I stalk toward the entrance, my fists tight at my sides, a song of war blaring in my mind.
I can’t think. I can hardly see.
It’s like a red film has been pulled over everything.
Who does this bastard think he is?
This is the most important day of my and Fiona’s life, and he thinks he can try and ruin it. He thinks he can stain it with his criminal goons.
I push out the double doors, guests parting as I stride down the pathway toward the castle-like gates.
I spot Zack standing on the other side of the street, leaning against the wall with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He looks even more bloated with steroids in the day, and his six associates look exactly the same, all of them swollen with the way they artificially-enhance their bodies.
He kicks away from the wall as he sees me coming, a grin spreading across his face. He tosses the cigarette to the ground and pulls his shoulders back.
His goons do the same, all of them wearing suits with their hair styled exactly the same as Zack’s. He’s recruited himself an army of mini-me’s. They all wear gaudy gold watches, catching the midday sun and glinting like they’re trying to blind the city.
Horns blare at me as I walk across the street, cars coming to a stop, but I can’t think about that. I can’t think about anything except for the way this bastard is smirking at me.
I stop at the edge of the sidewalk, my fists clenched so hard I feel like my knuckles are going to explode out of my skin, burst and splinter, and cut.
“Hello, Ford,” Zack grins. “How nice of you to come out and say hello.”
Pedestrians give us a wide birth, walking onto the cycle path rather than get into the middle of the confrontation.
“You’re a fucking idiot for coming here,” I snarl. “Do you understand that? Can’t you get it into your moronic head that I’ll do anything to protect my woman and her family?”
“Your woman,” he chuckles, shaking his head. “That’s where you’re wrong, old man. Fiona belongs to me. She always has. I first saw her, and I watched her from a distance. I bided my time. I knew the day would come. And it did, and she loved it … She loved those letters. There was just a misunderstanding, but I’ll set it right once I’ve got her alone.”
“You’re insane,” Fiona says from beside me.
I turn, a vein throbbing in my neck, pulsing like it’s going to erupt.
Fiona stands next to me, and Larry and the security detail hover across the street. Even from here, I can read the indecision on his face, his struggle between getting involved and protecting his employer and the order I gave him not to intervene.
Fiona wasn’t supposed to follow me.
“Oh, I’m crazy, alright,” Zack says, stepping forward and reaching into his pocket. “Crazy with love.”
Chapter Seventeen
Fiona
My heart hammers in my chest as Zack pulls his hand from his pocket. I flinch and take a step back, anxiety coursing through me like boiling water, scorching every part of me.
He’s going to pull a knife, a gun …
But no.
It’s the letters. He’s holding the letters out to me, a vicious smirk on his face.
“Remember these, little lady?” he chuckles. “I wonder how your new man would feel if he could read these little love notes.”
“She wrote them when she was a child, you fucking lunatic,” Forrest growls.
I’ve never seen him like this before, with every part of him tense and ready to erupt. I reach out and place my hand on his shoulder, squeezing, hoping I can tell him through the gesture that he doesn’t need to stoop to their level.
He glances at me, his eyes hard, his lips twisted into something savage and ferocious.
“It’s time for you to leave,” he snarls, turning back to Zack. “You’ve tried intimidating us and it clearly hasn’t worked. So just fuck off and never come back. Or I swear to God, this is it for you.”
“Don’t threaten me, Ford,” Zack snarls. “You might feel tough because you’ve got your little security over there. But I’ll find you when you’re alone—”
“I’ve called my security off,” he growls. “So if you’re going to do something, here I am.”
He spreads his arms, his hands still clenched into tight fists.
“Bullshit,” Zack says. “You’re trying to trick me.”
He sounds like a little kid with his voice wavering. People have stopped walking by us now, forming a circle, some of them with their phones out aimed at us.
“Forrest,” I say. “Let’s just go.”
“Shut up, you slut,” Zack snarls, and all his men snigger.
Shame drenches me in a tsunami of memory. All the times I’ve ever been humiliated, bullied, ridiculed, come crashing down on me and I want to scream.
I want to roar and hammer my chest with my fists and tell the world that I don’t deserve to be treated this way.