Total pages in book: 98
Estimated words: 92559 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92559 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
His expression went dark. “You . . . fucking bitch.”
She forced herself to hold his glare. “Do you honestly care I was with someone else—”
“You’re fucking the help?” He slashed a hand through the still air. “That’s why you ended it with me?”
The sad thing, she thought, was that as topics went, this was better than so many others.
“Just stop,” she said with exhaustion. “I know you didn’t come up here to fight for me.”
“Is that what you want?” He gestured around. “For me to beg you to come back? Is this whole drama some kind of attention-getting bullshit? Because you’re right, that’s not why I’m here.”
“So why did you make the drive,” she said in a low voice. “What are you doing this far upstate in the snow.”
“Your father sent me.”
“Ah, yes. I should have known—”
“You’ve made him so proud. I mean, who wouldn’t want a daughter like you, who doesn’t give a shit about who she disgraces.”
Fuck you, she thought as a wholly uncharacteristic rage hit her.
“Oh, I care about that,” she shot back. “Trust me. I’m pretty happy I disgraced you. It’s the best thing I got out of our relationship.”
That actually shut him up for a moment. And as he stood there, blinking like an idiot in that slick, dark gray suit, she just—
“I wanted to make it work,” she blurted. “Even though I knew you didn’t love me. I wanted to be the good female, do the right thing, but then I realized . . . I don’t know who you really are. Underneath your fine clothes, and the manners that hide your true nature, you’re not what you pretend to be. So I’m not sacrificing myself anymore to the lies—”
“Oh, spare me the vestal virgin shit,” he spat. “You’re not innocent, and I know that firsthand, don’t I. You’re lucky I was willing to stick around after that little news flash.”
Mahrci shook her head and told herself to shut up.
She didn’t. “And you only love my father, that’s who you care about. I was just a way for you to cement your connection to him—”
“In case you haven’t noticed”—Remis leaned in—“he and I are doing just fine without you. The only thing that’s changed is you’re out of his will, and I’m right by his side.”
Mahrci smiled as she lowered her lids. “That so.”
“Yes, that’s so.” He smoothed his tie. “You can get off your sacrificial mount. You’re the only one who’s impressed by it. And while you’re at it, you need to leave this property immediately. You’re trespassing.”
In the silence that followed, the chuckle that came out of her was no sound she had ever made before. “You know something, I feel really sorry for you.”
As he cocked an eyebrow, Remis clearly thought she was delusional.
“The glymera are not so kind to those who are less than.” Mahrci took a step closer to him. “How was your drive up here. Pity you can’t dematerialize like the rest of us—”
With a growl of rage, Remis launched himself at her, grabbing her by the front of the throat with both hands and slamming her against the wall. His expression was so furious, there was a blankness to it, as if he weren’t even seeing her, and his whole body was shaking as he squeezed her windpipe closed.
Mahrci gasped for air and clawed at his—
The bedroom door burst open, and Hemmy took control of the situation, picking up Remis by the armpits and pulling him off of her. As the male started to flail and holler, it didn’t make any difference.
Hemmy just walked out with his unstable load.
Mahrci sagged and caught her breath. Then she stumbled out into the hall. She was still grabbing at oxygen and tripping as she followed the pair to the staircase. Halfway up to the first floor, her vision cleared, and that was when Remis threw his head back and glared at her.
“You fucking cunt!”
Hemmy stopped short. “What did you say.”
Remis twisted around, shoving and pushing, and still getting nowhere. “She’s a cunt, and she fucked you to get back at me—”
One moment, the male was being held far enough off the steps so that he was kicking the handrail and the wainscoting. The next, he was being banged back and forth between the walls in the stairwell like a rag doll.
Banga, banga, banga—
And then Hemmy threw the male up the staircase, like he was heaving a bag of potatoes. The force of Remis’s impact on the closed door busted the latch open and the male spilled out into the hall beyond.
All those Idaho bakers rolling across the floor.
After which, Hemmy strolled up the remaining stairs. As if he hadn’t just tossed a fully grown male into a door—and broken the latter with him.
Meanwhile, Apex stepped into view and looked down at Remis, who was pinwheeling on his back like he had no idea what had happened to him.