her hands. Her skin flushed hot with embarrassment. She f

the club music. "I am not-this is not-" She couldn't even finish th

sh leather sofa. "Relax! You need to remember what it feels like to have a man actually worship yo

ing in perfect rhythm to the heavy, vibrating beat. Their choreography was polished, almo

and ripped it open entirely, flexing his heavily tattooed abs right in front of her face. Th

sheer ridiculousness of the situation. This was not her world. She didn't know how to be the woman who threw money at shirtless strangers in a VIP booth. But mayb

Claire. "Focus on the bride! Make her forget her miserable hu

wless. His empire was thriving. And yet, as he swirled the expensive amber whiskey in his heavy crystal glass, the ice clinking softly against the sides, he couldn't shake the image that had been burned into his retinas since morni

t was neutralized. Instead, he felt like a man standing on

ming tech merger. "The due diligence is complete, and the shareholders are ready to vote. We're looki

penthouse bedroom where a woman with haunted eyes had wept silently into his pillows. He had woken up this morning, seen the bruise on her wris

e. The screen lit up with an encrypted notification from Rick Nash: URGEN

ographs taken by his plainclothes security detail inside a dark, neon-lit club. The images were gr

dark hair. The St. Christophe

is knuckles turned stark white instantly. Blake was still talking, but th

ered mere inches from Claire's. The angle of the photograph-shot from across the club, through the velvet drapes of the VIP booth, with shadows cutting across both figures-created

ow that. And in the absence of context, his mind supplied the worst possible interpretation-the interpretation his PTSD-riddled brain had been primed to expect f

ce cr

rimal. Something that had been forged in the dark room of his childhood, where his mother's screams and his father's fists had taught him that love was a weapon and trust was a trap. C

own onto the boardroom table. The loud, sharp crack of the impact made Blake j

ed, his eyes wide. "Did the merger

boardroom, his long strides eating up the corridor as he headed straight for his private elevator. The doors couldn't open fast enough. The descent couldn't end soon enough. His reflection in the polished steel walls stared back at him, and

unshot. He didn't slow down for the velvet rope. He didn't acknowledge the bouncer who stepped forward to block his path. One look at his face-the blazing dark eyes, the corded muscle in his jaw, the barely contained v

entertainer had just offered to let her do a body shot off his abdomen, and that w

esperate to escape the suffocating proximity of the shirtless men.

d her off. "Go! Go! I'll hold dow

ed corridor. The sudden drop in volume was a relief. She pressed her palm against the wall, taking a deep breath of slig

thusiastic tipping spree-and was scanning the corridor for the bouncer she had seen stationed outsid

n she s

area bled into the hallway, painting his face in alternating flashes of red and black, shadow and fury. His suit jacket was gone. His shirtsleeves were rolled up to h

s eyes fixed dead on Claire. He didn't see Riley. He didn't see the bouncer. He didn't see anyone but her-his w

ut. She had known the security team was watching. But seeing him here, in the flesh, radiating a fu

so seen the bruise on Claire's jaw. The cut on her lip. The way her best friend had sobbed in the back office of the gallery just hours ago.

ning with possessive fury as they locked onto Claire. And her protective instinc

ston's path. She smiled a wide, mocking smile, the kind of smile that had gotten her punched in bars and

slowly, deliberately, right at Houston's broad ches