Series: Werewolves of Wall Street Series by Renee Rose
Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 66669 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 333(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66669 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 333(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
“I said no!” I thunder.
My team remains silent.
“Perhaps you should consider marking her and then discarding her. That would alleviate the greatest risk of madness,” Nickel suggests.
“No.” This time it’s crystal clear who’s talking. Me–the proud, stubborn man who would rather hold a grudge and die than make any kind of peace with the woman who betrayed me. My wolf is totally on board with marking her. Now. Yesterday, in fact.
“I don’t wish to discuss Madi. I will draw blood on the next person who brings her up. I want to talk about the pack and the company.”
“We’re looking at complete and utter devastation,” Billy says. “There will be no Blackthroat pack. None of us are strong enough to hold it. No one will trust me over you. The only reason they trusted you at age eighteen is because your father made it clear that you were his successor and all the wolves who fell in behind him backed you. Only one or two families defected. This time they will all defect. The Adalwulfs will pick off the weaker factions.”
Concerned looks ping-pong around the table.
“Contingency plans for the company, then. Let’s get to work.”
Madi
I stay in bed for two days without eating or sleeping. On the afternoon of the third day after being fired, I finally start following the loops and turns my mind has been hashing through while I’ve been wallowing in bitterness and despair.
The thing my brain kept returning to was that meeting with Aiden. When I realize why, I sit up abruptly from bed. Shower. I need a shower.
I swing my legs over the side, stand up, and nearly pass out because I haven’t eaten in two days. I'm sure I look like a holy terror. I'm in an old worn T-shirt and panties, and my hair is a tangled mess from lying in the bed with the covers over my head.
“Hey, you’re up.” Aubrey comes into my room. Her voice is soaked with sympathy, which makes me want to dive back under the covers for another cry.
But no. I figured something out.
“I need food,” I manage to say.
“I’ve been telling you that.” Aubrey snatches up the store-bought smoothie she brought in for me earlier this morning from the bedside table and gives it a shake. “Here, drink this.”
I uncap it and suck down half the contents. “Thanks. Listen–” I pace into the living room of the apartment. “We have to do something.”
“Yeah. Let’s plot revenge on those entitled assholes.”
“No!” I wave an impatient hand. “Listen–I was framed.”
Aubrey looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “Obviously.”
“No, I mean, I think I know how they did it.”
“How?”
“The janitor.” I punctuate the word with a jab to the sky with my index finger.
“Let’s get you some more food,” Aubrey says, like I’ve lost my mind.
Okay, maybe it does sound too hokey. Too Agatha Christie tidy. But I just remembered the thing that was bothering me.
“He was the only one who could’ve known when I was leaving the building the night Aiden tried to get me into his limo. He’s also one of the few people who has access to my computer. And he’s a wolf.”
“A what?”
Oops.
Too late I realize that I’ve said too much.
Even after Brick throwing me out, I still would never reveal his secret.
“I mean, he was probably working for the Adalwulfs.”
“Oh. Yeah, he could be. Is that all you have on him, though? That evidence is pretty circumstantial.”
I tap my lips. “There's the private investigator Brick hired to find out if Eleanor Harrington was my grandmother. I could call him. Maybe he can find a record of a payment from the Adalwulfs to the janitor. Or something?”
Aubrey looks at me doubtfully. “Well,” –she shrugs– “I guess it’s worth a shot. But why are you doing this? Do you want your job back?”
I hate that my eyes fill with tears. I thought I was done crying over this. “No, I don’t want my job back. But I also can't stand Brick thinking I would do this to him.”
I'm not obtuse enough to miss the parallel he was led to draw between his mother’s betrayal and what he believes is mine. He jumped to conclusions because of his past. That wound is so deep, and this whole fiasco just fed into it.
That’s the sick part. Aiden Adalwulf went for his deepest wound when he used me to get at Brick. I mean, he didn't use me–I wasn’t a willing participant in his treachery–but he framed me for this whole thing. Used my computer. Staged a meeting with me in front of the building. Made the phone calls damning me.
What had Aubrey said to me back when I was in the Berkshires? Never date a man who hates his mother? She couldn't have been more right. A man who hates his mother believes every woman is out to get him. Every female is going to be damned in his eyes.