Page 77 of King of Pain

“Yes.”

“Would you allow staff to enter your bedroom where your wife was naked?”

Mason pauses. “She’s not your wife.”

“Think of her like she is.” I need him to understand this and I’m not backing down.

Another stretch of silence. “You’ve only been back to the house for twenty minutes.”

“So?”

“You fucked her already.”

“What the fuck?” I spit into the phone. “What business is it of yours?”

Mason rumbles, a sound of deep dissent. “We are family, Luke. We have each other’s backs. We keep our word.”

“And which part of my word meant that I screwed Kate over?”

Mason doesn’t answer.

“I want to speak to Roman. I can actually remember him, and I need?—"

“You can’t speak to Roman, Luke.” His voice gets deadly quiet.

Two can play that game. “Why not?”

More silence. “He doesn’t know.”

I stare at the phone as Kate comes out of the bathroom in a fluffy white towel. She looks beautiful and fragile. Her wide eyes tell me she’s heard most of the conversation. Did she hear me refer to her as my wife?

She stops when our eyes meet, nipping at her lip.

“What do you mean Roman doesn’t know? Know what?”

“Roman doesn’t know you’re alive.”

Roman and Arabella are the most important people in the world to me besides Kate. “You better not mean what I think you mean.”

Mason sighs. “We all have a part to play. He needs to keep focused and thinking…”

I growl into the phone. “What you actually mean is that you’re manipulating him the way you are me.”

“It’s not like that, Luke. This tunnel is everything. I need?—”

“Not to me, it’s not. To me, my family is everything.”

“But this is about family. This project makes us impenetrable. Safe.”

I gesture Kate closer. I need to feel her skin.

She comes without question. “Set aside your ambitions for one fucking second, Mason, and tell me the truth. Having me ruin a woman’s life, that’s really how you want to do this? That’s justifiable to you?”

“Providing for the safety of my family justifies nearly any means.”

I grit my teeth together. “Tomorrow, Kate and I are leaving for New York. I won’t show my face in Vegas, and I’ll use cash. But she is getting another internship, and I won’t remain hidden and ruin her future.”

“You can’t. I need?—”

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