Page 270 of Hide and Keep

“What do you expect? My life as I know it is over and you’re not even giving me enough time to mourn it properly.”

“You’ve had nineteen years to mourn it.”

“That’s not true. I only became aware of your plan last year.”

“Now you see, that’s what makes you my greatest disappointment. You should’ve been prepared all along for your servitude to Munreaux Motorcycles.”

“That’s why? I thought it was because I let the entire O-line of Littoral’s football team run a train on me.”

Surging to his feet, he slaps me across the face, making my head whip to the right, my brain feeling like it’s between the prongs of a tuning fork after it’s been struck. My head is vibrating.

At least my lie worked. Now he’s the emotional one.

Vision blurred and ears ringing, I slowly turn back to face my flushed father, his finger already thrust at me as he fumes, “You will learn to hold your tongue or you’ll find yourself without one!”

Since the idea of bleeding out from a severed tongue sounds a thousand times better than going to that island this weekend, I snark right back, “But won’t my new—”

Crack!

The violent sound has me bracing for the second slap but nothing comes.

I glance over my shoulder to see the door open, almost at an unnatural angle—half hanging off its hinges maybe. Crue’s lowering his foot to the floor just before he storms into my father’s study, his face red as well.

Wiping the tears off my cheeks, I face forward again to hide the left side of my face from my bodyguard.

“Mr. Brantley!” Edwin calls after him, hot on his heels. “I apologize, Mr. Munreaux. I tried to stop him.”

Father puts up a hand to silence his valet.

“I hate to interrupt,” Crue says, zero pleasantry in his tone whatsoever. “But Ever has an appointment she can’t be late for.”

“Ever?”

Crue tries to correct his mistake too late by saying, “Miss Munreaux.”

When he latches on to my forearm and pulls, I lean the opposite way.

Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. Please just fucking stop. I don’t care what my father says to me. I don’t care what my father does to me. I only care about what he can, and will, do to Crue if he finds out we’re together.

“Yes… Miss Munreaux…” my father parrots, his narrowed gaze alternating between me, my bodyguard, and his hold on me.

Shit. He already knows. Or at the very least, suspects.

I rip my arm from Crue’s with a disgusted scoff.

He tries for me again, so I take a step away from him, out of reach.

“Enough to kick my door down?”

“It’s important,” is all Crue offers for explanation. No apology, nothing.

Father studies us for another minute before saying, “Whatever appointment my daughter has, cancel it. Never’s busy this weekend.”

“What’s going on this weekend?” Crue asks.

“That no longer concerns you.”

Here it comes. The snip severing all ties between me and Crue.

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