I felt her fingers brush mine as she attempted to take the drink from my hand, but it took me a second to realize what she was doing and I held on tight.
“Sebastian?” she questioned, confused as she gave another tug on the glass.
I blinked and my eyes moved to hers. She smiled up at me, but a hint of confusion remained on her face as she tried to understand my behavior.
“The Sebastian Black. It’s nice to finally meet you.”
I felt an instant irritation for the deep voice, but I gave him a tight, polite smile.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Sebastian, this is David Richards. He’s one of the people responsible for charity drive I attended last month.” She smiled up at him, and his gaze lingered on her lips. The air left my lungs as if I’d been punched in the balls. “David, Sebastian Black.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” I responded in a monotone. I meant to excuse Rosslyn and myself in the next breath, but she was talking before I could.
“Sebastian, David’s in the process of opening up his own club on the west side.”
“Congratulations.” I took a swig from my scotch and narrowed my eyes in his direction.
He was openly gawking at my girl. I wanted to put my fist through his mouth.
He laughed. “Thanks, but it’s nothing compared to Clive’s.”
“I’m sure it’s going to be a fabulous club, David,” Rosslyn added politely.
I knew she was just being nice. That was how Rosslyn was, but it bugged the hell out of me.
“So you’ve been to Clive’s?” I asked.
“Yes, quite a few times actually. It’s very impressive.”
“Well, allow me to do you the same courtesy. Please let us know when your doors are officially open, and Rosslyn and I will be happy to check it out.”
“Yes, of course,” Rosslyn said with enough enthusiasm to make my teeth ache.
His smile was more for Rosslyn than for me, and I wasn’t sure how much more of him I could stand before I threw Rosslyn over my shoulder and escaped from the room.
“That sounds perfect. You both are more than welcome to stop by before then, too.” His eyes left her face to roam across her cleavage. Fire licked up my spine. I took another swig from my drink and let it burn the back of my throat. “The place is a mess,” he continued, “but any insight from you, Mr. Black, would be greatly appreciated.”
Mr. Black.
The way he said my name was almost a taunt. He knew I’d seen him feasting his eyes on what was mine. He was enjoying my anger. I wasn’t buying his phony nice guy act for one second, but I couldn’t say the same for Rosslyn.
She looked up at me with a ravishing smile on her pouty lips, and when I realized the look in her eyes was one of pride, I felt my anger slowly melt away. She was proud of me and the club, and for some odd reason, that pushed all the other thoughts away. I no longer gave a shit about David. All that mattered was my girl only had eyes for me. Let the fucker envy me for what he could never have.
Rosslyn.
“We’d love to stop by, David.” She patted my arm, her way of telling me to be nice and go with it.
“Great. If you are both free this week, I’d love to have you. The kitchen will be open, so we could have lunch.”
“That sounds lovely-”
Before Rosslyn made any plans I had no intention of following through with, I stopped her.
“This week might not be the best. With wedding plans and construction on the restaurant under way, I’m not sure I’ll be able to get away.”
Rosslyn turned to scowl at me privately, and I returned it with a panty-melting smile.
“But I’ll be in touch, David. I’ll set up something soon.” I reached out and shook his hand with a squeeze that told him to back the fuck off.
“Of course.” He nodded, giving me another knowing grin.
“I guess I didn’t think about the restaurant and how busy you’ve been with it lately,” Rosslyn mused, “but I won’t be.”
She turned toward David before she could see my face change several shades of red.
“I’d love to come by sometime this week.”
I knew she wasn’t agreeing to meet with David to make me jealous. I knew Rosslyn, and it was obvious she was trying to prove a point. But she would soon realize it was a very dangerous game to play with me.
I wanted to tell her over my dead body. I wanted to tell her that hell would freeze over before I left her alone with a man who obviously wanted to fuck her senseless, but I knew that wasn’t the best tactic to take with her in our current surroundings. Before I could say anything, though, David managed to shock us both.
“That’s really sweet of you, Rosslyn, but the club isn’t in the best of neighborhoods. I wouldn’t feel comfortable with you making the trip out to the property alone.”
I wanted to believe he was using that as an excuse because he was afraid of me, but he seemed to be genuinely concerned about her safety. For the first time since I’d first laid eyes on him, I didn’t want to beat the life out of him.
MEN! FIRST, SEBASTIAN ALL BUT knocked me over my head with his caveman ways. I had expected him to drag me from the event by my hair at any second. He acted as though David and I were naked and seconds away from screwing against the grand piano in the corner of the ballroom.
Then, to make matters worse, David had to go and treat me like a delicate flower.
I wasn’t a delicate anything. I owned a gun and I knew how to use it. I’d lived in my car on the mean streets of New York City. I was a dangerous, wild woman. They thought they were the stronger sex. Just because I didn’t have actual balls hanging between my thighs didn’t mean I was a helpless little creature.
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The neighborhood wasn’t safe. Working wasn’t safe. They acted as if I’d be murdered just by leaving our condo. They acted as if I was totally helpless. Just little ol’ me, Rosslyn Harris, a girl who couldn’t fight her way out of a wet paper bag.
