Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 100417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
I rose up on an elbow to look at him. He slept on his back, one brawny arm around me, the other over his head. I nearly whimpered. Un hombre magnífico.
How would Máxim be with me this morning? Would he act like nothing unusual had happened? Be embarrassed that we’d been drinking and oversharing? That I’d seen his scars?
What if he looked at me the way he had our first night, waking up to sneer, “You’re still here?”
I cautiously rose, finding a robe in the bathroom, then crept out of the bedroom suite. The housecleaner in me cringed at the mess in the sitting area. We’d hit this place like a hurricane.
I scuffed to the kitchen and found orange juice. Guzzled. Then I took another full glass out by the pool.
I drank it down too, then frowned at my empty glass. I’d thought I’d be a hundred times more hungover than this. Wasn’t too much champagne supposed to mess a person up? I felt great. Maybe because we’d eaten?
Or maybe I was still drunk?
I shrugged, concerned with more pressing matters. Though my memories were foggy, my emotions were pinging clear. I was infatuated with Maksimilian Sevastyan.
No, I hadn’t wanted a relationship. But being with this sensual man in this romantic setting made me wonder what it’d be like to live with and love someone like the Russian.
Seemed my heart wasn’t bulletproof.
Yet I’d also thought I’d loved Edward. Obviously, I was not to be trusted.
I stared out over the ocean. A storm was rolling in, backlit by the rising sun. I hated storms.
Was Edward even now in the city, watching this very sunrise? I exhaled a gust of breath, memories of that last night with him overrunning my thoughts.
Gun in hand and rosary around my neck, I’d reached for our bedroom door, prepared to brazen my way into some answers—I had to know what was in the case. When I entered, my husband was screwing Julia, more impassioned than he’d ever been with me. . . .
“So I’ll be dead by the holidays, cabrón?”
He jerked out of her, scrambling from the bed to his feet, his dick bouncing. “Ana-Lucía! I can explain everything!” His accent shifted from British to Southern mid-sentence. He pulled on his pants, and I let him. “Please, calm down! And for goodness’ sake, put the pistol away.”
Lightning flared, matching my mood. I finally understood the phrase “seeing red.” I pointed my gun at the woman frozen on the bed. “Who the hell is she?”
Edward raised his palms. “Talk to me.” He didn’t like my attention on Julia? “She’s an old friend who was passing through town.” His blond brows drew together as he gazed longingly at me. “This didn’t mean anything. I just missed you so much, darling—I was momentarily weak. I was so stupid. But we can work this out. You are the one that I love.”
He was good.
Julia stood, wrapping a sheet around herself. She was tall and slender, with long sandy brown hair and porcelain skin. “May I get my clothes?”
Lightning flashed again. “No. You move closer to him. NOW, bitch.” I waved the gun, and she hurried to his side. Even in this situation, they somehow looked dignified together, a sterling couple.
I turned to Edward. “If you lie to me again, I will shoot you in your scrawny dick. How did you kill my mother?”
“What are you talking about! Have you lost your mind?” His green eyes appeared stunned, as if I’d sprung this information on him—out of nowhere. “Your mother died of natural causes. You know that.”
How could he be so believable? For the tiniest instant, I thought to myself, Well, I did know that. I shook my head. “Natural causes? Weren’t you going to make my death look natural?”
Edward was aghast. “You’re accusing me of murder? When I’ve never raised a hand to you? I’ve never even raised my voice. Everyone knows how much I adore you. All our friends talk about my devotion.”
In other words, if I cried, “Murder plot!” no one would believe me. “What’s in the case in that safety-deposit box?”
“Case? Now what are you going on about, darling? How did we go from my—admittedly stupid—screwup to murder?” There was that reasonable voice again.
How much had he been gaslighting me in the past? “I heard you two, cabrón. No one’s celebrating my murder in Aspen this year.”
Julia was unraveling. “I told you this one was trouble!”
I sneered to her, “With a capital fucking T, Julia.” Back to Edward. “How did you kill my mother? And what’s in the case?” I cocked the pistol, movie-style, and aimed it at his groin. “Try lying to me again.”
He narrowed his eyes. “You won’t shoot me. If you do, all your money—now my money—will go to my heir. You signed over everything to me a year ago.”
“Then you’re right. It doesn’t make sense to shoot you.” I turned the gun to Julia. “I should shoot her. She’d be your heir, no?”
“Ana-Lucía!” His breath left him, his voice scaling higher as he said, “Don’t hurt her. Please.”
The most shocking revelation of the night? This monster truly loved her.
“Don’t make me hurt her! Answer my questions.”
Staring down a gun barrel, Julia said, “I will answer them for you. We can talk about this. In the case, there’s a syringe. It was the last injection given to your mother. She was dying anyway, but we hastened it.”
My lips parted. Julia had confirmed murder.
She continued, “We targeted you for the land. Charles—Edward—knows how to break the trust.”
Shock muffled my thoughts, but I needed to stay sharp. What incentive did Julia have to admit these things? I gazed at them through watering eyes. The two were farther apart from each other. While she stalled, he’d been sneaking closer to his dresser!
He must have a gun in there. “Stop where you are, Edward.” Keeping the pistol trained on them, I sidled toward the dresser. “You got a gun? I’ll be taking it, as well as the key to that safety-deposit box.”