Page 165 of The Art of Ruin

Now he looks exhausted and disheveled. Unshaven. Eyes bloodshot and frantic in a way that sends an immediate warning straight down my spine.

“Jasper,” I say slowly.

My grip tightens automatically around the grocery bag. I need to pick up my handbag, but I don’t want to take my eyes off him to bend down. He’s giving me a vibe that puts all my senses on alert and has the hairs on the back of my neck lifting.

His gaze moves over me sharply.

Taking me in.

The new coat Adriano bought me last month.

The scarf I stole from Adriano’s closet because it smells like him.

The fact I probably look happy.

Something ugly twists across his face instantly. “There you are.”

Every instinct in my body tenses. As a woman, you have an innate gut feeling when a man is a danger to you. We don’t always listen, but right now my gut is screaming.

“What are you doing here?”

He laughs once.

The sound doesn’t even remotely resemble humor.

“What am I doing here?” he repeats, stepping closer. “That’s your question?”

People move around us along the sidewalk. Manhattan continues on, completely oblivious, while my pulse begins thudding harder beneath my ribs.

“Jasper,” I say carefully, “you need to leave.”

“Do I?” His voice rises suddenly, sharp enough that a couple passing nearby glance over. “You think I don’t know what’s happening?”

Cold unease slides down my spine. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Bullshit.”

The word cracks out of him hard enough that I flinch before I can stop myself.

His eyes catch the movement instantly.

For a second, something almost regretful flickers there.

Then disappears again beneath anger. “You think this is a coincidence?” he demands. “Everything I built suddenly collapsing overnight? Investors disappearing. Contracts gone. Federal investigations.”

My stomach drops.

No.

No.

“Jasper.” I raise my hands palms out as if I’m trying to calm a wounded animal.

“He’s destroying me.”

And suddenly every strange phone call Adriano took outside the room, every cold shift in his expression before it softened again when he looked at me, every vague answer—all of it rearranges itself in my head.

My chest tightens painfully. He told me he would leave it alone. He wouldn’t lie to me; he wouldn’t. Adriano knows that it’s the one thing I won’t forgive.