Page 170 of Meet Me In The Dark
The moment I step off the elevator, I know something is off.
Louise glances up from her computer, and the look in her eyes is enough to slow my stride. It’s a warning—a silentbrace yourself.
Julian told me everything last night—Kingsley’s little performance at the gala, the way he spoke about me, the black eye Julian left him with.
I know Kingsley’s pissed. I just didn’t expect him to be stupid enough to walk in here.
But there he is, sitting in one of the guest chairs in my office with a contract in hand. His right eye isswollen and bruised a deep, satisfying shade of purple.
I close the door behind me without a word, cross the room, and shrug out of my coat. I drape it over the back of my chair and take my seat like this is any other meeting.
“How can I help you?”
“Sign it.” He pushes the contract toward me.
I glance down at it, then back at him. “Straight to the point. I like that.”
“You should. This is the best offer you’re going to get.” His voice is smug, too smug for a man whose company is on life support.
I pick up the pen, click it once, and scrawl across the bottom of the page. His mouth twitches like he’s already won.
Then he looks at the paper.
The twitch disappears.
In neat block letters, just below my signature line, it now reads:Shove this contract up your ass.
A vein in his temple jumps.
Because what Julian also told me last night—after describing in detail how much he enjoyed hitting Kingsley—was that Kingsley’s miracle investor came with one inconvenient stipulation: I had to be working there. Without me, the deal doesn’t close.
So now, here we are.
At least it explains why he’s been so persistent.
“Something wrong?” I ask sweetly.
He slams the contract down, eyes blazing.
I tilt my head, letting my gaze linger on the bruising over his cheekbone. “What happened to your poor eye?”
“Your boyfriend has a temper,” he says, his tone laced with something that makes my skin prickle. “Thatfucking scum—”
“Watch it.”
We remain in this silent standoff until his phone rings in his pocket.
He glances at the screen and answers without excusing himself.
“What?” he says, voice clipped. He listens for all of five seconds before color starts climbing up his neck. “What the hell do you mean they—No. No, that’s impossible.”
There’s a pause before his grip on the phone turns white-knuckled.
“Run that by me again,” he demands, his voice lowering to something dangerous. The kind of dangerous men use when they’ve just realized they’ve been cornered.
I sit back in my chair, cross my legs, and watch.
The call ends with him yanking the phone from his ear and slamming it down on the desk so hard the screen probably cracks.
