Page 557 of Savage Bosses

“Hey. Are you sure we should be holding hands?” she questioned.

“Embarrassed to let everyone know who you belong to?” I retorted. Not fair to her, all things considered, but I was a bit jumpy tonight. And my dick still hadn’t gone soft. If I had to walk around all night half-hard, all it would do was make me want to leave that much sooner.

“Never. I just want to make sure that us being together in public won’t make you look bad.”

I stopped walking and turned to look at her. “I don’t give a fuck what people might say about us being together.” My hand cupped her chin, holding her gaze. “This is about you and me, Nyla. No one else. Don’t ever think I’ll hide you away. Your place is by my side.” Straightening, I looked around the room. A few people were looking at us, but I didn’t know who they were, so I didn’t really give a fuck. “I think I see Cade and Norah across the room. Come on.” I held her hand as we walked through the crowd of mingling people.

Maybe we wouldn’t stay as long as I first thought. I’d been to enough of these to know what the night would be like. Drinks. Fake laughter from fake people. Everyone trying to get their hands in everyone’s pockets. Tonight’s event was to benefit survivors of domestic violence. I learned from Cade that for the owners of Overwatch Security, the company he was partnering with, this was a topic near and dear to them. The founding partner’s wife, Adele Indellicati, was herself a survivor. One of the other partners, Ethan Dickerson, lost his older sister to domestic violence.

I took a sigh. Damn. Maybe I should stop thinking about getting my dick wet and do some good tonight. Nyla wasn’t going anywhere. We could wait a couple of hours to finally get what we both wanted. Now that we knew where this was going, we had our entire lives in front of us.

I glanced over at my woman and smiled. This wasn’t something I did very often.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

“Perfect.”

The closer we got to Cade and Norah, the more I felt uneasy. Something was tingling in the back of my brain. You know that feeling in your gut that tells you shit’s about to hit the fan? Yeah, that one. I looked around the room, trying to pinpoint what was about to happen.

When I turned back to the front, there she was.

Marysa.

The look on her face was crazed. Her eyes squinted as she observed me and Nyla. The fake ass smile I once mistook for class and sophistication, was menacing and manipulative.

Fuck. I did not want to deal with her shit tonight.

“King. Funny thing meeting you here.” She glanced over at Nyla. “Who’s your friend?” Her gaze then traveled down to our joined hands.

I could tell Nyla was confused, but she kept a smile on her face.

“Nyla Robinson. Marysa Lewis.” I motioned between the two women, hoping this would be short. I didn’t want Nyla caught in the middle.

Nyla reached out her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Her outstretched hand was ignored. We glanced at each other, and I knew Nyla was about to go the fuck off if I didn’t shut this shit down.

Marysa glanced from Nyla back to me. “King, may I speak with you?”

I shook my head. “Hell no, you can’t talk to me. We don’t have shit to talk about. Everything we needed to say to each other was said more than ten years ago.”

“But King, I just want to talk. You owe me that. We were going to be married.” Her eyes slid to Nyla when she dropped that bombshell.

This bitch. She knew exactly what she was doing by throwing that out there. I could feel Nyla trying to pull her hand out of mine, so I tightened my grip. Fuck no. She wasn’t getting away that easily. I turned my attention back to Marysa, knowing this was the time to make myself clear.

“There is nothing for us to talk about. You made your choice back then. Stop trying to get to me through my mother. Stop trying to call me. Stop trying to corner me when you can clearly see I’m with someone else. Fact is, we didn’t get married because you cheated on me,” I practically yelled. Only the overlapping noise from the now crowded room masked my outburst. Nyla’s hand tightening around mine was the thing to bring me back down to earth. “Now, as I said before, there is nothing you need to speak with me about. If you show up where I am again, you won’t like the consequences. Now get the fuck out of my way.”

I was about to walk around her when she blurted out. “You have a son.”

You have got to be fucking kidding me. Closing my eyes briefly, I looked down at Nyla. Her eyes were wide, and I was worried about what she thought of all this. Just when we decided to move things forward, here comes my past, trying to fuck things up.

“Liar,” I snarled.

“That’s why I’ve been trying to reach you. When I left, I didn’t realize I was pregnant. I didn’t know… I couldn’t tell who… you need to know.”

Fury was the only emotion I was feeling right now. A son.

“Why would you pick tonight, this moment, to tell me something like this?”

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