I have a thing foronePara Bellum president.
A big thing.
So big that it terrifies me and has had me hiding in my room for the past week. Not because I’m scared to see Achilles on campus. But because I’m scared of what that big thing I feel for him will do to me when I run into him.
I still want to hate him for all of it. But I justcan’t. I’ve tried to look at it objectively, removing the rose-tinted glasses, ignoringthe mind-blowing sex, and setting aside the way I feel just thinking about him.
But it’s impossible to disassemble your connection to a person and only choose the pieces you want to include when you put it back together.
Iamstill angry at him for the manipulation, and the stalking, and the wildly unfair advantage he had over me before our paths ever crossed.
But I just can’t hate someone I know in my heart I love.
“Let’s practice again,” Kyle mutters, holding up his phone. Mine is smashed and still in the bushes by the cliffside path I was jogging on when Kyle grabbed me and dragged me to the trunk of his car.
“When I call your daddy,” he growls, “you’re going to saywhat?”
I glare death at him. “Hi Dad, it’s me. I’m on Kyle’s shitty shrimp-dick-energy boat in Hawthorne Hollow harbor. He’s going to try and shake you down for?—”
I’m fully expecting the hit. But I’m still not ready for just how bad it hurts when I get knocked sideways across the deck of the boat.
Kyle bends down, grabbing a handful of my hair and twisting my head painfully, forcing me to look into his leering face.
“Try that on the real call, cunt,” he snarls, “and Iwillhave you, sloppy seconds or not. Daddy will listen to you scream as I make your ass bleed for me.Got it?”
I nod, all the fight flooding out of me.
Kyle stands, exhaling heavily.
"You know the funniest part?" He turns, swinging the bottle in a wide, sloppy arc. "I hadeverything." His voice cracks slightly on the last word from all the booze he’s put down. "The fund, the real estate deal, connections…” He shakes his head ruefully. “And thenyour fucking father," he slurs, pointing the bottle at me, “decided he was too good for my family."
He laughs bitterly.
"Do you have any idea—" He takes yet another sip from the bottle, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "How many people I borrowed from to keep that fucking fund liquid while the deal was being structured? Do you know what kind of people theyare?"
When I don't answer, he takes another drink.
"Badpeople, Yelena," he mutters. “People who send their kids to Knightsblood. People who aren’t very patient when their investments go to shit!”
He drops onto the bench across from me, the boat lurching on another wave as the storm rumbles again, closer this time.
"Let’s try this again,” Kyle slurs, learning forward, his elbows on his knees. “You're going to sit there and be quiet while I call your father. I’m betting that Daddy Dearest loves his daughter more than his pride.” He grins at me drunkenly. “And I'm hoping that after he hears you’re alive, he wires the hundred million that I ask for to the account number I tell him.”
“And then?” I half whisper.
He shrugs. “That’s it. I disappear, and you go back to being Achilles’ whore if you want.” He grins and takes a drink. “Simple, elegant?—”
“You forgot one thing.”
Kyle is so wasted that his reaction time is slowed. But when I hear that low, smooth baritone, my head immediately snaps to the side.
My pulse skips.
He came for me.
By the time Kyle realizes what’s happening and turns to look at Achilles standing in the doorway, it’s too late.
“You forgot what happens when you lay your hands onmygirl.”