded more appealing than sex right now was angry sex.
“Why are you taking this so lightly?”
I stepped close to him, bathed myself in his heat. “Because it doesn’t really matter what happens to me. It’s sweet that you worry, baby.”
He pushed back, uncharacteristically hesitant. “Jesus Christ, Shelly. What’s gotten into you?”
The glitter of silver in his onyx eyes gave lie to his refusal; he pulsed with lust, he breathed it out, filling the air between us with heat and spice. His desire might not have been for me, but caring had never been a requisite, so I purred anyway, rubbed my body against his in response, because ohh, he felt so very solid and aroused…so present. Yes, this was a little bit of payback to a man who’d used me and then turned me loose. And so what? That man didn’t want me anyway. Another girl.
“I’m trying to make it up to you,” I told him.
“And then worst of all,” he continued as if I hadn’t spoken, as if his erection weren’t pressing into my belly now, “you leave that girl here. She’s got claws, that one, and here you’re a cat in heat.”
“So kick us out.” I stepped back, waving my hand as if I didn’t care—and I didn’t. I was halfway to suicidal on a good day, and this wasn’t one.
He smiled, and I shivered. “I came up here to make a deal with you, Shelly. You know how this works.”
“I said I’d give you what you wanted.”
“You don’t have that anymore, sweet girl.”
I stiffened, not aroused nor pliant any longer. He wanted Ella. He wanted her fight, her youth. Or maybe, as I had learned, there was no rhyme or reason to who we wanted. “You can’t have her.”
“Why not? She’s old enough.”
“I saved her from that life.”
“Saved her? You’ve got half of Chicago trying to arrest her and the other half trying to kill her. If this is how you save someone, I’d hate to see you angry.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Then help me. I know you can.”
“My money. My favors. Mine. I’ve worked damned hard so that no one can tell me what to do, so that everyone owes me something, and I’m not about to give one goddamned inch because you ask me to. Once upon a time, maybe, but not now. Not after you sold me out.”
So it had come to this, finally.
“I’m sorry for that.” My voice dropped to a whisper. “Please, don’t make her pay for my mistakes.”
His voice slid into a seductive murmur. “I’m not going to hurt her. Is that what you’re worried about? I understand she’s new. I’d be gentle. You know I can be.”
The temptation nudged at me, as soft and potent as any caress. I could walk away from this, just like I had done every time at the shelter. It wouldn’t be so bad. The shelter was a sort of prison too, and this one was much prettier. I could even pretend I had saved her still, since Philip was a far kinder master than Henri would have been.
“I won’t let anyone touch her,” I said. “She’s going to get her old life back, and when she does, she’ll be…” Pure. I wanted her to have the life I hadn’t. I wanted her to be worthy of the men I wasn’t. “She’ll be safe.”