Chapter 4 Mother

Evelyn's POV

The air in the car froze for a second. The driver glanced at me awkwardly through the rearview mirror.

I caught his eye. "Pull over. I'm getting out."

The driver started easing toward the curb, and Brode's voice snapped through the cabin.

"You move without my permission?"

My hand was already on the door handle. I kept my voice as level as I could.

His massive frame leaned in toward me, and the whole space seemed to shrink.

"Listen, Brode. There's nothing between us anymore. Tonight was a mistake. We've been done with each other for three years. Okay?"

By the end, my voice was shaking. Not just from being up against that physical presence of his, that raw masculine weight, but from the dark, aggressive energy that came off him.

He wasn't that gentle boy from three years ago. Not even close.

"Done?" Brode gave a soft, cold laugh. "That's for me to decide, not you. I'm not finished with you yet. You don't get to leave until I am."

My pupils went wide. My breathing stopped for a second. It was like a wild animal had closed its jaws around my throat, no running, no struggling free.

The panic only deepened my fear. My heart was slamming against my ribs.

His hand shot out and closed around my arm. I sucked in a sharp breath.

"Driver! Stop the car! Let me out!"

My skin crawled. I fought him, and my nails scraped across his skin. I threw every bit of strength I had into pinching him, just to make him let go.

Brode released me with a hiss, looking down at the scratches I'd left on his arm. Fury flashed in his eyes.

"Are you still unclear on where you stand?"

"What the fuck are you even talking about? We have nothing to do with each other!"

I gripped my bag and shouted it right at him.

The driver slowed the car and started pulling toward the curb.

I didn't waste the chance. The second we stopped, I was out, gone before he could do anything about it.

* * *

When I got back to my apartment, all the strength went out of me. I dropped to my knees on the floor.

My phone buzzed in my bag. I picked up, and my mother's voice came through.

"Evelyn. This month's payment is due. The neighborhood boss was just here, asking again."

"…Yeah."

She exploded the second she heard how drained I sounded.

"What's that supposed to mean? Are you saying you won't pay? I'll remind you, you're my daughter, how can you just stand by and let your mother—"

"Mom, I heard you. I just got off work. I'm exhausted. I just got—"

I didn't even get to say "home." She cut me off.

"Then send me some money. Now."

My heart dropped. It took me a long moment. "I… I don't have any right now…"

"Cut the crap. Are you sending it or not? If not, I'll just go kill myself right now."

My hand tightened around the phone. I pressed my lips together and made a small sound of agreement. Then I wired her next month's grocery money.

When the call ended, I stared at my bank balance, two digits left. I didn't even have the energy to sigh.

I looked down. There was already a bruise where that man had grabbed me. Rainwater was still dripping from my hair.

I didn't know anymore what I was doing all this running for.

But life kept going.

My interview was at three the next afternoon. I got there half an hour early.

The building was sixty-eight floors of glass, rising up out of the financial district right in the heart of San Verona.

I pushed open the lobby door. A wash of cold air hit me, laced with perfume.

At the front desk, I gave my name and the reason I was there. One of the two girls smiled, handed me a visitor badge, and pointed toward the executive elevators. "Ms. Evelyn, your interview is on the top floor. The private elevator on the right, please."

I took the badge and rode up.

When the doors opened, a long corridor stretched out in front of me, lined with a hand-woven dark gray carpet. At the far end were two black oak double doors with brass handles cast in the shape of roses.

I walked toward them. Before I could even lift my hand, the doors opened from inside.

A middle-aged man in a sharply tailored gray suit stood in the doorway. Wire-rimmed glasses, hair combed back without a strand out of place.

"Ms. Evelyn?" His tone was polite, distant. "Please come in. Mr. Brode is waiting for you."

My stomach dropped at the sound of that name. But I was already here. I couldn't back out now.

I forced myself to follow him inside. The entire far wall was glass. The city skyline rolled out in front of me. In the gray light of the overcast sky, all the glitter and decadence of San Verona lay bare.

And the high-backed leather chair behind the desk, the one facing away from the window, was slowly turning around.

My nails dug into my palms.

Brode had changed clothes. His hair was combed back now, exposing a broad forehead and those eyes. No warmth in them at all.

"Sit."

A man in his position didn't bother rising. He just nodded at the chair across from his desk.

The man who'd brought me in slipped out. The door clicked shut.

I hadn't known the firm I was interviewing with was his. Now he was my interviewer. Pretending I wasn't nervous, wasn't sick with guilt, would have been a lie.

I watched him unhurriedly pick up my résumé. My heart was hammering.

"Working multiple jobs a day. How pitiful…"

There was a cold, superior sympathy in his tone. It cut.

"I support myself. I don't steal and I don't beg." I kept my voice steady. "And I've got two years at another law firm on my record."

"But—" he drew the word out lazily, "—as you said yourself once, none of this work has brought you power or money. Three years, and your social standing doesn't seem to have improved. Should I take that to mean you're unsuccessful? A failed lawyer?"

The words were familiar. His tone was the same one he'd used, no, the same tone I'd used on him, the rainy night I broke up with him.

The things I'd said to him three years ago were coming back now like a boomerang, slamming into me.

I looked up. My eyes burned. He was still reading my résumé, not even looking at me.

"You're good at dressing things up on paper." A soft, mocking laugh. "If I hadn't seen what you really are, or if someone else were interviewing you today, maybe the act would have actually worked."

"So I have to ask. This law firm you worked at before, what did you do? Why did they throw you out?"

His tone was almost playful. But his eyes were full of something dark that wouldn't dissolve.

"Betrayed your employer? Stole firm information? Or—"

"Enough!"

I shot to my feet across the desk, humiliated tears stinging my eyes. "If I'd known this firm was yours, I wouldn't have sent in my résumé. I definitely wouldn't have come."

"Yes, you're rich now. I'm poor. But you think that means I don't have pride? You think I have no dignity? I'm just doing whatever I can to survive. Maybe it's not glamorous, but I've never done anything to hurt anyone!"

He didn't know I'd been fired from my last firm because the debt collectors had tracked me there and I'd had no choice but to quit.

The tears spilled over. I felt his eyes pin me in place. I grabbed my bag and walked out.