"No." I pushed him away. "Not in a million years. No, nope, nien, niet." I
was rummaging through my memory for other languages to refuse him in. "No,"
I said again. "The last one was in Spanish, not English."
"Elaborate," he demanded.
"We can't marry. We don't love each other." I tilted my chin up defiantly.
"And yes, I know love is so very working class."
"Middle class," he corrected. "The happy, dumb medium is comfortable
enough not to care, and stupid enough not to aim higher. Working and upper
classes always take financial matters into consideration. May I remind you the
last time you married for love," he said the word as you would say herpes, "it
ended with a massive debt, a runaway husband, and death threats? Love is
overrated, not to mention fickle. It comes and goes. You can't build a foundation
on it. Mutual interests and alliance are a different story."
But here was the really pathetic part—I didn't want to marry him precisely
because a part of me did love him.
Putting my happiness in his hands was the dumbest idea I'd ever have.
No matter how much I tried to ignore it, Kill was my first real crush. My first
obsession. My unfulfilled wish. He would always hold a piece of my heart, and I
didn't want to think of all the ways he was going to abuse it if we were together.
Plus, marrying Boston's most notorious villain was a bad idea, and I was
pretty sure I'd filled my quota of asshole husbands for this century.
"Look, how about a compromise?" I smiled brightly. "I can date you. Be
your girlfriend. Hang on your arm and take a good picture. We'll have a little
arrangement."
He stared at me with open amusement.
"You think your company is worth a hundred thousand dollars?"
"You're offering me a hundred grand to become your live-in escort and bear
your children. Plural. If I were a surrogate, I'd get that same amount of money
for one baby," I burst out.
"Go be a surrogate." He shrugged.
"It's a long procedure. I don't have enough time."
"You don't seem to have enough brain, either." He tapped my temple,
frowning as if wondering how much was inside that head of mine. "Take my
offer. It's your only way out."
I pushed him away.
"You're a bastard."
He smiled impatiently. "You knew that when you offered yourself to me
very willingly all those years ago."
He remembered.
He remembered, and for some reason, that completely defused me.
Auntie Tilda, what the hell have you done?
"Look." I shook my head, trying to think straight. "How about we start
dating and I—"
"No," he cut me off dryly. "Marriage or nothing."
"You don't even like me!"
Cillian glanced at that chunky watch of his, losing patience.
"What does liking you have to do with marrying you?"
"Everything! It has everything to do with it! How do you expect us to get
along?"
"I don't," he said flatly. "You'll have your house. I'll have mine. You will be
stunningly rich, live on Billionaires' Row, and become one of New England's
most envied socialites. You'll be far enough away from me to do whatever the
hell you'd like. I am sensible, fair, and realistic. As long as you give me heirs,
give me exclusivity throughout our child-producing years, and stay out of
tabloids, you shouldn't see much of me beyond the first few years of our
marriage. But no divorce," he warned, raising a finger. "It's tacky, bad for
business, and shows you're a quitter. I'm no quitter."
I wanted to burst. With laughter or tears, I wasn't sure.
This is not what I asked for, Auntie, I inwardly screamed. You missed the
best part of my having him.
"You realize I'm a person and not an air fryer, right?" I parked a hand over
my hip, losing patience myself. "Because to me it sounds a lot like you're trying
to buy me."
"That's because I am." He looked at me as though I was crazy. Like I was
the one with the problem. "People who vilify money have one thing in common
—they don't have it. You have a chance to change your fate, Persephone. Don't
mess it up."
"Sorry if I sound ungrateful, but your proposition sounds like a very sad
existence to me. I want to be loved. To be cherished. To grow old with the man I
choose and who chooses me."
Even after what happened with Paxton, and even though I still had strong
feelings toward Cillian, I believed in fairy tales. I simply accepted mine was
written eccentrically with too much foreword and scenes I was happy to cut.
He produced a pair of leather gloves from his breast pocket, slapping them
over his muscular thigh before sliding his big hands into them.
"You can have all those things in time, just not with me. Find yourself a
lover. Lead a quiet life with him—provided he signs all the necessary
paperwork. You'll do you; I'll do me. What I do, in case you have any lingering
romantic ideas about us, includes an insatiable amount of high-end escorts and
questionable sexual practices."
The only thing keeping me standing upright at this point was the thought this
was probably a hallucination, due to the fact I hadn't been sleeping or eating
well recently.
Carbs. I need carbs.
"You want me to cheat on you?" I rubbed at my forehead.
"After you give me legitimate children, you can do whatever you want."
"You need a hug." I frowned. "And a shrink. Not in that order."
"What I need is siring heirs. At least one male. A couple of others for
appearance and backup."
