Fury flares in my chest. This bitch is going to get me killed, and I haven’t done shit to her. I’ve barely touched her. Any other man in his right mind would have fucked her on day one, no matter her excuses. He would have told her she couldn’t go out dancing on their honeymoon. He would have told her to get off her ass and do something while he was at work, not offered to hire help so she could go wherever the fuck she wanted, with whoever the fuck she was with today. He would have wanted answers, accountability, a wife who acted like one.
I went too easy on her. Bargaining isn’t going to cut it with her. I won’t make that mistake again.
I grab her hair and yank her head back so hard she gasps, struggling to free herself. I try to swipe the phone, but she keeps it to her ear. “When is that?” she asks, then waits for him to answer. “I don’t know if I can make it three more days. He’ll kill me by then!”
“Give me the phone,” I growl.
“Fine,” she snaps into the phone. “But if he doesn’t show up atJean-Jean’s,it’s because he killed me and went on the run. I hope you’ll be happy when I’m dead!”
I grab the phone from her hand and hang it up before shoving it in my pocket. “What the fuck is wrong with you? You trying to get me executed?”
“Why shouldn’t I?” she shoots back. “You executed my brother.”
“Is this a game to you, Eliza? Your whole fucking life is a game, isn’t it, just to see what you can get away with?”
She snorts. “Hypocritical much? That’s what everyone in the Life’s trying to do.”
I’ve never thought of it that way, and it takes me off guard yet again. I keep thinking I have her figured out, and then she goes and says something like that. She may act like a shallow party girl, but there’s more to her. I need to stop forgetting that.
“You’re a smart girl,” I say calmly. “You disobeyed me. You knew there would be consequences.”
I watch her throat working as she swallows. “What are you going to do, spank me?” she asks, the sass back in her voice.
“I told you to tell your father I was good to you, and you could go out with your friend. You didn’t do that, so you’ll be staying in for dinner with me. What do you want?”
She jumps up off the couch, all her smug bravado gone. “You can’t stop me from seeing my friends.”
“There are consequences to your actions,” I say. “It’s time you start facing them. You knew the terms, and you chose to lie.”
“I didn’t lie,” she shouts. “Youarehorrible. Keeping me from my friends is abuse!”
Now it’s my turn to scoff. “You’ve been with your friends all day. I don’t think it’s abuse to ask you to have dinner with me.”
She juts out her lip and glares. “You can’t stop me.”
“Who pays for your credit card?” I ask. “It’s not your daddy anymore, Eliza.”
Her mouth falls open in an expression of shocked disbelief, her eyes going wide with indignation. “You’re cutting me off?”
“I’m buying you dinner.”
“You’ll have to go downstairs to get food,” she says. “I’ll leave.”
“You have money for a taxi? An uber?”
“I’ll call Bianca.”
I raise a brow at her. “Will you?”
She glances around on the couch and coffee table before turning back to me. “Give me my phone.”
“You mean my phone?”
“You didn’t buy me that.”
“I pay the bill.”
We stare at each other a long minute. “I’ll message her online.”