Page 61 of The Villains We Make

“You met Chandler of all people?” He rounds on me, trapping me with my back to the sink.

“I met my father’s lawyer.”

“Really? I didn’t see him out there.”

“He left. Not that it’s any of your business. You lied to me. You left me for Nigella to babysit and outright lied to me!”

“What was that piece of shit telling you?”

“Doesn’t matter, Silas. You. Lied.” I poke at his chest for emphasis. “How did you even find me here? Are you having me followed?”

“Audi. It has a GPS tracker.”

“Of course it does.”

“Why would I have my wife followed?”

“I don’t fucking know. Why would you go see my grandfather behind my back?”

“And if you were here to meet Higgins, did it occur to you how coincidental it was that fucking Chandler Carlisle-Bent was here?”

It did, actually, but it doesn’t matter anymore. “I don’t have to tell you anything because you don’t bother to tell me anything. I’m leaving. Get out of my way.”

He doesn’t.

“Move,” I tell him, but he captures my arm and tugs me toward himself when I try to walk away.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he says, plucking the glasses from my face and setting them on the counter. “You’re not going anywhere. Not until you learn a thing or two.” He spins me around to face the mirror, pushes me down with one giant hand between my shoulder blades. The other he slips into the waistband of my sweats. In the next instant, they’re down over my hips pooling around my ankles, my panties quickly following.

“What the hell?”

Silas drags his eyes from my bare ass to my face in the mirror. “What the hell? Now you learn what happens when you disobey me.”

“Disobey?” I ask, my voice raised as I try to straighten. He, of course, doesn’t allow it. He just keeps me pinned with that hand at my back and with his free hand, delivers the first smack to my ass.

“Disobey,” he repeats, spanking my ass three times as if to make his point.

“Ow! Silas! Get the hell off me!”

“Oh, I will but only when I am sure you will feel me every time you sit down for the next few days.” Whack. Whack. Whack. “There is a fucking reason I told you to stay at the house. There is a reason we’re at that house in the first place.” He doesn’t stop spanking me, words controlled, not giving me a second to catch my breath and not giving me any room to wriggle away from his palm.

“You lied to me! You fucking lied!”

“Did you think I might have a reason?”

“Everyone seems to have their reason and I’m tired of it!”

He slaps my inner thighs to spread my legs and leans over me, so his mouth is at my ear and our faces are inches away from the mirror. “I told you to stay at the house because it’s the safest place for you. Chandler does not have the best intentions where you’re concerned. He’s outright dangerous. It’s why I went to see your grandfather. To find out what the hell I was dealing with. I didn’t want you to worry. That’s why I didn’t tell you. Christ, O, it’s like you didn’t hear a fucking word I said to you just a few hours ago!”

“Oh! I heard you but actions speak louder than words, Silas! And for me to find out the way I did?”

“I will come for you, O. I will always come for you. Everything I do, I do to protect you.”

“That’s why you’re spanking me?”

“Believe it or not, I don’t like punishing you.”

“No, clearly.” I reach back and grip his erection, so he knows I know just how much he doesn’t like it. “Another lie.”

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