Page 24 of Kingpin's Secret Baby

“They’re your men!” I burst out. “It’s not my job to keep them in line, it’s yours. So do that, or the next time your people threaten me or mine, it’ll mean war against Wesley Hall.”

There’s a moment of stunned silence. I’m breathing hard, too hard, like my lungs are bellows stoking a fire in my gut. I can’t believe what I’ve just said, but I’m also not about to walk it back. Achilles is the careful one, but he’s too careful. He waits too long to make moves, and if he’s thinking of doing that here, I’m telling him right now it won’t lead to anything good.

“Just so we’re clear,” Achilles says tightly, “did you just fucking threaten me?”

“No,” I say tightly. “I promised you. If any Ashwoods hurt Fantasia or me, I’ll consider that an act of war against the Warwick family. By you.”

“Fantasia is not, and hasneverbeen, your concern. You insinuated yourself into this mess, and now you’re leveraging my own sister as a reason to drag your infant empire into a war with me?!”

He’s wrong. Fantasia hasalwaysbeen my concern.

She’s always been everything to me.

“You abandoned her the second you agreed to send her away,” I snarl. “Don’t try to reclaim her now. She’smine. If someone attacks her, they’re attackingmy wife.”

“What?!”

“What?!”

I whip around at the echo. Fantasia is standing outside the bathroom, wrapped in a towel with another wrapped around her shoulders. My chest clenches at the sight of her.

At the look of horror on her face.

“Piers- What the fuck are you talking about-”

I hang up the phone, my eyes trapped on Fantasia. It immediately rings again.

If Achilles weren’t thousands of miles away, I’d punch him in the face.

“What the hell were you two talking about?” Fantasia demands, folding her arms over her chest. Thethis timegoes unsaid.

My mind is spinning. I’ve done a lot of rash things in my life, but declaring that I’m married without even proposing to the woman in question is potentially the worst one. I hadn’t meant to say it. At the same time, they feel like the most true words I’ve ever spoken.

And I’m not taking them back.

“I had to inform your brother about the rats under his nose,” I tell Fantasia, with a bit more acid in my tone than I mean.

“You know that’s not what I’m talking about,” she hisses. “What you said- what you called me-”

“My wife?” I repeat, because I don’t like that she’s avoiding the word. “Whatever happens next, whether we return to England-” That earns me an even blacker glare. “-Or we lay low here for a while, you’ll be safer if you’re associated with me.”

“Oryou’llbe in greater danger if you’re associated withme,” she argues. “I keep telling you there is nowe. When are you going to listen-”

“Not tonight,” I cut her off. “Maybe tomorrow, but probably not then either, because I’m not leaving you on your own.”

“What do you think is going to happen?” Fantasia presses. “That I’ll wake up in the morning and agree to go back to London with you and- and marry you?!” Her eyes widen, then narrow with defiance as she holds my gaze. Waits for my answer.

And I don’t keep her waiting. “That’s right. That’s exactly what I think will happen. It’s what should’ve happened years ago.”

She blinks, stopped short at that. Her mouth opens and closes, her sculpted cheekbones blossoming red. But her anger disappears for only a moment before coming back in a flood. “Whatever either of us thought was going to happen when we were younger- it didn’t. That’s the entire problem, Piers! You think, after I tried to kill you-”

“You didn’t try very hard.”

She turns her back on me, one hand clutching at her long damp hair. “You’re infuriating,” she hisses. “You’redelusional.”

Hard to argue with either of those things.

“I’m also tired,” I tell her simply. “I didn’t sleep on the plane. I haven’t slept since. And you’ve been strangled and sliced open. Whatever we want to happen or think will happen, whatneedsto happen is that we get some sleep.”

---