“What’s wrong?” He inches closer, his voice a lethal purr. “You look tense. May I suggest you take a beat to get over whatever’s got your jaw locked so tight? Breathe. Meditate.” He tilts his head, feigning contemplation as his gaze narrows. “Someone recently suggested sound therapy might be worth a try.”
My pulse pounds, my fury bubbling to the surface.
“Because if you push me again—” His eyes darken. “—subtle or otherwise—just remember, I won’t hesitate to attack.”
My nostrils flare, the volatility in my veins so rich and cloying I can’t chance opening my mouth and letting the venom spill out.
“By Monday morning, I expect your team not only to be answering the Cavallo Group’s calls, but to be scrambling to make amends. And you’ll have revised your stance on Halverson & Grey, with a plan on how to make your concerns irrelevant.”
I see red.
I feel it. Breathe it.
“Don’t disappoint me, Ms. Cross.” He steps back, his faint smirk tattooing itself into my frontal lobe. “Otherwise I’ll ensure that CEO position you’ve coveted all your life slips through your fumbling fingers.”
Chapter
Four
RAFFAEL
I takea second to breathe in the livid animosity that flares in Isla’s stormy gray eyes.
It’s exquisite. The sight enough to make my blood run hot.
She wants to unleash violence on me, and given different circumstances, I’d let her. But that’s an indulgence I’ve spent years trying to carve out of my system.
“Enjoy your night.” I turn on my heel and set a path through the crowd, my grin hard to contain as I relive the encounter on my way down to the hotel parking lot where I find my brother.
“Will she continue to be a problem?” Miko asks as I settle into the passenger seat of his Alfa Romeo.
“No.” I fasten my belt. “She’s under control.”
The power went to her head, and after a lifetime waiting for her CEO position, I don’t necessarily blame her. But she earned her reprimand. Nobody is allowed to fuck with my family without living to regret it.
We slip into the Manhattan night, the traffic thick and gleaming in neon colors.
“Did Philip look different to you?” Miko shoots me a sideways glance, the question sobering.
“Yeah.” The asshole was pale. Posturing. Whatever pulled him from CrossPoint wasn’t the luxury of early retirement.
“What do you think it is?”
“Could be anything.”Stress. The weight of too many secrets pressing in.Philip Cross isn’t exactly the straitlaced guy he’s led his daughter to believe. “What did you and him talk about?”
“The usual skirting around the obvious.” Miko shrugs and turns onto Fifth. “I offered the standard birthday formalities. Then came the nostalgia. He brought up our father and how he wished he were here to celebrate.”
I hold in a snarl.
Ourfather—neither the biological one nor the man who raised me—would want to celebrate Philip even if both men weren’t dead, their demise barely three months apart, over two years ago.
“That would’ve been an enjoyable conversation,” I drawl.
“Riveting,” Miko mutters, clenching his fingers around the steering wheel. “Are you sure you’ve got Isla under control?”
I focus on the sluggish crawl of city traffic, not appreciating his lack of faith. “Have I ever given you reason to doubt me?”
“No.” There’s a pause. “But she didn’t look muzzled. She seemed downright feral.”