Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 138003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
“No, that’s not what this is,” I say with a soft chuckle. But then, because I’m me, I begin to wonder, phone in hand, if I’m mistaken and now him.
No. I’m not. I just got a text from him.
I swipe to my banking app, thumbing in my login details, my thoughts resolute—all in, he loves me. “So who else has Raif dropped on a whim?” Because what woman doesn’t want to know those details.
“His fiancée. His previous fiancée, that is.”
“You mean Celine.” I lift my gaze just in time to see his eyes move over me in a way that makes my skin crawl. I look back at my phone and holy shit! He’s right—the money Raif promised—the money I was supposed to get at the end of twelve months is all there. Minus my overdraft.
“Lovely woman, Celine. Lovely looking, too. Legs for days,” he adds as his gaze drops to my legs. “She was very pissed off to find out he’d left her nothing.”
“It’s not like he died,” I say with a snort as I tug at the hem of my skirt over my knees. He might be good looking, and his suit might be Armani, but the vibes he’s giving off are nothing short of repulsive. “It’s not like a breakup comes with a penalty, Mr. Tierney.”
He swipes up his glass, examining it. “You mean like a prenup?”
Fuck him. Fuck his sleazy eyes and his seedy tone. “You’re the lawyer. Prenuptial. Isn’t the key in the word?”
“Clever,” he says, pointing a finger gun my way around his glass. “Remind me, where did you and Raif meet?”
“At my gallery, not that it’s any of your business. And it’s not what I came to speak to you about.”
“Ah, yeah. I remember now. That’s why you married him, right? To keep it going.”
I gasp—the audacity!
“No need to be embarrassed.”
“I’m not embarrassed.” I’m repulsed as he leans onto one butt cheek, and for a minute, I think… But he’s just pulling out his wallet.
“I was the one who looked into your financials,” he adds, pulling out a credit card. And a baggy a third full with white powder. What the fuck? “It was how Raif came up with the sum, the million sweetener.” He carefully opens the bag, tapping a little of the powder onto the table. Using his credit card, he fashions it into two lines before pulling a fifty from his wallet. “Personally, I thought it was a bit much.” His tone is conversational as he rolls it across the width, making a thin tube. “Especially given the state of your P&L accounts. You would’ve settled for much less, and I said so.”
He offers the rolled bill my way. I shake my head, disgusted. Not that it registers as he shrugs. Your loss.
“It’s gone five,” he says, as though feeling the weight of my judgment. This is a man in power—a man still in his office. Couldn’t he leave this shit until he got home? “Almost the weekend.”
“Wouldn’t a straw be more hygienic?” I ask as he bends forward, pressing it to his nostril. All those hands that thing has been in. Dropped to dirty floors. Maybe stuffed into thongs in strip joints. By all means, shove it up your nose.
“Ah, but that would be possession with intent,” he says, pausing. “As far as the law is concerned. Whereas a fifty with traces of coke on it can’t really be linked to me.”
“Except for your eyes,” I say, only just noticing his pinprick pupils. And a blood test, maybe?
“You know, he could’ve had women lining round the block for that deal—one look at him, and most would’ve thrown in sex for free.”
“I don’t like what you’re insinuating.”
But he’s no longer paying attention as he inhales.
“Fuck, yeah.” He sniffs, then wipes his knuckle under his nostrils. “It does make me wonder what kind of magical pussy five million gets you.”
“What the actual fuck?”
“No offense—quite the opposite. That’s what I’m saying. He could’ve dumped you the Monday following the wedding without owing you a penny, legally speaking.”
“What are you talking about? Why would—”
“Maybe he was still thinking about your brother at that point.” His shoulders rise and fall. “He must feel like he’s done with that now.”
“My brother? You mean Whit?”
He waves his hand, which I take as a no. This is like a conversation going in circles.
“The other one. The one who banged Celine. Raif thinks I didn’t know,” he says, tapping his nose, “but she told me. Told me then she shagged me to spite him. Our secret. If you want to avail yourself of the same…”
“Dream on.” My lips curl as I eye God’s less-than-stellar gift to women.
“Please yourself.”
“I will, thanks. But my brother and Celine? Is that what you’re trying to say?”
He nods heavily and uses his hands to mime bending a figure over before giving a repulsive flex of his hips. The pig. “He walked in on them in the act.”