Page 11 of Gangster's Empire: Leeza & Havel

He dumped her clothes on the floor.

Leeza shook her head and backed away. “I can’t sleep in here.”

Visions of Adam and the humiliations he subjected her to swam in her head and for a terrible moment she thought she was going to throw up on the carpet. She put a hand over her mouth to stop from spewing.

“What you want doesn’t matter.” Havel took a menacing step toward her. “You’re staying here with me.”

“But why here? Why does it have to be his room?”

His tone was pitiless when he replied, “Because he took what was mine and I want it back.”

Her heart twisted. Havel didn’t speak to her this way. Or at least he didn’t used to. Sure, he’d been hurt and angered when he thought she’d chosen Adam over him, but he’d taken the rejection with dignity, treating her with the same cool professionalism he showed every other member of the family. This hostility was a new kind of torture.

“Why are you doing this to me?” she asked, remembering that moment eight years ago in her father’s office when she realized she’d have to let him go. The heartbreak. She’d never healed, but the Havel she was facing now wasn’t the same man she’d fallen in love with when she was a teenager.

Havel stared at her for a long moment as though gathering his thoughts, then he reached for her, gripping her chin. Forcing her head up, he said in a deadly voice, “I never stopped loving you.” A thrill snaked through her, giving her hope for the first time since their reunion. She almost admitted she never stopped loving him either, but he kept talking, “I also never stopped hating you.”

She flinched as he shattered her fleeting moment of happiness. The pain of his words was unbearable, though she supposed she should be glad he felt anything for her at all. Indifference would have been worse.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t want to hurt you.”

“It’s too late for apologies.”

“Then why are you forcing me to marry you?” she asked desperately.

“You crawled under my skin eight years ago and I’ve never been able to rip you out. Now, instead of trying to forget you, I’m going to cage you up where I can see you everyday to remind myself what a fool I was. You’ll never again be allowed to destroy the lives around you with your reckless selfishness.”

“I can’t bear this,” she whispered, a sob escaping her throat. “Please, please, just leave me alone.”

He stared down at her for agonizing seconds, then said, “You’ll never be alone. Not as long as I live.”

He released her chin, gripped her arms and dragged her into his embrace, treating her to a stinging kiss. It was meant to be punishment, but a thrill of excitement went through her. As he set her on her feet, she stared up at him wondering what kind of a future they could possibly build together when the foundation of their marriage was based on hatred and lust.

CHAPTER FIVE

Havel pushed her into the washroom and stood sentinel outside the door while she showered and prepared for bed. She supposed she should be grateful he didn’t insist on coming inside with her. After she finished, he pushed her into the bed, climbing in after her, but thankfully left her alone to curl up on the edge of the mattress.

Still awake hours later, Leeza lay on her back, her gaze on the shadowy ceiling above. Havel’s soft snores were almost irritating. She thought about slipping from the bed to find a knife so she could stab him in the eye, but he was a warrior – he might appear to be asleep but a wrong move from her would have him on his feet and ready to fight.

Her skin crawled with the memory of her time spent with Adam in that room, in that bed.

She thought she understood Havel’s thinking in forcing her to sleep with him in Adam’s bed. It had to be some kind of primitive desire to replace Adam with himself in her mind by physically placing himself where Adam used to be. The only problem was, associating himself with Adam in any way only deepened her disgust.

She flipped to her side to face her captor, his soft rosewood and citrusy scent floating to her. It reminded her of better times, of the smells of trees, gun oil, and oranges.

Damn it, Havel’s evil plan was working! She was forgetting about Adam and thinking about Havel.

His deep voice reached to her from his side of the bed and she nearly jumped out of her skin.

“Stop moving.”

Her eyes met his in the darkness and they stared at each other for a long minute, then Leeza narrowed her eyes. “You’re the one making me sleep in this damn bed. It’s your fault I can’t sleep.”

“You can’t sleep?” he asked in a low, sexy voice.

Oh shit. “No, wait – ” but he was on top of her before she could finish the sentence, his massive bulk pressing her body into the mattress. He was naked except for a pair of boxer briefs. She was wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt.

“Get off me!” She pushed hard against his shoulders.

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