Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 125121 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125121 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
None of the above.
I still wanted to have that talk with all of them. I couldn’t go on sleeping and hooking up with these guys without defining what we mean to each other. Especially with my flipping fiancé living down the hall.
Wilder and I will talk. He has to know that even though our situation is complicated, my feelings for him aren’t. That kiss knocked the wind clean out of me. I wanted to—
My thoughts stopped dead in their tracks. Frozen, I did little more than stare at him—lips parted to scream an alarm that no one else would hear.
The man calmly set his teacup down and cleared his throat. Lifting his chin, he gestured for me to take the seat across from him.
“Hello, Miss Sinclair-Bowden. Please, join me.”
“Who are you?” I backed out of the kitchen. “How did you get in here?”
His brow crept up to his salt-and-pepper wings. “You don’t know? I’m told the resemblance is uncanny.”
He said it and I saw it. Wavy, raven locks. Enigmatic, flinty green eyes. An air of danger that clung to him like Wilder’s spicy-sweet colognes.
“Leon Dumont.”
Cato and Rafael’s father raised his cup. “Pleasure. Now that introductions are out of the way, you can stop preparing to run.”
I halted in my tracks, face warming. “Your sons aren’t here.”
“Of course they aren’t. I’m here to see you.”
“See me? Why w-would you be here to see me?” I tried to say that confidently and managed a stuttering rasp.
There was one stark difference between Leon Dumont and his sons. The cold, biting chill leaking from his eyes. He tracked me unblinkingly like one tracks a fly—waiting for the right moment to strike.
That such eyes could be within that handsome, lined face threw me further off-center. Even with the touch of silver in his thick hair and neatly trimmed beard, there was an ageless beauty about him that drew me like a moth to the flame. Who would think someone so beautiful would be dangerous? You don’t fear a rose or a butterfly. You get in close—too close. Then the trap you didn’t see coming strikes from behind.
“Miss Sinclair-Bowden,” Mr. Dumont said, all trace of pleasantry gone. “Sit.”
I took a breath and didn’t release it. Slowly, I approached the table, pulled out a chair, and sat down. Mr. Dumont reached behind him, and got the kettle and extra teacup that was apparently waiting for me. I swallowed hard as he poured.
“So, this is it,” I rasped. “Framing me didn’t work, so they sent you.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You’re here to kill me.” It wasn’t a question.
His expression gave nothing away. “Why would I want to kill you, young Luna?”
“Because they put that stun gun in my hand to get rid of two problems, but here I am. I was fooling myself thinking the killer wasn’t the Phantom, but someone else who took their shot. They got rid of Natale, and now they’ve sent you here to get rid of me. The Sinclair-Bowden problem finally ended for good.”
Leon Dumont listened without reaction or interruption. When I finished, he simply finished fixing my cup and slid it over.
“Funny,” I spat, lip curling at the tea. “I thought your wife was the poisoner.”
He chuckled. “Poison?” Leon dipped a spoon in my tea and brought it to his lips. He drank the harmless sip with open amusement in his eyes. “I don’t know where you got such ideas about me, or my sweet Sasha, but I mean you no harm. Even if I were what you seem to think I am, I’d like to believe I’d have an age cutoff. Any number that ends in teen or under, for example.”
My muscles didn’t unwind. “Then why are you here?”
“I’ve come to meet you. Something wrong with the tea?”
I flicked down. Was this a test or proof of control? He wanted me to sit, I sat. He wanted me to drink, I would drink. What command was he working his way up to?
“Yes,” I said. “I usually take it with honey.”
“Ah, yes. Of course you do. Young people these days. You’re so used to everything being altered or simplified for you, that it’s almost an affront to consume naturally. You don’t have to go to a record store for your music. You just tap on your phone.” He swirled his finger around his rim. “You don’t have to grow, tend, and harvest the leaves, so you think nothing of destroying the flavor of your store-bought bags with a microwave and bottle of honey.”
“Wow. You feel very strongly about tea.”
Mr. Dumont laughed. “I feel strongly about things being done the right way. My sons have been pestering me for information for you. If there’s something you’d like to know, it’s only right that you ask me yourself. Better yet, that we go through the trouble of introductions.”