Page 76 of Ride Hard
“Those men who are after you?” he continued, his expression pure thunder. “They’re the same men who took her from me. History will not repeat, Sloane. You hear me? I won’t letit.”
I froze, trying to make sense of this whole fucked up mess. His wife had been murdered by the same men who were trying to kill me. Was that why he cared? I was his redemption? His second fucking chance? This had nothing to do with love and had everything to do withclosure.
I was a pawn. Always hadbeen.
“I made a deal with Fortitude,” he said. “They help me get revenge, and inexchange…”
I shook my head and felt a black hole of sadness open up inside me. “You haven’t got ityet.”
He didn’t reply. He just stared at me, his foreheadcreasing.
“I should never have let you touch me.” I snarled, wrenching out of his grasp. He looked as if he’d been slapped, and it only made my rage intensify. “You piece of shit. You used me for sex. You used me just like I was…” My voice broke, and I turned away from him, focusing on the landscape rushing past outside the window. “You’re just like all the men I ran from when I left Fortitude. You’re just like my father. Small, manipulative, sadistic, and power hungry.I killed a man foryou.”
“Sloane.”
I felt his hand on my shoulder, and I shook him off with a violent jerk. “Don’t touch me. You never get to do that again,understand?”
“No, you don’tunderstand.”
“You don’t get to command me,” I said with a snarl, rising to my feet. “I am not yours! I don’t belong to you, Chaser. I understand plenty. I’m the Band-Aid on a festering wound. Nothing more, nothing less. You just couldn’t help yourself to a little pussy to soothe the ache left behind by your dead fuckingwife!”
“Shut your fucking mouth.” He snarled, standing beforeme.
In the small space, we had no room to move, so we were right up in each other’s faces, an inch apart. Instead of falling into his arms and him kissing me, we were on the verge of tearing each other apart. If only we’d gone this way that day on the side of the road when we’d first kissed. If only we’d leaned a little more toward hate thanlove.
Ifonly…
“I’m such a fool…” I said, my gaze searching his. “Neveragain.”
It was a promise, a threat, a motherfucking contract written inblood.
Never.Again.
