Page 51 of Roots of the Wicked

Chase pointed an angry finger in his face. “So? What if she was purple? What damn difference does it make? There are only two reasons you wouldn’t want me with her. You sense that she’s good for me, or she is exactly what you have always wanted, and you can’t stand seeing her with me.” Chase’s irritation roared with each word. I loved this more aggressive side of him that had come out in my defense.

“Don’t be ridiculous. I didn’t think you were into Black women. Mark…my…words, that one is trouble,” he said, pointing a finger toward the door I was nearly kissing so that I could be nosey. “Based on what you’ve always chosen and considering I have never seen any of the men in our family dating one, it makes me question your decision.”

“I don’t know if you’re drunk or crazy, but you better watch your fucking mouth where it concerns Jax before I put my fist in it!”

“But she…”

“Are you finished?” Chase cut him off. He aimed a stiff finger in Blake’s face, as ready for the conversation to end as I was.

“Hell no, I’m not finished.” He said. The man didn’t know when to shut the hell up.

“Open your damn eyes. She’s nothing but trouble. She’s a distraction you need to get over, quickly. Have fun with her and move on. Dad hasn’t intervened because he’s in shock, and too sick to realize what’s going on. You know he isn’t going to go for this. I’m trying to warn you. She has no status. She can’t contribute to the Taylorson legacy. She’s too much of a risk; too damn mouthy.”

Chase heaved a sigh. “This is classic, Blake. You love advising and telling everyone else what to do, but you never follow your own advice. I find it difficult to believe you graduated from NYU with a mind as narrow as yours. Frankly, Blake, I don’t give a fuck what you think about me or Jax. I’m leaving now before I do something I can’t take back.”

No one except my father had defended me the way Chase had. It touched me in a place I had been guarding since we met. Chase was wiggling his way into my heart, and I didn’t know how to stop it.

I rushed away from the door before he caught me eavesdropping. I would have loved to smack Blake upside the head with a hardy dose of reality, but he wasn’t worth it. The man could be the anomaly who could freeze the hottest pits in hell. Thankfully, he and Chase were nothing alike.

Chase walked out with a tight angry frown on his handsome face. The moment his eyes met mine, his expression melted away into a charming smile.

“Did you hear us?”

“No. Just walked up.” I lied.

When he placed his hand in the small of my back so we could leave, I glanced back at Blake and winked. A frown grew so deep in the asshole’s face, it could rip a hole in the shit-pile he called a brain.

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