Page 10 of Cherry Auction

“Fuck?” I say bluntly.

She nods, cheeks going red.

“And you just happened to be here. In Dallas. Befriendingmysister. Showing up inmybest friend’s club naked for an auction of your supposed virginity.”

The idea that she’s still a virgin is fucking laughable. I can’t believe she’s still using this old shtick. Vulnerable little waif needs a big man to protect her.

Her eyes search my face and the confusion suddenly clears.

“Wait.” She sits up straighter, half getting out of the car. She reaches out a hand towards me, stopping at the lastmoment before touching my suit-coat arm. “Do you know me?”

Her change in demeanor is somehow alarming, and I take a step back. “What the fuck’s your game, Mads?”

“You keep calling me that. Who’s Mads? Please.” She’s almost frantic now, pulling at my coat sleeve. “Do you know me? Who am I? I was knocked on the head two months ago. I didn’t even know my own name at the hospital after the mugging and I didn’t have any ID on me. I thought maybe you were familiar. Almost like I—like I trust you. Please, if you recognize me, tell me who I am!”

It takes me a few seconds before I can make sense of her gibberish.

“Wait.” I finally bark out a laugh. “Are you trying to say you’ve gotamnesia?”

“Yes! Exactly.” She breathes out in relief. “That’s it. Amnesia.”

I can only stare at her.

Wow.

She mustreallythink I’m a total fecking eejit to fall for that one. She’s supposedly got amnesia and just happened to be released to the women’s shelter where my sister works? I first met her in Ireland. Pretty sure she didn’t end up in Dallas, Tx with a magical case of amnesia except by design.

She frowns, head shaking slightly as she watches every twitch of my face. “Why is that funny?”

Because all I can do is laugh. She has got to think I’m the dumbest box of rocks to fall for her sweet-as-all-American-apple-pie shit twice.

“No,” I say honestly. “I don’t know you. Now get back in the car. I just paid fifty million dollars for your virginity. It’s your turn to pay up.”

Her shoulders sink and she obeys, sitting down in the seat and pulling her legs back in.

I slam the door on her and sit in the front seat, quickly hitting the child locks on the back doors. I’m not letting her go now that I’ve got her back in my grasp again.

I never knew her, that’s for damn sure. But if she’s back, I can play along with her games just enough to tease out what the fuck she’s up to this time around. And to get my retribution. Oh yes, I always dreamed about what I’d do if I ever got my hands on Madison Harper again…

“Put on your seatbelt,” I bark, then burn rubber pulling out of the parking lot to drive the ten minutes back to my house. There’s a little yelp from the backseat, but then a click that tells me she’s complied.

I really don’t get the play she’s trying to make here. Did she think I wouldn’t recognize her after all these years? Did she really think just because she left me behind with as little care as every other stupid fecking mark of her and her father’s cons, I’d forget her the same way?

I glance in the mirror. She looks almost exactly the same, like she stepped through a time portal. She mightaalready had work done. She’s two years older than me. But while I look like I’ve earned every line of my twenty-six years on my face and then some, she’s still a dewy-faced debutante.

Maybe I’m the only one who’s changed. But she expects me to be the same dumb fuck I used to be, overtaken by lust and nostalgia for the pussy I never got to fuck—as if I’d just invite her back into my life?

That’s disappointing, because it means I built her up in my mind as more intelligent than she actually is. In reality, she’s just as disappointing and foolish as all the rest of them.

Well, Mads, you might’ve been expecting the little lamb I was, but I’ve gone and become a wolf since you last knew me.

Still, if she came for games, I’m suddenly thinking I would very, very much like to play.

She doesn’t say a word, and when we pull in my large, four-car garage, I’m all but leaping out of the car to lift her out of her seat, again by the elbow.

“Did you tell Quinn or Moira where we were going?” Madison asks, looking around in wide-eyed wonder at the high ceilings of my mansion as I drag her down one hallway after another toward my elevator.

I hit the down button and the door immediately pings open.

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