The corridor faded away as I stared at the brutal beauty of his face. He was close, so goddamn up in my space that I felt the heat of his breath, and oh my fuck, he smelled good. Seductively dark and woodsy, like exotic incense and something more. Something carnal and manly, unlike anything sold in a designer bottle. My nose rejoiced in the aroma, my nostrils flaring, taking deep pulls, savoring.
Snap out of it.
I held my breath and averted my eyes. What was happening to me? I couldn’t be in thrall to a man who meant to hurt me. Nausea swirled, stirring icy fear in my stomach.
He didn’t need words to scare the shit out of me. His nearness alone frazzled my nerves all to hell.
I just needed him to leave, and the quickest way to make that happen was to give him what he wanted.
Tugging the phone from my pocket, I slapped it in his waiting hand.
I knew that in a couple of hours I was going to find myself lying in a strange bed, scared and alone, cursing my decision to surrender my connection to the outside world. My phone was my lifeline to my brother.
Keaton was annoyingly overprotective of me, but only because he cared. He was the one I turned to when I needed help, words of advice, or a shoulder to lean on.
I was going to need him more than anything tonight.
My chest ached as I watched the phone vanish in Father Magnus’s pocket. Out of my reach.
He returned to the classroom and paused just inside, his hand resting on the doorframe. Every sinew in my body was strung tight as he glanced over his shoulder and met my gaze.
I expected indifference, but what I saw in his expression was worse.
His eyes glinted with triumph.
He thought he’d won. He thought, from here on out, I would cower and cease resisting, that I would be malleable and easy to control. He thought he had my capitulation.
As if.
He’d never crossed swords with a Constantine.
My destiny was of my own making, and I was willing to ruin my reputation to get the hell out of here. If he stood in my way, I would take him down with me.
“I promise you this.” I squared my shoulders and stood, facing him head-on. “I’m going to make your life a living hell.”
“Hell is fast approaching, little girl. But I assure you, it’s not coming for me.”
With a cruel twist of his lips, he stepped into the classroom and shut the door in my face.
CHAPTER 3
TINSLEY
Standing in the corridor, I pressed the heels of my hands to my eyelids and waited for the threat of tears to dissipate.
Tinsley Constantine was a lot of things—and sometimes, she referred to herself in the third person—but she wasn’t a crybaby.
Why didn’t they ever talk about my finer points on social media?
They don’t know me.
No one knew the real me. Not even my friends in Bishop’s Landing. They only saw what they wanted to see—what they could gain from my family’s wealth and influence. Deep down, I knew that my closest friends only hung around to get close to my brothers.
Story of my life. My last name preceded who I was in my heart, and it wouldn’t be any different here.
But there were advantages to being my mother’s daughter. She’d bred tenacity in my veins and steel in my bones. I’d spent my entire life watching her, learning from her. While she wasn’t a nurturing person, she didn’t take shit from anyone.
To win this, I would have to take a page out of her book, no matter how vicious my opponent.
Hell is coming for me.
Not the words I expected to hear from a priest’s mouth, but to be fair, I threatened him first.
I stepped toward the classroom, placing my hands on the door. My mother’s muffled voice drifted from within, drawing my ear to the wooden barrier.
“I investigated you, Magnus. You’re well respected in the church and held in high esteem by your fellow teachers. But I’m more interested in your history before priesthood. I find it strange that you decided to become a late-vocation priest, considering that before the age of thirty-one, you led a rather excessive, self-indulgent life.”
My breath cut short, my whole body going still.
“Self-made billionaire.” Her heels clicked through the room, punctuating her words. “New York’s most eligible bachelor—”
A flurry of noise erupted overhead. I spun, crouching, and slapped a hand against my pounding chest. Dammit.
Craning my neck, I scanned the rafters along the hallway. There was something there, quiet now, but whatever it was had nearly given me a heart attack.
The ceiling crested into shadowed pockets high above the glow of the wall sconces. I strained my eyes, searching for movement.
Nothing.
If it was a critter, it must’ve scurried away.
I crept back to the door and pressed my ear to the surface, catching my mother’s voice.