Page 11 of The Bastard Prince

Nine years later, I found myself in the very same position; infatuated with a boy – now man – who had handed me off to his father and brothers like I was a piece of turned meat.

So cruel.

So cold.

So ruthless.

I belonged to the Crellids now, but only because this piece of shit in front of me didn’t keep his promises.Because he believed another over me.

Silly little lamb.

Never trust a wolf.

"Trigger." Chewing on my gum, I offered him a bright smile and walked over to the gigantic meeting table that housed sixteen chairs on each side. Taking a seat on the opposite side of the table, I propped my heels on the expensive, stained oak. "So, the prodigal son returns from his travels."

"Get up," he ordered in his thick Spanish drawl, not bothering to look up from the stack of paperwork he was combing through. We both knew what he was looking for and where he would find it. "Now."

Rolling my eyes, I resisted the urge to crawl across the table and toss his paperwork on the floor, and climbed to my feet. "Dare I ask where you've been for the past two years?"

"You can ask whatever you want," was his flat response. "It does not mean that I will tell you shit."

Pain.

It was pungent.

"Where did you go, Trig?"

Silence.

"Why have you come back?"

More tense silence.

"Are you working with your father again?"Have you been working with him all along?

Nothing.

Anger bubbled inside of me. "Are you going to give me an answer?"

A solid ninety seconds passed by before he bothered to tear his gaze off his work and actually have the common decency to look at me.

What was I talking about?

These men had no common decency.

They were barely human to begin with.

"I do not answer to whores," he finally said, his words cruel and harshly spoken.

Ouch.

His dark hair was all mussed up, his brown eyes so full of spit and fire were narrowed on me, and I was acutely aware that I was in the presence of the second scariest person I'd ever known.Third,if I counted my father. But his corpse was rotting in the hills now, so I decided that he didn’t count.

His eyes took a slow, drugging appraisal of my body, causing my skin to ignite in a sudden flush of heat. "The fuck is that?" he demanded then, handsome face set in a deep frown.

"What – my dress?" Keeping the fury out of my voice, I reached down and thumbed the hem. Smiling sweetly, I asked, "Do you like it?" Lowering my voice, I purred, "Your brothers think it's cute."

I was testing him.

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