I release a sigh. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“He’s not interested in me anymore.”
He stares at me as if I’ve grown an extra head. “Not interested in you? On what planet have you been living, Cecily? The guy stalks you like a creep and actually smiles while he does it—honest to fucking God thought he didn’t know how. He’s also developed some bizarre fetish about removing anyone who poses an obstacle to you. That teacher who was giving preferential treatment to his friend’s kid? Jeremy was the reason he asked to transfer. Those American football players who stole and slashed your textbooks? Jeremy eliminated them. Those guys at the club who danced with you? Jeremy beat them the fuck up and put one in a coma. Oh, and news fucking flash, he tortured Jonah to near death by waterboarding him and threatened to kill his parents, brothers, sisters, and everyone he cared about. Then he proceeded to tell his family about all the scandals he could get them into by airing some of their dirty laundry. That’s the only reason Jonah turned himself in. He still gets beaten up in prison every day because Jeremy and his whole fucked-up entourage have the ability to pay off people who can do it. Inside England’s prisons, which should be far away from their territory, but isn’t. You still think that’s not called interest?”
My jaw nearly meets the floor.
The onslaught of information swirls inside me, barely allowing me to absorb anything.
I frown. “How do you know all of that?”
“I have someone who follows him, just like he has someone who’s following me.”
“Following you?”
“Yeah. You think he knows by now that I’m here?”
“Lan, whatever you’re planning, stop it.”
“I need you with him, Ces. I’m not asking.” And then he grabs me by the cheek.
I know where this is going, what he’s planning, and I want to stop him, but my reaction is delayed.
His lips are reaching for mine, and I try to push at his chest, but before I can do that, Lan is shoved off me.
Not by one set of hands, but two.
Jeremy punches Landon in the face, and when he falls to the ground, a very angry, very beautiful blonde stares down at him with a murderous expression.
Then she kicks him in the nuts. With her giant boot.
31
CECILY
I’ve never been more stunned than as I am at this moment.
The scene happens in slow motion, yet it’s so fast that I can’t keep up.
It’s like staring at the world through blurry lenses while riding a roller coaster.
Landon grunt, groans, then rolls onto his back, sporting a bloodied lip and a red jaw. However, he has the happiest, most genuine grin I’ve ever seen.
“Hi, mouse. Miss me?”
Mia continues glaring at him, and it looks anything but menacing, in view of her poufy dress, the ribbons intertwined in her hair like snakes, and her generally regal presence.
However, her kick was definitely painful considering the echoing sound. She flips him off and signs something to Jeremy. I don’t understand what she’s saying, but there’s a lot of energy behind it.
Mia strikes me as the type of person who simply can’t be defined by her disability, fashion sense, or spiky personality. It’s like she flows and flows, unable to put a halt to the flood of what’s inside her.
While she talks to the man who’s grabbing me from behind, a violent chill covers my skin as I glance back.
I’ve seen Jeremy exactly two times since he cruelly and indefinitely removed me from his life. Once when I drove by the cottage and saw him going inside.
The other time was when I allowed Ava to drag me to the fight club and watched him nearly be beaten to death by Killian.
It was one of those off-championship fights that happens every night, and it looked like he had a death wish.
I left before the fight was over.
Now, I regret looking at him, because nothing could’ve prepared me for being this close to him.
In a way, he hasn’t changed. He still has sharp, masculine features that drip with savage intensity and the build of a warlord who gets off on conquering lands and people.
His broad shoulders eat up the horizon, filling my vision with the dazzling strength of his presence.
The black T-shirt tightens around his biceps, and the tattoos ripple with each flex of his muscles. As if, like him, they’re on the edge.
My gaze flicks to where he’s touching me. My elbow.
That’s what he always grabs when he wants to put distance between us, when he treats me like nothing more than the object of his dirty fucks.