Page 4 of Syndicate of Sin Bundle

Instead of prying anymore, I slid into bed, turned onto my side, and stared into the darkness. “Good night,” I whispered, trying hard to keep my voice steady and unwavering.

Tears welled up in my eyes. The feeling of his hand closing around my throat so viciously like that haunted me.

The bed dipped next to me, Ben sliding under the covers with me. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, fingers brushing against my hip to pull me closer.

I pushed him away. If he didn’t want to tell me the truth, I didn’t want him to touch me.

“I’m taking you out tomorrow night. We’re going somewhere nice,” he said, then turned onto his side to face the opposite direction.

I pressed my lips together and refused to make any noise, any whimper, any sign of weakness. God, I did so much for this man. I worked my ass off to get us out of debt—or at least tried to—had stayed up late with him to watch him play those stupid online card games when we started dating, spent a weekend in Vegas with him when I should’ve been working. And he couldn’t even tell me why he had been coming home late and why there was fucking blood on his clothes.

Before I could fall asleep, the bed shook slightly, and I could hear the quiet sobs coming from his side.

“I fucked up, Roxie,” he whispered so lowly, probably thinking that I had fallen asleep. “I fucked it all up.”

3

roxie

So much for wanting to take me out somewhere nice to spend time with me.

Sure, we might’ve been at the fanciest, most upper-class club in all of Manhattan, and I might’ve been on my second glass of Afterglow Elixir sweet white wine that was way too expensive for our budget, and some guys from across the bar might’ve been looking me up and down the entire night and making me feel good for the first time in two weeks, but Ben was nowhere to be found.

He had disappeared almost half an hour ago, telling me that he needed to use the restroom. My fingers turned white against the glass as I tried to think of the best-case scenario. Ben was just taking the biggest dump of his life—not in there, fucking some girl—while I sat here, stupidly waiting for him.

A couple of the men dressed in black stared at me from across the bar, their wandering eyes dark and sinful. I swallowed some more of my wine and pressed my knees together, knowing that I shouldn’t ever feel this way about any man who wasn’t my fiancé.

But he hadn’t paid much attention to me since we had gotten engaged, had left me alone for weeks now, barely touching me when he got home for the night. The most I had gotten was a kiss on the forehead lately.

I tore my gaze away, heat crawling up my neck, and pushed my empty glass to the edge of the counter. Fuck tonight. Maybe I should’ve waited a couple of more years to get engaged or pushed a little harder last night when asking him where he had been.

“Another one?” the bartender asked.

After glancing over my shoulder toward the back hallway where Ben had disappeared, I frowned and nodded. I didn’t expect he’d be coming back out anytime soon.

“Make that two,” someone said from beside me. His voice was deep and charming, sending shivers right down my spine.

And when I looked over at him, I knew why. He was one of the handsomest men I had ever seen. Dressed in gray suit pants and an off-white dress shirt that looked to be a size too small—or maybe his muscles were just a bit too big—he had eyes of the devil, a smirk so sinful that I was sure I had only seen it in my nightmares, and luscious black hair that curled over his forehead.

The bartender placed two glasses of Afterglow on the counter. “Here you are, boss.”

Boss.

He sat down in the seat beside me, his long leg grazing against mine. “I’m Cristian. I—”

“I’m not interested,” I said, cutting him off and glancing over at his godly sculpted face and those intense brown eyes that seemed both cruel and filled with fervor.

While his jaw clenched, he let out a low chuckle that seemed to warm me in all the right places. “I’m not here to hit on you—yet. I’m just here to talk, Roxie.”

I tensed when he said my name, the sound of it so smooth on his full lips. “Do I know you?” I asked, gripping my glass tighter and trying damn hard not to feel that heat crawling up the insides of my thighs, gathering in my core, making me lust after a man who I didn’t call my fiancé.

“I know your boyfriend,” he said.

“Fiancé,” I corrected.

He curled his lips into another sinful smirk and sipped his drink. “Not for long.”

I raised a brow at him, kinda, sorta feeling a little buzzed and really freaking ticked off tonight. Whoever this Cristian was, he had another thing coming. I wasn’t about to sit here and take his shit.

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