Page 48 of Velvet Cruelty

The gooshy romantic feelings vanish. “Is that what you think of me? That I’m a gold digger who wants diamond spoons and Amex black cards?”

“No! I just want you to know the world is open to you. That if you marry me, I’ll work my ass off to make your life beautiful. I’ll buy us a house anywhere you like, and you can go to college or start your own business or dance or take singing lessons or just… be my wife.”

Bobby sounds exactly the way I wanted a man to sound when he talked about marrying me. He even looks exactly the way I dreamed my husband might look. But from the corner of my mind, Zia Teresa speaks. If you marry this man, you’ll be a murderers’ wife.

“…and we can get a dog or a cat or—”

I lean forward and press a finger to Bobby’s lips. “Are you asking me to marry you or are you saying that’s what’s going to happen?”

His eyes widen. “I’m asking. I’d never… I’m asking, January.”

“Then my answer is no.”

Bobby’s face falls. “Is this because you want to be with Eli?”

Oh my God, not this again. “No.”

His mouth becomes a hard line. “Doc?”

I tear my hand from his. “What is your problem? You and the others all asking, ‘Is it him instead of me?’ I don’t want any of you! Why is that so hard to understand? I just want to go back to the way things were!”

Bobby’s mouth softens. “JJ…”

“Only my family calls me JJ! You can’t call me JJ!”

He stands, his jaw working. He wants to be kind and soft, but I can feel his anger burning beneath the surface. “You can’t go back. And you don’t want to. You don’t want to be Parker’s wife.”

“How do you know? You won’t even tell me what he did to make you angry.”

Bobby shakes his hands in frustration. “Okay,” he says. “When did your dancing lessons start?”

“I… when I was little?”

“When you were nine,” Bobby corrects. “Because Parker has a thing for ballerinas.”

“How do you…?”

“I run professional surveillance for a living. Parker made you start dancing and he’s the reason you weren’t allowed to give it up when you were in high school.”

My stomach swoops. When I was fifteen, my ballet instructor, Madame Blanchet, told me it was time to consider dance styles ‘more suited to my figure.’ I wasn’t too heartbroken. I was already a head taller and two cup sizes bigger than every girl in my class. But when I took Madame Blanchet’s letter to my mom, she threw it in the trash. “You’re staying at New York Academy. It’s important for young women to have poise.”

I shake my head like a dog trying to get rid of water. “Mom wanted me to be a ballerina.”

“And what about your weight? Did your mom want you to weigh exactly one hundred and twenty-one pounds?”

Every muscle in my body goes stiff.

“Again, Parker. He wanted you that way.”

The room starts spinning. I try to find Bobby in the blur of lamplight. “Mom weighed me. She changed my food if I wasn’t at one-twenty-one.”

“And did she do that with your sister? Or just you?”

A million terrifying thoughts zap through me and then everything blows out. My mind goes blank, my body slumps onto the covers, heavy as cement.

An arm wraps around my shoulders. Bobby, engulfing me in cashmere and his sweet smoky smell. He presses his mouth to my hair. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. You deserved better.”

Energy surges back through me and I turn and half climb into his lap. Bobby goes stiff as a board “JJ… baby… what are you doing?”

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