Page 62 of Beautifully Damned
“No,” Roman says. “No, that’s not what you meant. You don’t use the word love if you don’t mean it that way.” His voice gets louder with each sentence.
I hold my ground.
“Has he kissed you?” he asks. “Tell me the truth. Now.”
I pause. And that’s all it takes for him to see the answer.
“We were kids,” I say quickly. “It was stupid. It meant nothing. We never talked about it again.”
“So he has.”
“It didn’t count.”
“I don’t care if you were still sucking your thumb—he touched what’s mine.”
“I’m not yours,” I snap. “You just like pretending I am.”
His fists are clenched so tight his knuckles go pale. I don’t know why I don’t shut up. Maybe I want to see how far I can push before he really breaks.
“Emir’s coming over for dinner tomorrow,” I say. “I invited him. He said yes.” I realize I should have stopped one sentence ago. But it’s too late now.
“You’re bringing a lover into my home?” he seethes. “I’ll kill him. I’ll stab him, Ayla. I’ll hang him outside your bedroom window so every man on this fucking planet knows what happens when they even think about looking at my wife the wrong way.”
He’s raging. “You were gonna kiss him under my roof?” he spits. “With my ring on your finger, Ayla? Is that the plan? Are you going to let him touch what’s mine?”
I raise my chin and let my hand fly, slapping him right across the face. I just slapped the Pakhan a second time, and I hope this won’t be the time he buries me six feet under.
“I’m not like you,” I snap. “This marriage—it’s nothing I ever wanted. But I still made vows. I made them before God. And unlike you, I don’t break mine.”
I shove him backward with both hands, hard enough to send him a few steps back. “I’m not cheap, Roman. I’m not the kind of woman who fucks around behind her husband’s back. That man is my brother. He misses me. I miss him. That’s why I’m bringing him over. Not to fuck him under your roof.”
I move to where the door should have been and point. “Now get out.”
His chest heaves, but he doesn’t move.
“Get. Out.” I scream so loud it tears my throat raw.
And somehow—somehow—he does.
Tomorrow will go great. I won’t let Roman ruin it. I won’t let him intimidate me in the one place I have to call home for the foreseeable future.
If he so much as looks at Emir the wrong way, I’ll shield him with my body. I’ll protect him with everything I have—because Emir is all I have.
?Chapter XL?
Roman
Emir Kaya.
Twenty-seven. Turkish mafia blood running thick in his veins. Raised on a battleground, trained to take bullets before most kids knew how to drive. He became Ayla’s personal shadow at twenty. But they’ve known each other longer than that—shared milk teeth, scraped knees, and bedtime stories.
He kissed her once. I believe her when she says it was innocent. Kids. I believe her when she says he’s like a brother. But I don’t believehim.
No man who’s tasted even a fraction of what Ayla is made of—her softness, her light, her maddening refusal to be anything but herself—comes out of it unscathed.
She makesmewonder if what I feel for her is love. And I’m not even capable of feeling that. All I know is that when she ignores me, my skin crawls. When she gives someone else her smile, something sharp coils inside me. I want to destroy whatever pulled her attention away.
And nowhe’scoming here. For dinner. With mywife.
