Page 35 of Blurred Lines

“Nice.”

Then he twisted an arm behind Steeger’s back and turned him to face Cris. The man was pale as an anaemic ghost.

“This is your second warning. You won’t get a third. I’ll have somebody keeping tabs on you, and if you even look at another woman funny, you’re going to disappear. Do you understand?”

Steeger coughed, and Cris slapped him with considerably more force than Lauren had mustered that day in the spa.

“I said, do you understand?”

“Y-y-yes.”

“Within a month, you’ll leave California. Do you understand?”

“But this is my home, I—”

Dawson twisted harder, and Steeger yelped.

“I don’t give a fuck where you go, but you’ll leave the state. Do you understand?”

“Y-y-yes.”

“If you ever contact Lauren again, I’ll hunt you to the ends of the earth and make your life a living hell. Do you understand?”

“Y-y-yes.”

Cris drove a fist into the man’s side with enough force to crack ribs. Probably his own knuckles too, but he didn’t care at that point.

“Good.”

When Dawson let go of Steeger, the man crumpled to the floor, groaning, the carpet squelching as he landed in vomit. Guess he might have to do some housekeeping now.

Cris’s work there was done. Was he worried about repercussions? Not really. Money bought multiple layers of security, and Cris knew how to look after himself and Lauren. An investigations firm was already on the case, and they’d monitor Steeger to make sure he held up his end of the bargain. But Cris had looked into the man’s eyes tonight, and what he’d seen was a coward. A jellyfish. He’d bet money that Steeger had pulled shit like this before, but without having to face any serious consequences. Today, he’d learned that karma existed.

Cris and Dawson left him in his hallway to consider the consequences of his actions and plan his next career move. It was getting late, and they needed to pick up their women. At first, Cris had been reluctant to leave Lauren with Lucas Collins, but Dawson gave assurances that Collins was a good guy, and Lauren had been happy to see him.

This whole relationship thing was gonna take some working out.

Marriage had been easier, and also a mistake. Back in those days, Cris had still been blissfully unaware when it came to the intricacies of the female psyche—clueless, even—and when Tessie had gotten upset about his upcoming deployment, he’d offered a ring to placate her. It seemed like the best option at the time. A month later, they’d gotten hitched in a small ceremony at the local courthouse, just the two of them and a couple of witnesses. Oh, he’d liked her well enough in the beginning, but never had the depth of his feelings come close to the all-consuming attraction he felt for Lauren.

She was his soulmate; he felt it to his core. His girl, his soon-to-be wife, and hopefully the mother of his children.

Cris’s life had been defined by a series of derailments, but things were finally back on track.

EPILOGUE - LAUREN

“If you hate it, change into something else.”

Four months after I became intimately acquainted with Cristian’s cock, I finally got to see him wearing a tuxedo, although he kept pulling at the shirt collar as if it were choking him. It wasn’t. The assistant who’d measured him had declared it a perfect fit. As for me, I was wearing a dress by Ishmael that I’d have needed to sell a kidney to buy if Cristian hadn’t given me his credit card. And I was also wearing a massive freaking diamond.

“I hate it,” he said, “but that dress goes with a tux, not a T-shirt.”

True. The dress was deep red with a silver ribcage stitched to the bodice. Flashy but not slutty, quirky but not too outlandish. Vi was wearing teal tonight, a jigsaw of satin held together by oversized silver stitches. She’d make the gossip pages, that was for sure, but it was her premiere, so having people talk was a good thing. Her public appearances were limited—it was written into her contract—but rather than hindering the movie’s prospects as the marketing director had feared, her avoidance of the limelight had created a mystique that only made people talk about her more. Her life was a delicate balance, a series of trade-offs between protecting her career and protecting her privacy.

And so was mine. The Mr. Hotly debacle had propelled my latest book to the top of the bestseller lists, and things had only gotten crazier when I was pictured on a beach in the Caribbean with Vi, Dawson, and Cristian, and some enterprising bloggers had noted Cristian’s physical attributes and put the puzzle pieces together. Rumour said I blurred the lines between fantasy and reality, and how could I deny it? I was living my dream. My book boyfriend had come to life like a prince riding from the pages, and whenever I wrote another dirty vignette, Cristian was the first to read it and offer feedback.

Day-to-day, we tried to keep a low profile, but no way was I missing the opening night of my bestie’s new movie. Vi had spent months last year filming the remake of The Thing, and although I’d spent a few days on set with her, this would be the first time I’d seen the movie all the way through.

Claudia stalked into the bedroom and rubbed against my legs, purring. I’d never pictured myself as a cat mom, but she was a friendly thing, always waiting for scratches when I arrived home.

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