And maybe, just maybe, when James had asked me what I thought of the whole marrying-Diana-and-running-for-president thing, I possibly might have told him it was a fantastic idea even though I hated it. Why? Because although Black had once complained that Diana was too clingy, she was the one woman he’d brought back to Riverley with him. He thought I didn’t know that, but I did.
I knew who some of the others were too. And even now on the rare occasions I came across one of them, I still felt that hot little bud of fire in my belly, the primal instinct to shove them over a damn cliff. But I didn’t. Perhaps because in the past, I’d had to cope without Black for the best part of a year, and I knew I could survive alone.
I’d be miserable as hell, but I’d survive.
All of which meant I could forgive Black for what he’d done to me, but not for what he’d done to Alaric.
“Sloane said you told her to clear your schedule.”
“How can I work? I can’t even think straight right now.”
“You weren’t thinking straight yesterday either. I’m half surprised you didn’t splatter Alaric against the wall.”
“I wanted to,” Black admitted. “I was angry. Angry at him for being here, angry at you for leaving with him, but most of all, angry at myself for driving you back into his arms.”
“Back into his arms?” Oh, for crying out loud. “Is that what you think happened?”
“Didn’t it?”
“For fuck’s sake, you’ve got to stop thinking that way. Alaric saw a distressed woman and helped her because that’s the kind of man he is. We went out for dinner. We talked. Alaric told me he was in love with Bethany, and I told him he should be having that conversation with her and not me. He told me I should talk things through with you instead of running away from my problems again, so here I am. Happy?”
“He brought you home. Stayed the night.”
“What did you do? Spy on me? Can’t you just let this go? He brought me home because I drank so much I couldn’t walk. Ana was there too, last night and this morning. I have no idea if she stayed over as well because I was unconscious. If this is how you’re gonna react every time I spend five minutes with Alaric, then we’ve got even bigger problems than I thought. And let me tell you, Chuck, we’ve got some pretty big problems.”
“I know.” He closed his eyes and pressed the heels of his hands against his forehead. “I can’t believe the way I treated you last night. The way I grabbed you. You’re right—I am a monster.”
“Look, you have a jealousy problem, I get it, and I’ll take some of the responsibility for how far things went.” My knuckles were a tiny bit bruised too. “You’re not a monster. A fool, maybe, but not a monster. I’m more concerned with the past. Why did you do it? Why did you ruin Alaric’s whole life? Did you plan it? Did you sit down and map the entire fucking path of his destruction?”
Black had always been a planner. A plotter. A schemer. But the thought of him jotting notes and calculating probabilities and working out timings made me sick to my stomach.
“I didn’t plan it at all. I just…snapped.”
“You snapped? And somehow happened to pull off the perfect fucking crime? Oh, and nearly got us both killed in the process?”
Black’s worried expression turned to absolute horror. “I swear I didn’t know you were going with him to the drop! If I had, I’d never have done it.”
“So it was okay for Alaric to get killed? Just not me?”
“I didn’t think he’d get on the damn boat. I figured he’d open up the case to check everything before he left here.”
Because Black would have done exactly that. Check, check, and check again. He was meticulous whereas Alaric was more of a one-and-done guy. He did things once, and he did them carefully.
“So he’d only have lost his job, lost the painting, and possibly gone to jail?”
“I fucked up. Like yesterday, I wasn’t thinking straight, and I panicked. I was…scared.”
He whispered the word as if it were an intruder. A trespasser that had no place in his psyche.
“Scared of what?”
“That you’d leave me.”
“I wouldn’t have.”
“You were looking at houses. He bought you a ring.”
The first part I was well aware of, but the second part? That was news.
“A ring?”
“A fifteen-thousand-dollar white gold and purple sapphire solitaire ring. There’s only one reason a man buys a woman jewellery like that.”
“Shit.”
The word slipped out, much the same way as it would have if Alaric had asked me to marry him all those years ago. Then the rest of my brain caught up.
“What were you doing? Monitoring his credit card statements? His email?”
Black’s silence told me that was precisely what he’d been doing.
“For the love of fuck! Why didn’t you just talk to me? Ask me how I felt? Yes, I liked Alaric a lot, but I didn’t want to marry him.” I closed my eyes and sucked in a ragged breath. “Not when it would have meant divorcing you. I couldn’t have done it. Even after you coldly informed me our one and only kiss was a mistake, I still wanted you. If you felt the same, why didn’t you just tell me?”
“I came home that evening to do exactly that. The job finished early, and I got a ride back—”
“With Pale?”
Black nodded.
“That lying cretin.”
“I asked him to lie. He told me I was an idiot.”
“He was right.”
“I know.”
“So, you came home…”
“I jumped out of the plane. I hadn’t skydived for a while, so I figured it was a good opportunity to fit in some
