Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 76478 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76478 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
My head snaps toward him like the damn exorcist.
Bryant takes another puff of his cigar. “That day that you and Brooke came to the tent, we knew who your dad was, yeah. The truth, Isa, is your dad owed me a great debt.”
Tension builds between my eyebrows as they pinch together. “What do you mean?”
Bryant licks his lips. “He owed me for something I did. Something I helped him with. As a backup, if he didn’t pull through with what he promised me, I needed to get close to you. Easier to kidnap someone when they’re willing to get in your car…” he whispers off the words with a smug smirk on his face.
I want to slap it off.
I rise from the seat, shaking my head. “Wait. So—” Reality slams into me like a sledgehammer right to the head. “Wait!” Breathe, Isa. Breathe. You can’t go to prison. “So you proposing, wanting to marry me, the reasons why you told me you loved me, were actually lies?”
Bryant looks up at me from hooded eyes, the veins on his arms popping out. I hate when he rolls his dress shirt up to his elbows. He has perfect arm porn.
“Baby…” Devon reaches for my hand. “What happened to get you down that aisle and everything up to this point doesn’t mean anything on what we both are now.”
I’m on my feet in a flash and before I can stop myself, I slap Devon across the cheek with a loud clap. He takes the hit, shrugging me off. “I knew that they had played me, Devon. I knew that my father and even Bryant had cooked something up.” Tears stung the side of my eyes. “But I thought you were different! I trusted you, Devon! Even when I was unconscious and fighting the battle of Brooke in my head, even when I saw you with Brooke in my head, deep down I still trusted you!”
Devon came closer to me, and before I can run, his arm is hooked around my back as he pulls me into his chest. “Fuck you, Isa. You know I love you. You know how I feel about you and what I would do for you and only you, Isa.” He squeezes me, and my emotions are fighting silently with his right now, because the crack in his voice shatters my core. “Because I didn’t want any other girl on my dick. Just you. Always just you. So I went to men, because every single time I was cock-deep in another fucking pussy, all I thought of was yours. So fuck you if you assume less of me. I’m not responsible for the shady shit your brain created.”
My heart sinks at his words, the pain almost unbearable. I need to be alone. Devon releases me, stepping backward to allow me my space. I knew Devon was in love with me. I truly and beneath it all knew all along, but I slept with him anyway. All along, I was messing with his feelings and didn’t even realize.
Bryant was in the same position, watching me. When I bring my eyes to his cold, dead ones, his jaw tenses.
“You got anything to say for yourself?”
“Yeah,” Bryant says. “I’m not done. So if you could sit your fucking ass down so I can finish, maybe I won’t need to beat your ass to make you compliant. And Devon can watch.”
My arms cross.
“Stop acting like a brat, Isa. You know damn well how both he and I feel about you and you fucking know that no one walking this earth would ever be able to get near you.”
“Really?” I snap, glaring at the both of them. These two infuriating men who mean more to me than I could ever attempt to explain. “Because last I checked, you both fucking left me in an asylum.” As soon as the words leave, I already know I’m beating a dead horse. We know this. I’ve been through it. I’m starting to feel like the words are losing their substance every time I say them.
Bryant stands from where he was sitting. The air shifts as he eats up each step. Closer and closer. Any other woman would crawl back into her shell. He’s intimidating and he knows it.
“One, I believed him when I saw the state you were in. We both did. The asylum was legit. We thought you were in the best care. Why would your father go to this extreme at keeping you hidden, hmmm?” Another step. I take one back. “Two, if you doubt my feelings for you one more time, Isa, it will hurt.”
I bang into the desk, my hands squeezing around the edges of the wood.
My phone starts vibrating again. “So, to be clear…” I say. “My father offered me to you to pay his debt?”