Chapter 131 132

Chapter 131 132
That might exist somewhere. But it isn’t this universe.

“What do you want?” I ask rudely. “Why are you still standing there like a fucking weirdo?”

His jaws tighten. His eyebrows knit. He looks almost pained by what he’s about to say. “You need to stop trying to run, Colleen—”

“If you call me that again, I’m going to shove this paintbrush down your goddamn throat.”

He goes on. “I’m not letting you take my child—”

“I don’t see a baby in your belly.”

“But once you have given birth to my heir, you are free to go. But before that time comes—”

“Wait a second.” I walk over to him, standing close. I can smell his cologne. Why is he using cologne? Did he spray it just for me, or is it habit? Is he seeing somebody else? That thought should mean nothing to me, does mean nothing to me. “Wait, just hold on. Are you really going to stand there and tell me you’re gonna kidnap our baby and make it so I can never see it? Have you lost your mind?”

He won’t look at me. He’s looking at my painting. It’s like he’s trying to force himself to be the monster he thinks he needs to be.

“Drop the crap, Carlo. Even you aren’t that fucked in the head.”

“Even me,” he repeats. “Because I am the one who’s been lying to you this whole time. I’m the one who’s been laughing behind your back about your dead family—”

“I wasn’t fucking doing that!” I interrupt. “Stop saying that. I was heartbroken. I was terrified. I was devastated. Do you really think I’d laugh at something like that? What the hell is wrong with you?”

“I’ve told you what’s happening,” he says. He turns to leave. “Your reaction is your own choice.”

I dart my hand out and catch his hand. That familiar electricity sparks between us. He tightens his grip as though on instinct. I feel it in him, the urge to pull me closer. But then he pulls away.

“Carlo, I won’t let you do this. You can’t think there’s a world where I let this happen. You’ve completely lost your mind.”

“I’ve lost my mind?” He wheels on me. A few strands of his spiky hair have fallen out of place. It takes a straight-up Herculean effort not to reach up to correct them. “You’re Colleen fucking Sweeney—”

Thud. My hand actually hurts when I hit him in the chest. It’s like hitting rock.

“That. Is. Not. My. Name.”

He catches my wrist, tightening his grip. “You can be part of the baby’s life. You can have visitation rights.”

“You’re trying to make me angry.” I make to pull my hand away, but he just grips tighter. Dancing sensation moves up my arm. “I refuse to believe even you’re this much of an asshole. You’re not taking my baby.”

“I loved you!” he suddenly roars, letting me go. He takes a step back, jaw clenched as though he’s trying to swallow the words. He can’t believe what he just said. His voice is shadowy and dark when he finally breaks the silence. “Ever since Jasmine, I told myself I’d never let myself feel anything for a woman. And then you came into my life and …” His face hardens. “You couldn’t have planned a better way to make me hate you.”

“You hate me?” I move closer. “You really expect me to believe that?”

I loved you. What, so he doesn’t anymore? But I don’t care about that, right? Right?

“But that’s your world, isn’t it, Carlo? You get to decide how things are. You want to take me from my life at the rec center—hey presto, I’m your personal little fuck-toy in your mansion. You want to make me care about you—easy, just snap your fingers and here I am. You want to make it so I can actually imagine a life together—done, no problem. One smitten-kitten Hazel coming right up. Oh, and now you’ve decided that you want to lock me away in a tower like some messed-up fairy tale. Abracadabra. You’re just a spoiled fucking criminal.”

I’m blinking back tears. My words aren’t sounding as angry as I want them to. There’s too much of how I really feel coming out. Somehow, I have my hand on his chest. And he has his hand on mine, pressing it closer.

“Your heart is beating so fast,” I whisper.

We meet eyes. It would be so easy to just melt into each other right now. We both want it. I can feel his desire, smell it, taste it. It’s like he’s already a part of me. All it would take is for one of us to lean in.

But I don’t, and neither does he.

I snatch my hand away. He lets out a growling sigh.

“Stop trying to run.”

“Pretty sure you already said that.”

“Or I’ll have to restrain you. I don’t want to do that, but I will. I won’t let another Sweeney take my family from me.”

“I’m not a Sweeney!” I cry. “I never was. I was just Dad’s little pet project. Do you know what he told me when I called Benjy?” I tell him about how he wanted to kill me as a baby. “Dad probably hates me more than he hates your family, and you’re acting like I was fucking holding his ammo or whatever on the day he—he did that stuff to your family.”

“That …” He sighs. “He was probably just trying to upset you, Hazel. The Elephant is an evil man. A spiteful man.”

“Yeah, tell me something I don’t know.”

It seems we’ve reached some sort of impasse, because Carlo just looks at me. I just look at him. His throat shimmers as his pulse gets faster, his eyes flitting down my bare legs and up to my paint-stained tank top.

“Don’t look at me like that,” I whisper.

“Like what?” I want you, his blue-green irises bellow.

I can’t stop myself. He approaches. My face gets hot. His scent, that just-Carlo scent, that Jesus-I-want-his-cock inducing scent, engulfs me. “I’m not doing anything.”

His chest presses up against me, his belly, his legs. Everything is so hard. I feel his manhood grazing my belly.

“Carlo.” I put my hand on his chest. I mean to push him away. I end up scraping my fingernails down instead. “You came here to tell me you’re going to take our kid. You … you can’t just say something like that and then try to fuck me. That’s not how this works. Unless you’re going to let me go, you need to stop.”

“I’m not going to let you go.” His fingertips trail down my body, around my back, his hand flattening over my ass cheeks. I want him to grab, to spank. Oh God, I know how crazy the sex would be. Anger sex. Makeup sex. “But I can do other things for you, Hazel.”

With his other hand, he makes as if to cup my center, his fingers probing. I know that if he touches me there, I’ll be too tempted to let him go on.

I grab his wrist, shake my head, give him a soft but definitive shove. “No,” I say. “I want you to go. You owe me that much at least. Because, Carlo, if you’re going to try and stick to this whole baby-stealing shit, you’re never laying a finger on me again.”

He stands there for a moment gazing at me with a solemn look in his eye.

Then, out of nowhere, he seems to remember that he’s meant to hate me. He backs toward the door. And then he’s gone. His scent lingers behind him.