Page 15 of Brutal Kingdom

“With what I’m about to go through, I probably won’t want to see ass until Thanksgiving.”

“Hang on, I can’t hear in this elevator. Give me a second to get to my room.” I hear some whirs and beeps in the background, and I imagine he’s disarming his security alarm. “Okay, I’m back. Why are you ass adverse until Thanksgiving?”

“It’s hell night, and Bella’s putting me through the crucible.”

He pauses a second, before saying, “I’m sorry, it sounded like you said you’re going through the crucible.”

“I did.”

“How is that even possible? I thought our fathers did away with that shit.”

“As far as using it for a punishment, they did, but Bella’s bringing it back.”

“Shit. How many?”

He’s asking how many women I’ll be resisting.

“I have no idea or who she’s selected, and get this. I’m supposed to not sleep with any of them.”

“Damn. Don’t drink anything, she might slip you something to lower your defenses.”

“I know.”

“Okay.” He says, going into work mode. “I’ll hack the camera feed and shut down the Wi-Fi to make sure whatever footage she’s planning on grabbing doesn’t make it out of the building.”

“They can just save it as a draft on Prospectus.”

“Which will be down for system maintenance starting in… how much time do you have?”

“About thirty-six hours.”

“Fine. It’s going down for maintenance in thirty-four hours and fifty-five minutes.”

“Shit, man, you don’t know how happy I am that you returned my call.”

“I’m sorry, I’ve been out of pocket. There’s this huge project I’m working on, and I figured you had your hands full with that Prenup. Speaking of which, why is she putting her future baby daddy through this?”

I ignore the jab. “Because neither of us has signed anything. I got my dad to agree to slow walk the paperwork, while I try to find proof she’s behind the thing with Jordanna.”

“Really, Logan? After all this time, youstillthink they were in cahoots?”

“Just because I haven’t found any proof of it doesn’t mean they’re not.”

“I still think Tabitha had the best idea. You should ask, Jordanna.”

Those two don’t agree on shit lately, but on this, he’s got her back. “So she can lie to my face again? I don’t think so. Now, where are we with the files? Were you able to find them in the cloud?”

“Nothing’s there, man. I told you wherever she stashed them, it’s not on a computer connected to the school’s network.”

“Maybe she keeps them at home in Kingsley Bluffs.”

“And risk you hiring someone to break in? Nah. My guess is she has them on her. It would have to be a small drive she can hide in her bra, or on a bracelet, or something.”

“If she does, I’ll never get close enough to take it from her.”

“You don’t have to take it from her, you just have to be close enough to erase the data on it. A huge ass magnet or electrical charge will do the trick.”

Those files are all Bella cares about and the last thing I want to be bothered with. “Is it wrong that I don’t really care about it, at this point?”

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