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My heart does a backward somersault inside my chest. My face heats.
“So I’ll be your whore,” I mutter coldly, my voice shaking.
“If you want to call it that.”
“You know what I mean,” I hiss, pushing back against the throb of heat that tingles through me like venom. “I mean, do I get any say in the matter?”
He fixes me with a look. “I’m sure you remember the word.”
I go still.
The word.
The safe word.
Vault.
“You remember,” he murmurs quietly. “If you say it, this ends. But it goes without saying, so will my offer to bail out your firm.”
I wet my lips.
“So I don’t have a choice.”
“Of course you do. Sometimes our choices are difficult, aren’t they?”
I chew on the inside of my mouth as I look out over the water.
“I’m not going to be a sugar baby or anything like that.”
“Excuse me?”
“I mean, no…” I shrug. “No paying me off. Like no gaudy jewelry or money or whatever.” I turn to look at him, my pulse jangling and my hands shaking a little. “You’ll get me,” I croak. “But that’s all. I won’t be paid to do…that.”
He nods slowly. “Fine.”
I nod back and then turn to look out to the Tyrrhenian Sea.
“How long?”
“Three months,” Drazen replies promptly.
My breath sucks in sharply.
“You’ll stay here for three months as my wife. After that…” he shrugs. “Go where you want. Do what you wish. Our business will be concluded.”
“Really,” I say, suspicion lacing my tone.
“Really. In the meantime, I’ll float Crown and Black enough money to get Roger off your backs. Once our business is concluded, you’ll receive the balance of what you need to make the deal good with Poulter and Lenz.”
I nod my head slowly. This could work.
“And obviously, we’ll work out a repayment schedule for the other twenty-two million.”
My eyes snap to him. “Excuse me?”
Drazen smiles coldly at me. “I’m eager to hear where you thought the startup cash for Crown and Black came from.”
I glare at him. “From my trust fund.”
