Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 26246 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 131(@200wpm)___ 105(@250wpm)___ 87(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 26246 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 131(@200wpm)___ 105(@250wpm)___ 87(@300wpm)
He’s just like them.
The thought came out from nowhere.
An insidious taunt about the past.
And it was enough.
The moment she remembered that it was her boss who was like all the other men her mother dated—
That it was Lyrius Havington, and not Cyrus, who was tall, dark, and handsome like them—
“I’m f-fine now, Mr. Havington.”
But his arm only tightened around her as she tried to step back, and Kyara started feeling uneasy—
“P-Please let me go.”
As well as desperate and panicky when her boss turned her down with a single word.
“No.”
“S-Sir—”
“Not until you tell me what’s wrong.”
She was already shaking her head even before he had finished speaking. “N-Nothing’s—”
“Liar.”
“I’m not—”
“Would you rather I ask Wallace instead?”
His tone was so, so silky as he spoke, like...like he was simply telling her what kind of coffee he liked, that it took Kyara an extra moment to understand what he was saying.
Lyrius’s features remained impassive as a pair of green eyes flew up to meet his. Her face was a picture of shock, but Lyrius met her stunned gaze without a single ounce of remorse. He had made up his mind earlier. He was done waiting. Done playing. She was his. Had always been his. And the time had come for her to know it, too.
“You know about Cyrus?”
Kyara didn’t know what to feel as she watched his lips tighten at the other man’s name.
“What kind of man would I be if I didn’t?”
And she certainly didn’t know how to answer that as well.
“I’ve always known about him.”
Or that.
“Just like you have also always known the truth.”
What in the world was he—
His gaze slowly lowered to her mouth, and Kyara couldn’t believe how such a simple thing actually had her toes curling inside her shoes.
“You were meant to be mine.”
No. No. No.
“I knew that the moment I saw you, and three years ago—”
Why—why was he saying this? It wasn’t true. This...this wasn’t true.
“You knew that, too.”
Chapter 4
“THAT’S...”
“Terrifyingly true?”
“No, and will you please let me go—”
“Not until you tell me why you’re crying.”
“It’s none of your—” His arms started to tighten in warning, and Kyara quickly backtracked. “Okay, okay, I’ll...I’ll tell the truth if you let me go.”
His lips slowly curved, but she told herself it was just a coincidence that her heart skipped a beat the second after.
“Surely you don’t think I won’t know if you’re lying.”
And that voice!
She didn’t know what it was with that voice, that accent, or was it the way he spoke? Like he thought every word he uttered was a blessing to their ears? Could someone’s arrogance be so contagious that you ended up believing what that person believed, and that was why every time her boss spoke, she had to remind herself she was loyal to Cyrus even though Cyrus wasn’t loyal to her, and* aaargh!*
Her thoughts were going nowhere, just like she would end up going nowhere, too, if she let herself spend another second caged in her boss’s arms.
So...be convincing, Kyara!
“I’m n-not lying.”
“I know you are.”
Kyara forced herself to look at him in the eye...and just the eye because honestly, being this close to Mr. Havington was making it so, so hard for her to ignore just how much his presence smoldered, and how devastatingly gorgeous—
Not helping, self!
She refocused on his gaze, and just his gaze. “I promise I’m not.”
Her body tensed as a moment of silence followed, but when she felt his arms loosen—
Gotcha!
She made a run for it—
Lyrius let her go because he wanted to see what she would do with the half-second of freedom he had given her. He was already moving when she pivoted toward the door.
“Like I said...”
But it was no use.
“I know you’re lying,” her boss said silkily, “but I wanted to see what you were planning to do, and so here we are.”
She had never stood a chance, and so there they indeed were, her being worse off than five seconds ago since he had used her own weight to shut the very door she had tried to leave...while Mr. Havington was right behind her, once just her boss, but now he was her warden, too.
“I expected better from you, Kyara.”
Her boss’s voice was softly taunting, but it was hard to feel mad when he was whispering every word into her ear.
“Lying is a sin. Or did Shayla—”
How in the world—
“—not teach you that?”
He had already stepped back by the time she whirled around to face him, but her boss didn’t even have the decency to look away.
“H-How do you know about Shayla?” Kyara really couldn’t wrap her mind around it. “How—h-have you—have you been spying on me? Because if you have, that’s—”
“—something I’ll have no qualms doing, if I deem it necessary. But in this case, however, there wasn’t any need.”
Kyara crossed her arms over her chest. “And you expect me to just believe that?”