Well, I had news for them!
I was strong, and I could definitely protect myself. Hell, Sebastian didn’t know it, but I’d already done so. Technically, the guy left without harming me, but still, I’d been attacked and I’d handled the pressure just fine. I didn’t fall into the fear. I’d remained calm even though my nerves were crazy, and I’d handled the situation.
I was beyond livid by their words and actions, and I could tell by Sebastian’s expression that he knew I was seconds away from exploding with anger.
“So basically, you’re saying I can’t protect myself?” I asked, my words coming out angry and rushed.
David’s face cleared and his eyes went wide. “Of course not. I would never suggest …”
“That’s exactly what you’re suggesting. What, because I have breasts I can’t fight off an attacker?”
Sebastian choked on his scotch, and David’s face went pale at the mention of breasts so loudly in the middle of a ballroom full of people.
“Ms. Harris, I assure you I would never …”
Again, I cut him off in the middle of his sentence as my anger boiled hotter. “Because I can assure you, Mr. Richards, that regardless of my breasts, I’m quite capable of protecting myself. In fact, I protected myself against an attacker a few days ago just outside my job.”
Three things happened the second those words spilled from my lips.
One, the string quartet stopped playing to switch songs, making my loud declaration sound even louder.
Two, I slapped my hand over my mouth as if to push the words back in and make their memory dissolve into the air around us.
And three, Sebastian’s face turned several shades of red as he brought his glass away from his lips. His eyes clashed with mine and his brows pulled down so sharply I was sure he was going to erupt right there in a room full of New York’s finest.
“What did you just say?” he asked.
His words were a sinister whisper, as if my answer was life or death, and som
ething told me they might just be.
David stepped away from him. He rubbed the back of his neck and looked away as if he was clueless to the tension between Sebastian and me.
“Well, it was nice to see you again, Ms. Harris.” He turned toward Sebastian, who wasn’t even acknowledging him, and nodded. “Mr. Black.”
And then he was gone, leaving me there with a man I was suddenly afraid of.
Sebastian would never hurt me.
Never.
But the anger in his eyes made even me shiver.
“Sebastian, I know I should have told you …” I started.
He didn’t let me finish.
Instead, he turned and started toward the exit.
I followed him out of the ballroom and into the grand foyer.
“Sebastian, please. Just listen.”
But he wasn’t paying any attention as he stepped out into the cool New York night air and called for Martin to pick us up.
I’d just screwed up royally.
Honestly, it really wasn’t a big deal, but if I knew Sebastian, and I did, there was going to be hell to pay for not telling him I’d been attacked.
IN MY WORLD, ROSSLYN NOT telling me she’d been attacked was the equivalent of lying.
I was livid.
How was I supposed to trust her if she couldn’t tell me something as important as her life being put in danger?
I knew she was behind me, but I just kept walking. I needed to get from beneath the knowing gazes of everyone in the ballroom and into the back of my car before I did something really stupid … like freak the fuck out.
“It’s really not a big deal, Sebastian. Nothing even really happened.”
At that, I swung around, my eyes devouring her in her long gown. “Not a big deal? You’re fucking joking, right?”
She crossed her arms in aggravation and matched my heated glare.
“Tell me what happened. Don’t leave anything out.”
“I refuse to tell you anything until you calm down.”
We were standing beside a busy street as we waited for Martin to pick us up, but I barely heard anything over the loud beating of my heart.
She opened her mouth to explain, but at that exact moment, Martin pulled up in the sleek, black Town Car.
Turning away from Rosslyn, I pulled the back door open before Martin could even get out of the driver’s seat.
“Get in,” I demanded.
Anger moved over her expression, and I knew she was about to start her shit about not being told what to do. Before she could complain, I moved away from the door and pulled her to me.
“Get. In.” I enunciated each word slowly to prove how serious I was.
She blinked up at me, her thick-mascaraed lashes sweeping across her flushed cheek. She pulled her arm free from my grasp and moved around me to climb into the backseat.
The drive home was a quiet one. I couldn’t bring myself to speak. I was too afraid of what I’d say. The last thing I wanted to do was say anything callous to the woman I loved, but every time I closed my eyes, all I could see were her dead eyes staring up at me from the asphalt of a dark alley.
She could have been killed.
She could have been taken away from me.
I’d die without her.
I had no doubt in my mind that something happening to Rosslyn would be the end of me.
I couldn’t take my eyes off her, and she matched my stare. Neither of us spoke a word. I wanted to, but every time I opened my mouth, the words would catch in the back of my throat and I’d close my eyes and see her dead all over again. It made me feel nauseated; sick so deep in my gut I was sure I’d never feel okay again.
“I know what you’re thinking, Sebastian, but I swear it wasn’t bad.”
I didn’t believe her.
Of course, she was going to downplay the situation because she knew how angry I was.
“Look at me,” she demanded, holding her hands out. “I’m fine. See?”
Exhaling out my nose, I closed my eyes once more, my heart breaking into a million pieces at just the thought of something happening to her.
