Page 13 of His Wild Seduction

That I would ever have.

Meredith had destroyed whatever good there might have been after the military threw me away. I was twenty-five when I met her. And she’d barely been legal.

It was stupid, putting all my faith in someone so young. But she seemed older than her years. She was one of those rare old souls.

Her brilliance, her wit, her confidence were things of beauty. She had an appreciation for life I’d never seen in anyone else.

Meredith was like the sun coming out after what had been a long time in the shadows for this jaded ex-soldier.

She flirted. She teased. She chased. I evaded every attempt she made to waylay me and dismissed her feelings as hero worship or a childish crush.

But eventually, we became friends. We talked. Confided in each other. And yeah, I fucking fell for her. Head over goddamn heels.

But I didn’t fucking touch her until the clock chimed midnight on her eighteenth birthday.

I was going to marry her. We were supposed to leave the following night after she had a birthday dinner with her father where she was going to tell him everything.

Only Meredith didn’t meet me at our planned rendezvous. Her father, or stepfather as I’d just learned Franklin Gray to be, had shown up instead.

Fucking smarmy prick had apologetic crocodile tears in his eyes when he handed me her note. He’d added a check, of course, to shut me up and soften the blow.

“She’s too young for a commitment. Too young to know she shouldn’t play with men’s hearts.”

That was his half-assed explanation. A pitiful excuse for his failure to educate her in matters of the heart.

But I still accepted it and his check.

I took that bastard’s money and gave it to Adrik and Marat for their fledgling company, buying myself a nice piece of stock.

It took a few years, but I made enough money from that initial investment to start my own company. Later, I diversified my assets and now I qualified as a bonafide billionaire myself.

Not bad for a ward of the state who never knew his own parents.

But that didn’t assuage my thirst for revenge.

It took years for the opportunity to arise. But it had. It finally fucking had.

I’d kept tabs on Gray Corps and waited for the Franklin motherfucking Gray to fuck up.

Like a viper hiding in the grass.

So, when the opportunity arose, I struck. I went for his fucking jugular.

I knew taking his company would hurt the old prick. I’d hoped the cutoff of her funds would sting the woman who broke my heart.

But I never wanted to see Meredith physically injured. I wasn’t that much of a monster.

I did not physically hurt women. I hired female staff, mercenaries, and experts in the security field to do that. Sure, I was all for equal opportunity.

But I knew my physical strength and I would never unleash that kind of fury on a female. Nor would I allow any of the men who worked for me to do so.

One fucking foot out of line, and they were gone.

My feelings for Meredith were fucking complicated. I wanted to hate her. I wished I never loved her.

Despite all that, I couldn’t stand the idea of one strand of her fiery mane being hurt.

No way I could watch her crash onto the hardwood floor.

---