Page 9 of Ruthless Regret

I’mmarried.

To Zain Ryder.

To my brother’s best friend.

To the man I was convinced murdered him.

How the hell did I get into this mess?

I should never have come back to town. I should have stayed in New York, with my friends. Zain would have found it harder to railroad me into doing what he wanted if I’d had my friends around me.

Would he have even bothered to try and find me? I set myself up as a target.

Twisting the ring off my finger, I throw it across the room. It hits the wall, bounces over the carpet, and rolls beneath the bed.

Why did I sleep with him?

That’s easy to answer.

He’s kept me so off-balance since our very first meeting, that my emotional responses are all over the place.

If you hadn’t been at the house today, would the intruder have surprised Zain? Would they have killed him?

The image of him bleeding out on the kitchen floor sends a chill up my spine.

Why do you care? He’s done everything he can to torture you for the past three days.

That’s another easy one.

Because since seeing the recording of my interview, I can’t deny the fact that I’m responsible for all those years he’s lost. For the reputation he’s gained. For the way his life has been ruined.

Because watching his interrogation and seeing the confusion and despair on the face of that twenty-year old boy—and hewasa boy—broke my heart.

Is that why I slept with him? Out of guilt?

No. I wasn’t thinking about our shared past at all.

He didn’t guilt you into having sex. You’re attracted to him. Which is fucked up. Which means you’re fucked up.

No matter what he’s done to me, or what I’ve caused him … thereisan attraction there that’s hard to ignore. Andthat’swhy I slept with him.

But I won’t be doing it again.

I push to my feet. I need to have that shower. Wash the smell of him off my skin.

Stripping out of my clothes, I go into the bathroom, and step into the shower. Head tipped back, I let the heated water fall over me. It’s soothing, easing the tension in my muscles. But the more my body relaxes, the more the thoughts swirl through my mind, making it harder to stop reliving the moment where I walked into Zain’s kitchen to find a stranger standing there.

Before I can stop myself, I’m on my knees, face buried into my palms, and crying. Harsh, gulping sobs that make my entire body shake with the force of them.

Someone tried to kill me.

Kill me. Why? What did I do? Was I just in the wrong place at the wrong time? Were they there for Zain? Was I just in the way?

The questions spin on a loop in my head. I don’t have an answer, not one that makes sense anyway.

When I finally get my emotions under control, and my sobs become quieter, I drag myself to my feet, wash, and turn off the water.

It’s time to face my friends. I’ll tell them everything that’s been going on, and then we can get out of here. Go back to New York.

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