“I don’t know what I’d do,” I said, my words sounded strangled and broken.
She slid closer to me, her thigh brushing mine. “What do you mean?”
“If something happened to you. I don’t know what I’d do.”
She reached out and cupped my cheeks and I turned my face into her touch. My lips brushed her soft palm, and she ran her thumb across my lips.
“Nothing’s going to happen, sweetie. No one will ever take me away from you.”
I folded my arms around her and pulled her to me.
I’d overacted; I knew I did, but I couldn’t help it. When it came to Rosslyn, everything was so dire. Every emotion I had was intensified.
She was untouchable.
She was mine.
I held her as she told me about being in the parking garage and getting into her car. About finding a man in the backseat of her car waiting for her. She didn’t know what he looked like since it was dark, but she explained how he held a knife to her while he spoke before he jumped from her car and left her alone.
It didn’t make sense.
What was the point of climbing into the back of her car and then doing nothing?
“Did he say anything else? Did he ask for money or anything?”
She went over everything he’d said to her, but only one sentence stood out from the rest.
“They call me the boogeyman, sweetheart, and I’m your worst nightmare.”
“He said what?” I hissed, making Rosslyn jump beside me.
She looked up at me with equal parts confusion and fear at the tone of my voice.
“He said, ‘they call me the boogeyman, and I’m your worst nightmare.’” She stumbled through the words, not exactly sure what I was thinking.
His parting words to Rosslyn left me reeling uncontrollably, and I told myself it wasn’t connected. I told myself it was merely a coincidence, a really fucking terrifying one. I just wasn’t remembering correctly, and when we got back to the condo, I’d read the letter again and prove that I was wrong. I prayed to whatever god I needed to, to all of them, that I wasn’t right.
Rosslyn was still staring at me, and I realized I hadn’t responded for what seemed like a full five minutes.
Finally, I blurted something, anything, out.
“Since when is there a parking garage outside the legal aid building?”
Her swallow was visible, the skin on her neck quivering with nerves. Her eyes widened, and she began to nibble on her bottom lip the way she always did when she was seconds away from telling me something that would anger me.
“I wasn’t completely honest with you about a few things.”
I pulled away from her and peeled her hands from my body. She set them on her lap and looked down like a child who knew they’d done something bad.
“I’m not exactly working at the legal aid office.”
Closing my eyes against her deception, I shook my head as if I could shake away her untruths.
“What does not exactly mean?”
“It means I’m not working at the legal aid building.”
“Where are you working?” I asked, knowing before she even answered that it was going to be someplace terrible.
If Rosslyn had to be dishonest about where she was working, then it was obviously someplace I would never approve of.
“You know that office building across from The Pit Stop?”
Running my palms over my face, I looked away and let my eyes linger on the ceiling of the car. I needed to breathe it out. The neighborhood around The Pit Stop was one of the worst ones in New York City, yet my fiancée was driving there alone and working God knows where.
“Please tell me you’re fucking kidding me right now.”
“I got a job as a probation officer. It’s actually been working out great. Nothing dangerous or bad, I promise.”
“Ye
ah, nothing but being held up with a fucking knife, Rosslyn!” I growled.
Martin’s shoulders stiffened in the front seat at my loud explosion.
If, and I say if because I wasn’t completely convinced this was the same guy yet, but if it were the same guy sending the threatening letters, it could be any one of the lowlifes she was working with threatening her.
“You don’t know that that has anything to do with where I work! I was leaving the gym when it happened, not work. He wasn’t trying to hurt me. He just wanted to scare me.”
“And it fucking worked!” I roared.
“I’m fine, Sebastian.” Her voice was hard.
“Well, I’m not. I’m not fine at all.”
Before she could respond, the car stopped in front of Clive’s—home—and I nearly fell out. I needed air. I felt like I’d been suffocating the entire car ride home.
Rosslyn got out of the car and moved around me, making her way inside. I followed until she reached the stairs to the condo. When I didn’t follow her up to our place, she stopped and turned around to look at me.
“Are you coming?”
“No,” I responded harshly.
“What do you mean no? Where are you going?”
“I’m going to my office. I need space. I need to digest.”
“And you can’t do that in our condo?”
“No, I can’t.”
“Fine,” she said stubbornly, taking a step back down the stairs.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” I demanded.
“To give you space. No need to sleep in your office when this is your condo. I’ll stay with Trish tonight.” She passed me and headed toward the exit.
“The hell you will! So help me, Rosslyn, if you take another step toward that door …”
“You’ll what?” she challenged.
“Get upstairs. Now.”
I hated telling her what to do.
I really did, but after everything she’d confessed to me on the car ride home, I couldn’t stomach having her out of my sight. I wouldn’t survive if something happened to Rosslyn. I had to keep her safe.
I could see the debate playing out on her beautiful face. The urge to take her over my knee was strong—the need to control was there, but I couldn’t. Rosslyn wasn’t just some woman from my black book.
Little Black Box Set (The Black Trilogy) Page 29