“He does. He loves you in his gentle way.” He throws the phrase back in my face. “The minute you are on my side and he thinks you are important to me, you become what I love.” I shift uncomfortably at what he says. The word love associated with us sounds wrong on his lips. “He loses, because he will have to drive that fucking car into you. That’s how fucking simple it is,” he says, finishing his drink in one gulp while I shake my head.
“Except it’s not. You’re wrong, Zachary.” He sends me a questioning stare. “You’re trying to understand the unsub through the prism of your character. That’s what you would have done in this situation. Like you’ve done with me. Took Sebastian away.” That’s purely a guess on my part. But I see how remorse, for a second, crosses his face but then is replaced with an odd possessiveness and anger; he doesn’t like the reminder of my husband between us.
Well then, tough luck. “If the profile is right and my suspicions about his childhood are correct, he will want to punish me for what I’ve done in his eyes. Trying to find someone to kill who I love.” I laugh bitterly. “Ideal choice would have been for him to find someone we both love and hurt us with it, but there is no such person.”
A cracking sound reverberates through the space, and I gasp, watching the glass in Zachary’s hand shatter, the blood spilling from his palm. I get up swiftly, grabbing the white napkin, wrapping it tightly around his hand.
Betty runs to us, and I ask her, “We need a first aid kit. Please, do you have one?”
I don’t have the chance to examine the wound, because Zachary stands up, puts several hundred dollar bills on the table, grabs my elbow, and pulls me in the direction of the exit, saying over his shoulder to Betty, “After paying my bill, the rest is your tip.” He continues to drag us toward the elevators, pressing furiously on the button, unfazed with the fact that his freaking blood is dripping on the floor, leaving red stains.
“Zachary, we need to take care of your hand.” He ignores my words and leads us inside the elevator the minute it opens on our floor then presses the ground button. “Zachary!” I scream in his face, still like an idiot holding his hand wrapped in a napkin. “What the hell is going on with you?”
Instead of answering me, he takes out his phone, pressing on the name Zeke to call him, as I open up the cloth. I sigh in relief that there are no tiny glass slivers in his skin, but the cut looks deep and might need a few stitches.
Which I could easily do if he’d just freaking let me!
Covering the wound again, I hear a male voice on the other end of the line, answering on the first ring. “Yes.”
“Is there a chance anyone can know the details of Emmaline’s adoption?”
I freeze, wondering why he wants to ask this question right now, of all times.
Is this what has unsettled him? But didn’t he say that with this plan, the attention would be on me? What does Emmaline have to do with me?
A thought brushes over my mind—disturbing and hideous in its nature with the power to turn me insane for how impossible it is—whispering in my ear that maybe there is a connection.
Maybe there is an explanation.
But I grit my teeth, putting a stop to it before I start building something in my head that doesn’t exist.
“No, why? Everything was confidential, signed contracts and all,” the man replies, and unconsciously I press closer to Zachary to eavesdrop on the conversation. “Not to mention, all the paperwork is in a safe, stored in the bank, just as you asked.”
“Check with them to see if they had anyone come recently to fetch the papers.”
“It’s impossible. The person would have to know all the details, like numbers and such. Why is it an issue right now? Is someone blackmailing you with this information?” I frown at this, finding his conclusion very odd. Who would be stupid enough to blackmail Zachary with it? His family knows, and I’m sure the public does as well that he adopted a child; besides, isn’t it a good thing?
“Zeke, I’m not paying you to ask me questions. I’m paying you to do as I say.” With this, he hangs up on him, puts the phone into his back pocket, and that’s when the elevator dings on the ground floor. And then he’s dragging me once freaking again, and I’ve finally had enough of this.
Tugging on my arm, I dig my heels into the floor, and he stops, half turning to me while I still hold his injured hand. “What’s going on with you? We need to look at your hand, yet you’re rushing God knows where,” I say with a loud exhale, not knowing what to make of his constant mood swings.
His jaw tics, his eyes unreadable under the sunlight streaming from the double doors leading outside, and even through such small contact, I feel the tension surrounding us along with an unfamiliar emotion from him.
Fear.
Before he can reply to me though, his phone rings and he answers. I have a split second to see Zeke’s name flashing again. “Yes.” Whatever Zeke says to him eases the beast roaring inside him as he sighs with relief practically pouring from him. “Are you absolutely sure? You’re a dead man if you are lying.” He hangs up, and I gasp when he pulls me to his chest so that we are mere inches apart from each other. “My baby girl is safe. We’re getting married, because then the person he’ll hunt will be me.” He delivers this stupid conclusion, based on his own deductions, right before his mouth connects with mine—just in time for the people entering and emerging from the elevators to observe, obviously, by their shocked gazes.
But just as quickly, his mouth is gone from mine, and then my eyes widen when he drops to his knee in front of me, taking a black velvet box from his pocket and flicking it open to showcase an emerald ring surrounded by tiny diamonds on a platinum band. He doesn’t even care how his blood smears it.
The stone shines brightly under the light, glistening for everyone to see. A few ladies gasp in the distance, their phones recording the entire damn thing, accompanied by a few flashes from others snapping pictures. “Phoenix, the entire world lights up when you’re around me.” I blink at this and hear someone exclaim, “Oh my!” More fucking flashes in my face!
Zach stays oblivious to the company and continues, “Will you do me the honor of being my wife?” Although he words it like a question, I don’t miss the steely warning in his tone, his gaze drilling into me and silently ordering me to go along with this game of his that is…
I don’t even know what to call it.
“Oh my God, is she going to reject him?” someone whispers loudly, while I still don’t take my gaze away from Zachary, who lifts his chin and issues me a challenge, as if he has power over me.
Part of me, the vindictive part I thought I never actually had, yearns to do just that and shout in his face that he is a horrible man, and, therefore, I can never marry him.
But the other part, the reasonable one that used to love being a psychiatrist and delve into people’s minds… knows there is merit to his theory and the possibility that this charade could disturb the unsub.
Even if it’s a slim chance, it’s better than nothing.
Until Lydia resolves my case with the state, I don’t have money or social standing to search for the truth, nor a safe place to stay.