Page 119 of Powerless
Sloane gasps. I’ve always known he’s a piece of shit, but I think this might be the first time she’s really seeing it.
With two long strides, I’m at her side, entirely blocking the doorway.
“Talk to her like that again and see how it ends for you.” The angry, fucked-up teenager in me flares to life. I’ve worked hard to get control of myself over the years, and Robert fucking Winthrop just undid it all with one well-placed tug on a loose string.
“You forget what I told you, boy? You want that career? You want that paycheck? I can still ruin you. I can take it all away in a second.” He snaps his fingers for emphasis.
The logical part of me doesn’t want to believe him. The logical part of me knows I’m a household name. A national sensation as the headlines would say. Indispensable to my team—at least when I’m playing well.
Sloane steps up to her dad, dwarfed by his size but holding her head high like she doesn’t notice at all. Her dainty finger points at her father, steady and strong. “Talk tohimlike that again and see how it ends foryou.”
“Sloane, let the men talk.” He waves her off like she’s completely inconsequential to him.
She rears back as though he’s struck her. And I guess in a way he has.
He also talked to her like that again when I told him not to.
With one gentle hand, I usher her behind my body, protectiveness pouring out of me. “Get out.”
“I’ll ruin you, Gervais. You’re not in the plan for her. You’re an orphan who works in the entertainment industry. She’s practically Canadian royalty.”
My head tilts, and Robert Winthrop might as well be a puck. Because all I can think is that I need to stop him. Stop his forward motion into this room. And stop his stupid mouth from running.
“I think Sloane will be the judge of that. I think we’re all going to step away from telling Sloane who she is and what she needs to do. I think Sloane is very smart and very capable of knowing what she wants for herself.”
My gaze flits over his shoulder to Cordelia, whose eyes are boring into mine. She looks angry but not at me. It’s the type of anger that could brim over into hot, quiet tears.
I know that anger. I know those tears. They taste like regret, and that’s what’s written all over her face.
She looks so much like her daughter, it’s hard not to see the parallels between them. It’s hard not to see her as living the life that Sloane could be years from now. Having to watch her own daughter get pawned off like chattel.
I shake my head. What fucking year is it? I guess I really must be from the wrong side of the tracks because these business transaction marriages are just not a part of my world.
“Is that so, Sloaney?” Robert peers around me, bending down condescendingly, looking far too amused by his daughter’s distress.
I want to deck him in the face and watch him crumple to the floor. But despite my lowbrow upbringing and beingan orphan who works in the entertainment industry,I’m not dumb. He’s the type of asshole who will waltz into his fancy lawyer’s office and fucking cry about it.
Sloane’s fingers link with mine as she steps close to me, holding her chin up, refusing to cower. “You need to leave. When I’m ready to speak to you, I will. And my name is Sloane. Not Sloaney.”
Robert blinks once as he straightens. He expected her to roll over and show him her belly, not curl her lip at him.
I’m proud of her. Of how much she’s grown in the last couple of months.
The beefy man tugs at the lapels of his jacket. “I’ve made us a dinner reservation for your birthday on Wednesday. If you deign to grace us with your presence, it would be lovely to have the birthday girl there.”
He slips into being a condescending asshole so easily. My teeth grind, and my fingers curl tightly around hers while the opposite hand balls easily into a fist.
“Jasper has a game that night,” she says matter-of-factly.
Robert smiles. “That’s fine. He isn’t invited. Not if he wants to keep that gig.”
Sloane’s chin dips and her shoulders roll inward. Disappointment paints every crevice of her body, but she doesn’t offer a response.
He’s almost out the door when he turns back and delivers his killing blow. “Think hard,Sloane.If you’re going to be master of your own destiny or whatever this new phase is, you have to consider some things. Do you want to be the reason Jasper Gervais goes back to where he came from? That’s a long way for a man like him to fall.”
With that he raps his fingers against the doorframe and strides away like he owns the fucking place.
Cordelia’s haunted eyes are a shot straight to the chest. The look of pleading she hits me with is heavy and uncomfortable.
