The Villain (Boston Belles, #2)(102)

“So Kill was right,” Sam said tonelessly, powering up the laptop as he took a seat in Andrew’s chair. His fingers were gliding on the keyboard. He shoved a USB drive into the device. “You’re not completely useless, after all.”

“You don’t think very highly of women, huh?” I turned outside, to the hallway, craning my neck to look downstairs and make sure Tinder was okay.

“I thought you were a gold-digger,” Sam said bluntly, clicking away on the laptop, his eyes glued to the screen. “Shit, there’s a lot of stuff in his cloud. Amateur mistake.”

“Copy everything. I want to sort through all of it,” I instructed him, standing at the door, returning to our initial conversation. “And I’m not a gold-digger.”

“No shit.” He chuckled. “You’re risking your ass here. You know that, right? You can get a lot of jail time for what you’re doing.”

“Really?” I widened my eyes comically. “I had no idea. Dumb it down for me. What’s jail? The one with the bars, right? I think I’ve seen a movie.”

Sam’s eyes drifted from the screen to me. He smirked.

“So that’s why he kept you all this time. You talk back.”

I glanced through the window, hugging my midriff, speculating whether Andrew’s house was wired like Cillian’s or not.

“The coast was clear.” Sam read my thoughts. “The house is wired, but the idiot’s cameras have crappy street view due to overgrown trees. Apparently, his conscience wouldn’t let him trim the fuckers.”

He stood, handing me a disc-on-key.

When I reached for it, he tilted it away from my reach.

“You sure you don’t want me to go through it myself? That’s a lot of data. You can’t mess it up.”

“I will do a thorough job.”

“Let me make a copy for myself. Just in case.”

“If you make yourself a copy, I’m going to make sure you lose your job with the Fitzpatricks.” I tilted my chin up warningly. “There may be some private things in there I don’t want anyone to see.”

“Like a sex tape?”

Men.

“Sure.”

Sam Brennan was a handsome man. Then so was Ted Bundy. I didn’t find him attractive, especially seeing as his weekly body count surpassed Ted Bundy’s entire career. I honestly couldn’t see what Aisling’s fascination was with him. Then again, the same could probably be said about Kill and me.

“You do understand the concept of an arranged marriage, correct? Nothing about what you have with your husband is real.”

“Samuel,” I used his given name, my tone haughty, as I did when one of my students was misbehaving, “give me the flash drive, please.”

He tucked it into my dress pocket, laughing softly.

“I didn’t get it at first.” He dipped his head down, scanning my face. “I thought he wanted Emmabelle. Every time the three of you were in the same room, his eyes were on her. But then I realized,” he dropped his voice, “the timing was peculiar. See, Kill always looked at Emmabelle exactly at the same time you looked at him. He wanted to throw you off. To make you jealous. The first and last human thing I’d ever seen him do.”

Sam took a step back, looking around the room.

“I’ll relock the study. Andrew will never know we’ve been in here. Proceed as normal when they get here.”

He turned around, tapping the doorframe.

The oven dinged downstairs, and I heard Tin-Tin yelping in delight.

We were running out of time.

I thought Sam was going to say some parting words.

About my bold move.

About the risk I’d taken for my husband.

But that would imply Sam Brennan was impressed.

And if there was something I knew with every bone in my body, it was that, unfortunately for Aisling, my friend, woman-hater Sam Brennan would never be impressed by the other sex.





“I’ll be going away after today, but things are about to change here. I thought you should know.” I sat Tinder down in front of the burnt, disfigured cookies. Neither of us touched the sweets. His big brown eyes clung to me like I was a lifeline.

“C-Change how?”

“Your father is not treating you well. He shouldn’t do the things he is doing, and I cannot—will not—be able to be here all the time to protect you. There will come a day when you grow up and make your mind up about what I’m about to do. You will either hate me or appreciate me.” I shook my head, feeling the tears welling up in my eyes, but held myself back. Tinder deserved more. He deserved my composure and reassurance. He deserved the world. “However you choose to feel about me, I will accept and respect it. I think I’m going to put your daddy in a lot of trouble soon, but you will still have your mommy and your brother, and they’re the important part, you hear me? They’re the part I want you to focus on.”

He nodded slowly, taking it all in. It was a lot. Even I wasn’t sure if I fully grasped what I was about to do. I dropped my forehead to Tinder’s, breathing him in. If I inhaled really deeply, I could still detect it faintly. That elusive baby smell that made my bones melt.

“Have I ever told you about The Wish Cloud, Tin-Tin?”

He shook his head.