Page 55 of Tempting the King

“Go back,” I tell the security guard, already picking up the pace, following the sound of the voices. He’s falling behind looking like a heart attack ready to happen and I don’t need to be dealing with that right now. “Victor, you’re with me.”

He stops, bending over with a thank you sort of wave as Victor and I run headlong down a narrow corridor, raised voices echoing through the empty space as clear as if we were right on them.

“Your brother told us it was a sure thing. Told us you’d take care of it. You don’t like your brother, is that it? You know what happens when you don’t square up? Then, you screw us and we lose money?”

“Let go!” Emee’s shrill voice pounds nails into my heart as I push my legs faster, harder, down the hall toward the sound. “I’ll pay you whatever he owes, just let him go. Please!”

“Yep. You’ll pay. Sweet girl like you gets a nice price.” A low male voice yells. “You don’t fuck with me. Make a fool of me. You’re gonna work off this debt taking a lot of dicks in all your holes.”

Blind rage crackles over my skin as we come around the corner and my world falls apart.

Emee’s lip is bleeding, there’s swelling around her eye, and her hair and clothes are disheveled. There’s a guy holding her arms back while another holds her chin in his hand.

No, fucking way.

I don’t say a word to Victor, but we’ve been friends long enough not to need it. He wades in right alongside me, heading for the guy holding Emee while I rush the one who was touching her. They weren’t expecting company, and they take a second too long before they see us coming.

Benjamin is on the ground with another goon standing over him, but right now, it’s all about Emee.

The squelch of blood as his nose explodes against my right fist gives me a satisfying rush of adrenaline. I hear a grunt and a shout from the other fight, but don’t stop to look as I swing with my left, feeling my knuckles crush against his temple. He stumbles back, raising a hand to defend himself, but I’m already following up.

“Stop!” he shouts. But I’ve got him on the ground, smashing the back of his head over and over onto the concrete as my vision turns red and blood weaves its way from his nose, down the sides of his cheeks and over my fingers.

But, I don’t stop.

I cock back for another punch but this stupid motherfucker smiles, then says, “You still think she’s for real, don’t you? Only reason this bitch spread her legs for you was to put you off your game, so her big brother could bet against you. So, we could clean up. Now, look at you. Here to play the hero. Oh, man, you’ve been played.”

I growl, my fist hanging in the air, muscles twitching and burning.

“Ask her.” He sputters, spitting blood and saliva, keeping himself from choking.

I turn my head, Emee is standing there, eyes wide with horror, brow knitted together.

But, there’s something else.

She doesn’t just look scared, she looks…sad?

No, not sad. She looks like she’s been caught.

She’s shaking her head, as her brother pushes himself to sit up, his face battered into a blue and red swollen disaster the guy standing over him a minute ago is long gone.

“She didn’t want to,” he says through swollen lips, clutching his face. “She did it for me, okay? These guys were going to… If I didn’t come up with cash fast, they would have killed me, and Emee…” He looks at her, “I’m sorry. I never wanted you to get hurt. I’m sorry.”

The guy under me tries to roll away, but I twist my fingers into his shirt. He looks up at me with a bloody smile. “She fucked you to make you lose, man! You gonna let that cunt make a fool of you like this?”

“That’s not true. You have to believe me!” she screams, but everything starts to spin.

The guy on the floor takes my momentary disorientation to grab a blade from his pocket, swinging it in an arch toward my face.

I block it at the last second, delivering another fist to his nose as he howls in pain.

Then, Emee is right there, that hellcat look in her eyes, delivering a solid kick to his ribs then turning her sorrow filled eyes at me. “I didn’t do what they said. Benjamin asked me to, but I said no. What happened had nothing to do with…” She looks around at the chaos around her swinging her arms. “This.”

I only blink.

Is this happening? Am I hearing all this right?

“You fucked me so I’d lose?” I furrow my brow as I push to my feet, the bloodied guy on the floor losing priority as I process that the woman I love played me.

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