Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 91146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 456(@200wpm)___ 365(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 456(@200wpm)___ 365(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
My blood boils when he smiles mockingly. “Nicole thinks I’m the only man she can rely on. She told me that only last night when she slept in my bed, snuggled in my chest.”
I fight, thrash, and growl. “Let me out of these fucking restraints, Knox! You think you’re all that, then fucking prove it! Stand in front of me toe to toe, you weak prick. Stop being such a fucking coward!”
“Even if I were to let you go, what would you do? Drag me to the police station and tell them I made you lie?” He shakes his head like he can’t believe I’m so stupid. I don’t understand his shock. I clearly am an idiot. I took the rap for him, didn’t I? “That will only see you facing more charges, and you have nothing to prove your claim…” He scrubs at his jaw, hopeful it will hide the snide furl of his lip. His attempts are woeful. “Except perhaps how you weaseled your way into your victim’s security team.”
“You hired me. You offered me the position.”
I chew on my words when he asks, “Where’s the proof, Laken? I don’t even have a signed employment contract to log in your defense.”
My fight weakens when I recall stuffing his employment contract into his chest when Nicole got hammered by the paparazzi, but only by a smidge. “I won’t let you get away with this. You lost your shit when you thought I’d stolen your girl…” I spit out my last words in a way even someone as fucked in the head as him can understand. Nicole was never his girl. “So how will you handle it when I upend your entire fucking world? You won’t just be penniless when I’m done with you, Knox. You’ll be rotting in a jail cell.”
He swallows to clear the nerves from his voice before saying with a big sigh, “I kind of figured you’d get attached to the first person who feigned interest in you, hence me doing everything I could to keep Nicole away from you, so I put extra steps in place to make sure you’d heel like the dog you are.”
The cuffs bend under the strain of my yank when he places a legal-looking document on top of the newspaper article. It is the guardianship contract my mother was meant to sign to relinquish all rights to River to me when Knox handed her the fifty thousand she demanded. Her signature is at the bottom of the legally binding document, but my name is no longer on the top.
Knox’s is.
“There he is.” I yank away from him when he tries to pat my head like I’m an obedient dog. “Should have known I only needed to use your brother to puppeteer you again. I’m sure she sucks dick good, but so do the other three hundred million fish in the sea.” After mimicking the moves of a puppeteer forcing his puppet’s motions, he collects the newspaper and guardianship contract from the ground, then spins to face the dimly lit exit. “Once she’s earned back my share of my family’s wealth, I’ll shred this. Until then…”—he cranks his head back to face me—“I suggest you stay the fuck away. The restraining order Nicole requested this morning should be enough of a deterrent, but in case it isn’t, you should know that isn’t the only nationwide newspaper with your face on the front page. It’s everywhere, and her fans are a crazy bunch of fuckers.”
He salutes me before pulling open a heavily weighted door that streams sunlight into the room and darting through the opening.
“Help!” I scream, hopeful the thick steel door is for show. “Help!”
By the time the crank of the steel door opening booms into my ears, my wrists are bleeding, and the feet of the chair I’m restrained on are closer to the maintenance room I’m hoping has a hacksaw capable of breaking through my restraints.
“What the…?” Dallas's eyes shoot to me before they follow the droplets of blood my endeavor to escape dotted the floor with. I almost laugh when his eyes lower to the cuffs and he asks, “Do you have the key?”
“If I had the key, would I still be sitting here?”
He doesn’t reply. He enters the maintenance room and returns with a Stanley knife and a screwdriver. The knife shreds through the rope part of my restraints like a hot knife through butter, but it takes a while for the screwdriver to buckle the steel cuffs enough for me to slip my wrists through the once-tight opening.
While rotating my wrists to ensure nothing was broken during my endeavor to free myself, I notice several needle pricks in my arm. I look like a drug addict.
I have a million questions in my head, but I focus on what matters the most. “Have you seen Nicole or River since last night?”