Backup.
Were we talking about children or phone chargers?
My head spun. I reached to the wall for support.
I always knew Cillian Fitzpatrick was messed up, but this was a level of
crazy that could easily secure him a place in a mental institution.
"Why male? In case you haven't noticed, this is the twenty-first century.
There are women like Irene Rosenfeld, Mary Barra, Corie Barry…" I began
listing female CEOs. He cut me off.
"Spare me the supermarket list. The truth of the matter is, some things
haven't changed. Women born into obscene privilege—aka my future daughters
—rarely opt for hectic careers, which is what running Royal Pipelines demands."
"That is the most sexist thing I've ever heard."
"Shockingly, I agree with you on that point." He began to button his coat,
signaling his departure. "Nonetheless, I'm not the one making the rules.
Traditionally, the firstborn's son inherits most of the shares and the role of CEO
in Royal Pipelines. That's how my father got the gig. That's how I got it."
"What if the kid wants to be something else?"
He stared at me as though I just asked him if I should pierce my eyebrow
using a semi-automatic weapon. Like I was truly beyond help.
"Who doesn't want to be the head of one of the richest companies in the
world?"
"Anyone who knows what a role like that entails," I shot back. "No offense,
but you're not the happiest man I know, Kill."
"My first son will continue my legacy," he said matter-of-factly. "If you're
worried about his mental health, I suggest you send him to therapy from
infancy."
"Sounds like you're going to be a wonderful father." I crossed my arms over
my chest.
"They'll have a soft mother. Least I can do is give them the hard facts of
life."
"You're awful."
"You're stalling," he quipped.
The nervous knot of hysteria forming in my throat grew. Not because I found
the idea of marrying Cillian so terrible, but because I didn't, and that made me
deranged. What kind of woman jumped headfirst into marriage with the
wickedest man in Boston while still married to the most unreliable one?
Me.
That was who.
I entertained this insane idea for many reasons, all of them wrong:
No more money problems.
A sure divorce from Paxton.
Having Cillian's company, and undivided attention, even if just for a few
short years.
Who knew? Maybe Auntie Tilda was going to deliver after all. We could
start off as an arrangement and end up as a real couple.
No. I couldn't board his train to Crazy Town. The last stop was Heartbreak,
and I'd had enough of that in my life. Paxton had already crushed me. But my
infatuation with Pax was sweet and comfortable. Cillian always stirred in me
something raw and wild that could enrapture me.
I needed to think about it clearly without him getting in my face with his
drugging scent and square jaw and cold flawlessness.
I stepped sideways, toward the stairway. "Look, can I think about it?"
"Of course. You have plenty of time. It's not like the mob is after you," his
rich-boy diction mocked me.
I knew exactly how bad my situation was. Still, if I was going to officially
sign the rest of my life over to the man who crushed me, I needed to at least give
myself a few days to process it.
"Give me a week."
"Twenty-four hours," he fired back.
"Four days. You're talking about the rest of my life here."
"You're not going to have a life if you don't accept. Forty-eight hours.
That's my final offer, and it's a generous one. You know where to find me."
He turned around, making his way to the door.
"Wait," I yelped.
He paused, not turning around.
A flashback of myself watching him leave and asking him to stay at Sailor
and Hunter's wedding slammed into me. I knew, with certainty that scorched my
soul, that it was going to be our norm if I accepted his offer.
I would always seek him out, and he would always retreat to the shadows. A
dusky, heady smoke of a man I could feel and see but never catch.
"Give me your home address. I don't want to go to your office again. It
makes me feel like we're conducting business."
"We are conducting business."
"Your PA is horrible. She almost stabbed me that day I visited you."
"Almost is the operative word here." Producing a business card, he flipped it
over and scribbled down his address. "I wouldn't have covered her legal fees,
and she knows it."
He handed the card to me.
"Forty-eight hours," he reminded me. "If I don't hear from you, I'll assume
you declined my offer or were offed prematurely, and move on to the next
candidate on my list."
"There's a list." My jaw dropped.
Of course there was a list. I was just one of many women who ticked all the
boxes for the mighty Cillian Fitzpatrick.
I wondered what said boxes included.
Naïve?
Desperate?
Stupid?
Pretty?
I swallowed, but the ball in my throat didn't budge. I felt about as disposable
as a diaper and just as desirable.
Cillian shot me an icy look.
"Go browse through your mail-order brides catalog, Cillian." I narrowed my
eyes at him. "I'll let you know my answer."
I watched him go, carrying my freedom, hopes, and choices in his designer
pocket.
Knowing it didn't matter whether I refused or accepted his offer—either
choice would be a mistake.