Chapter 12: 9| Blood-1

┏━━━✦❘༻༺❘✦━━━┓ Blood ┗━━━✦❘༻༺❘✦━━━┛ Chapter 9: Blood (Amara's POV) I had his blood on my hands now. I couldn't deny, a part of me felt good to make Tristan Harper bleed, knowing that all others who tried had failed. But he left me far too puzzled to sleep peacefully that night. Tristan had a temper, one that he was infamous for, but would he really go so far all because I stole a client? This wasn't the first time we lost clients to each other. Six million dollars was a lot, I understood that too. But Tristan Harper was a fucking billionaire and Harper and Co. Law Firm was a multi-billion-dollar company. I found it hard to believe that he did it all for money. I hadn't seen Tristan since our trial for the Benoits two days ago but he seemed more hostile than usual tonight. It seemed like I went back a few years and caught a glimpse of the Tristan I was so familiar with. A loud huff escaped me as I rolled over onto the other side and shot up to flip my pillow before dropping my head on it again. I stared ahead blankly in the darkness. I couldn't shake off the feeling that something else was brewing. With no other choice at this hour, I shook off that feeling and closed my eyes, ignoring all thoughts until I lost track of them and dozed off at some point. Hours passed, the next morning bled into the next afternoon, and no matter how hard I tried to focus on work, I couldn't shake off everything I felt last night. The feeling of my own knife being held against my throat, of every inch of Tristan's body pressing into mine as he pinned me down, and especially the feeling of his blood slowly trickling down my arm, tainting my sleeves. If I had it my way, I would have burned that shirt to ashes but I settled for throwing it away instead. The last thing I wanted was for anything that belonged to me to be stained by Tristan Harper. My eyes drifted up to my door as Lana's heels clicked on the floor followed by her knock. "Come in," I called out. She strolled in with a file in her hands and her warm smile. "Ms. Milano," she greeted, handing the file to me, "I've put together all the details I could find about the case. It's been twenty years… so, I'm afraid I couldn't put much together for you. It was really hard to get whatever information I could find and it might not be enough." I paused, glancing at the file as I set it on my table. "Thank you for doing as much as you could, Lana. I hope you didn't ask my father anything." She faltered and my heart sank. She mumbled quietly, "I know you instructed me not to but it was impossible to get any details without him finding out, Ms. Milano. Every cop who worked on that case, every attorney involved, they were told not to tell anybody anything without his permission. I'm sure Mr. Milano was informed right after I called, which means-" "Which means he'll be asking me tonight," I finished for her, sighing in frustration as I turned to look out the glass window that ran from the ceiling to the floor, overlooking New York City. Clearing my throat, I faced her again. "It's all right. He would find out at some point anyway. At least now I won't have to tiptoe around him. You can get back to work." She nodded in understanding and then walked out. The door opened just a second later and my eyes lifted up to meet Cal's. I tracked his movements until he dropped into the seat across from me. "You have a lot of making up to do, Amara," he scoffed. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes and resumed working. "I didn't tell you to lie to him," I retorted. "He's furious after what you did. More than he already was," he added. My eyes drifted to his. "What do you mean?" He leaned back in his seat and unbuttoned his suit, glancing at the time on his watch. "He was already in a foul mood last night when he got to The Veil. I assume it had something to do with business or his uncle but he wouldn't say. You were his cherry on top." Lifting a brow at me, a slightly amused smirk danced on his lips. "Did it feel good to get a rise out of him?" "Of course it did," I answered blankly, looking back at my computer. "Did you cut him?" he asked bluntly, catching me off-guard. "He cut himself." He eyed me with suspicion. "Trust me," I added, "even I didn't expect him to be that reckless and grab the blade with his bare hands." "So you did pull a knife on him." "He crept up on me, Cal. I was defending myself." "Would you do it again?" I let out an annoyed huff and turned my attention completely to him. "What?" I spat out. "If you knew it was Tristan standing behind you would you pull that knife on him?" I didn't think twice before answering. "Of course, I would. If it's him, I have all the more reason to." I lifted a mocking brow at him and he shook his head lightly, answering his phone as it buzzed with a call. He remained silent, listening to whoever was on the other end but I knew it was business by the way his gaze hardened almost immediately. Every time I saw Cal, I realized how seamlessly he separated work and relationships because every time I saw him, I would forget he fucking killed people. Cal's hands were just as bloody as the rest of us. Being a corrupted Fed, Cal kept himself closed off. He was a mystery to every person on this planet. Nobody knew what he was truly like. Anybody who underestimated Cal had a death wish because he was extremely fucking dangerous. "I'll be there in ten minutes. Don't let him out of your sight. Call Dante." I couldn't help but lift my brows in surprise as he hung up the phone and rose to his feet. "Dante?" I asked, "Dante Rossi?" "Yes," he exhaled, clearly agitated from whatever he heard over the phone.