Page 106 of Taking Denver

She reaches across to the side table. I notice the gun lying there, but instead, she picks up a small red bag and empties the contents into her hand.

“He found this,” Denver says, playing with Wyatt’s ring.

Something close to rage surges through me because I should have known she’d kept that fucking ring. All this time, I assumed the men I hired to set up Wyatt’s death had pocketed or lost it, but of course, Denver had it. She’s smart but also frustratingly weak when she wants to be.

“You kept that? Are you stupid?”

She focuses on the ring. “Maybe I’m sentimental.”

“Get rid of it.”

She slips it onto her thumb and holds her hand out. “I might keep it. The great Ranger Luxe taken down by a wedding ring. Quite fitting for our wedding day, isn’t it?”

I take a step forward, ready to snatch it off her finger, but she picks up the gun fast and points it at me.

“What are you doing, Denver?” I ask. “A sudden crisis of conscience over killing your piece of shit husband?”

“Is that what he was?”

I sigh, irritated because I’m tired of this game, and she’s dwelling over shit that doesn’t matter.

She stares at me. “You lied about everything, didn’t you?”

“I didn’t create tapes of him fucking other women.”

“But you did hire them.”

“If all it took was me paying a few girls to say some nice words, and he fucked them, then he was always going to do it,” I say. “I saved you the pain of finding out ten years from now, instead. You’re welcome.”

“‘You’re welcome’?” she whispered. “Everyone is saying he deserved to die, Ranger.”

“Something tells me he can’t hear them.”

She stares at me, her brow furrowed in disbelief, but what did she expect? Regret? Wyatt's death is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. It was a fucking celebration the day he died.

“The life insurance?” she asks.

“You want the truth, Denver?”

“It’d be a nice change.”

I take a few seconds to breathe. Fine. She wants the truth; she’ll get the truth, but it won’t change anything. She’s marrying me today whether she likes it or not.

“Wyatt wasn’t going to kill you, Denver. He never asked Cal to kill you. But there was a chance the women alone wouldn’t have been enough to influence your decision,” I say. “And I knew that if it came down to your life or his, you’d choose yours.”

She doesn’t look frightened. She doesn’t look intimidated. She looks like she did the night she pulled the trigger, and I live for her like this. Alive. Powerful.

“He was innocent,” she says.

“He was weak. He didn’t deserve you. He was stealing you from me, and I wasn’t going to let that happen.”

“I’m not yours.”

I take a step forward. “Yes, you are. He might have married you, but it wasmewho was faithful to you. It wasmethat took care of you. It was my bed you came to. It was me youalwaysturned to. He might have married you first, but make no mistake, Denver, you have always beenmine.”

Her expression doesn’t change. Her grip on the gun doesn’t loosen. She remains totally calm, as if she expected this to happen all along.

“Did you kill my dad?”

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