Page 39 of Chained to You (Dark Billionaires 6)

I shook my head. “No.”

He seemed displeased at my answer and even asked, “Why the hell not?”

I licked my lower lip and gently pushed my hair behind my ear. “Because James is here with me, and he won’t let you hurt me.” God, I sounded confident, didn’t I?

Scott chuckled in amusement.

Liam shifted his gaze to James beside me. The two men locked eyes for a moment, which kind of freaked me out because I thought they were going to start some sort of father vs son fight, considering neither seemed to be backing away or showing any sign of forfeit.

But then Liam returned his attention to me and suddenly touched me, his fingers about my chin. He tilted my face up a little and inspected me thoroughly. “Yet you have bruises all over your face.”

I knew what he meant and said, “Well, what happened to my face didn’t really have anything to do with James. The man respons

ible was from my past, and he—”

“He’s dead now,” James said darkly.

Liam said, “I see. Did you make sure the bastard got what he deserved?”

James nodded.

“You’ve been through quite a bit, haven’t you, young lady?” Suddenly, Liam leaned even closer and kissed me on the forehead, which surprised me. It was then that I felt this tense atmosphere dissipating around us.

Before he moved away, he said, “If James upsets you, come to me, and I’ll make sure to give him a good beating.” He even winked.

I was stunned, of course.

Liam then moved over to James, and the two men hugged.

“Dad,” James said. “So I’ve heard you’ve been messing around in Japan. What the hell is going on?”

Liam chuckled. “You’ll find out soon enough,” he said before moving on to hug Scott, too. Then he greeted Matt and William and, of course, the nervous Savannah.

By then, Eric and Aria had returned, along with Ms. Lane and two other maids, arms loaded with presents. I wasn’t surprised. They dumped the various boxes in the middle of the room, and Aria excitedly started unwrapping them. There were many soft toys, along with cute dresses, costumes, and figurines.

It was some twenty minutes later, after Aria thanked her grandfather profusely, that we girls headed up the stairs for the night, taking along her presents, leaving the men to socialize and talk business.

Chapter 17

James

The moment their father appeared at the door, James knew for a fact that Eric wasn’t happy. He knew also that, soon, the youngest brother would bring up the subject of their father’s future young bride and demand details. Of course, James had no idea why Eric was so riled up about something this trivial. After all, their father was very popular with the opposite sex, regardless of age, and for him to tie the knot again, with a twenty-five-year-old woman at that, wasn’t all that surprising.

Currently, they were drinking, nibbling, and chatting about various topics—social and business. They even talked about Herbert Weston and the Mexican Mafia, which didn’t much interest James. To him, what was done was done. Of course, what really interested James was Mia.

Fuck! He wanted to kiss her and make passionate love to her, but alas, he obviously couldn’t do that until everyone left.

It was around midnight when Eric finally brought up the much-anticipated subject. Of course, James was quite surprised his brother waited that long before the question burst out of his mouth, considering how impatient he usually was.

“Well? Aren’t you going to tell us what the hell you’ve been up to in Japan?” Eric asked. “And what about this future bride of yours?”

Liam’s eyes twinkled. “You’re impatient, as usual, Eric,” he said. “You’ll meet them tomorrow.”

Scott raised his brows in curiosity. “Them? You’ve brought them here?”

Liam nodded. “Alice and Yuki,” he said. You’ll meet with them tomorrow at lunch. Come to the main house.”

Eric frowned darkly while Scott whistled.

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