“What are you talking about?” Vera asked. She dug her hands into her hair and pinched her eyes closed, shaking her head like she could knock something loose and make sense of it all. “I married Nico so I wouldn’t have to marry Camden. I married Nico because I wanted to make my own choices and because I wanted to be valued beyond what I could provide to some man.”
Lorenzo barked an unhinged laugh. “They always say to sleep with the devil you know, Verana. And this is why. This is why we followed those traditions and arranged a marriage. We did it to protect our company. And you ruined it by breaking the rules and fucking it all up.”
They stared at each other. Him waiting for her to admit what she’d done and her waiting for it to make sense. When she stayed silent, realization dawned on Lorenzo, and he laughed.
“You dumb girl.”
“That’s enough,” I growled.
But it was like he didn’t even hear me. His laugh turned to a manic cackle echoing off the tile floors and glass walls. “You don’t know. You don’t even know that you’re being used. Looks like I’m not the only one he stole the company from.”
“Goddammit,” Vera growled. “Will someone tell me what the fuck is going on.”
“Verana, if we can go upstairs, I can explain.”
“What?” Lorenzo asked. “More lies? I don’t think so.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about. And I will not stand here and allow you to talk to my wife like that.”
“Your wife? Or the pawn you acquired to win?”
“She is not a pawn,” I growled, reaching my own limits of control. Vera was a queen, and I was about to lose her.
He smirked when he saw the panic flash across my face before I could mask it. As if in slow motion, he turned to Vera, and I opened my mouth to stop it, but nothing came out. Part of me wanted to toss her over my shoulder and run, but I knew I was only fighting the inevitable. My grandpa’s words came back.
A marriage built on lies is no marriage at all.
“You married Nicholas Knightly Rush. Grandson to the owner of Knightly Shipping—or what used to be.” I grit my teeth at his dig. “Until his grandfather made a poor business choice—”
“He did not,” I growled.
“—and I stepped in to help. And when he couldn’t repay, I sold off what was owed to me.”
“You took advantage of a suffering man, you arrogant prick,” I said through a clenched jaw.
“It was just business,” he threw back.
The words unveiled every ounce of anger that brought me to this moment, and I snapped. I forgot every plan I’d made over the past week to tell Vera the truth over a candlelit dinner at home—preferably naked and tied to the chair so she couldn’t run. I forgot everything beyond Lorenzo’s shitty barb. “Yeah, well, me buying up Mariano Shipping was just business, and I hope you enjoy watching me take it all away from you.”
“You fucking shit.” Lorenzo lost his own patience and stepped closer. He tried to get in my face but was too short to come close to being as threatening as he wanted to appear. “What? You couldn’t find enough shares for your pitiful revenge, so you took my daughter? That’s not business—it’s cowardly.”
“You practically shoved her in my face with the way you pushed her away. Don’t blame me for losing your daughter.”
He opened his mouth, but her soft voice cut through all the macho anger spilling around us.
“Revenge?”
I snapped my gaze to her, her brown eyes wide and filled with surprise and hurt. The look punched me in the gut, stealing all the air from my lungs—from my need to win against Lorenzo.
“Vera—”
“He’d been buying shares to Mariano Shipping for years, using shell companies to hide his identity. And you, my spoiled, ungrateful daughter, gave him the final few he needed,” Lorenzo supplied.
“That’s not—”
“Did you know who I was?” Vera asked, cutting me off. “Is that why you hired me? Because you knew my last name the whole time? Did you know it was me under the mask while you fucked me?” Her questions got louder. “Did you plan this all along?”
“No, Vera. I never planned—” I tried to explain again only to be cut off by Lorenzo raging against Vera.
“Maybe if you hadn’t spent an extra week spreading your legs for the enemy, we might have fought this,” Lorenzo interjected. “We had one chance, and instead of answering your damn phone, you extend your vacation by another week, giving him just enough time to seal the deal.”
She blinked, her brows pulling tight as she put the pieces together. “France?”
“Oh, is that where you went? Was that before or after you gave him the inside details to our company? He knew just where to hit us, Verana. He knew exactly how to get around the clauses your grandma put into that stupid contract. Did you spill the secrets willingly, or did he steal that too?”