“I want to see those documents,” she told Tucker. “Can I see them now?”
“They’re in the house, but probate—”
“She’s not going into that house by herself,” Diane snapped. “I want the police there.”
Megan sighed. “Mother, you are such a miserable bitch, do you know that?” It wasn’t original or clever, but it was the best her stunned and weary mind could come up with at the moment. “I’m not a thief. I just want to look at what’s mine, and I want to do it now so I can get the hell out of this shitty little town.”
“Grey, you’ll be with her?” Tucker half-whispered in their direction, while the rest of the room stared at Megan in silence. Her mother’s eyes narrowed, hatred burning in their icy depths, but she said nothing.
Greyson must have nodded, because Tucker cleared his throat and spoke again. “Mrs. Chase, Mr. Dante is a highly respected attorney. He’ll be with Dr. Chase in the house. I trust him—and Megan.”
Dave stood up, holding out a set of keys. “Here, Megan.”
He didn’t look at her, but for some absurd reason tears threatened behind her eyes just the same. “The house is part yours anyway, right?”
Two hours. They figured they had about that long before everyone came back, and Megan had never in her life wanted anything as badly as she wanted to be out of the house before they did.
The will reading wouldn’t take that long, but the discussion they knew Diane and Dave would have with Tucker afterward just might.
Megan pulled boxes out from under the desk, lifting the lids, rifling through loose papers. The documents had to be in here somewhere. She needed to know who her father’s partners were in that land deal. She had one-third interest. Who were the other two? She thought she knew.
The blank walls in what used to be her bedroom stared at her as she worked, while Greyson set another box on the neatly made bed and started flipping through its contents. He’d barely said a word since they’d left the reading, but his silence wasn’t cold any more than his body was.
Her back started to ache from crouching by the time she found what she sought, by the time the names leaped out at her from the page. Every letter taunted her, answering questions she didn’t know she had but leaving more in their wake.
“Greyson. Come look.” Her voice sounded stronger than she thought it would.
He took the sheaf of papers from her and thumbed through it. “Title deed…documents of incorporation…here we go. Blah blah blah, board members—” He looked up.
“Board members, yes.”
“David Chase, Orion Maldon, and…Templeton Black.” He lowered the papers and stared at her. “I didn’t know, Meg. I swear I didn’t.”
So he’d come to the same conclusion she had. The same knowledge. “Look at the date.”
“I don’t need to.” But he glanced just the same. “Temp never told me he—”
“That he’d essentially bought me from my father? That in exchange for me, he and Orion Maldon would give my father part ownership in valuable property, they’d build his practice, they’d—” She stopped, unable to go on. Her hands shook as she raised them to her head.
Sixteen years ago she’d sat in this room and had her first conversation with the Accuser, right before he’d entered her body and changed her life forever.
And that was what David Chase had wanted. In exchange for power and wealth he’d sacrificed his only daughter.
Anger rose in her breast, filling her, making both her hearts beat faster. She wanted to hit someone. She wanted to hit her father. She should have laughed at him in that casket yesterday. She should have scratched his dead eyeballs out of his head and stomped them into goo under her feet.
“That bastard, that unbelievable bastard.” This time she didn’t try to stop her tears. Rage, not sadness, brought them to her eyes, but it didn’t matter. She stood next to her childhood bed and cried, and after a second Greyson gathered her in his arms and held her tight, and for once it didn’t feel like she was being humored.
It didn’t last long. The initial wave passed, and she was left simply raging, wanting to strike out at someone, anyone.
“I hate this room. I hate even being in this house.”
“I know.”
She turned around to look at the bed, at the window by which the Accuser had rested sixteen years before. Light poured through it, taunting her. “He stood right there,” she said. Her palms ached from her fingernails digging into them. “I was in bed and that’s where he was. Like…like he was my buddy or something. I wondered why no one was home that day. My mother usually was…”
She jumped when his warm hands touched her shoulders and rubbed gently. “Maybe it’s a good thing,” he said. “Now you know.”
Her head fell forward as he massaged her, easing some of the tension in her neck but doing nothing for the howling fury gripping the rest of her body. Her muscles ached from trying to still her trembling.
“I always knew. I mean, I didn’t know know, but it doesn’t change anything, does it? I’m still what I am, no matter the reason. They never liked me. They never wanted me around. It must have been like winning the lottery.” She couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice as she uttered the last line. Her blood still raced, her heart pumped furiously. She wanted to go run a mile, she wanted to throw things and attack things and tear them apart. All that excess energy buzzed around in her mind, in her veins, until she thought she might explode from it.
A cold breeze caressed her, like a ghost passing by. “Forget them.”
“I can’t forget them. I’m too…God, Greyson, I’m just so fucking mad at them, I can hardly see straight.”
The zipper of her dress lowered a bit. His lips tickled between her shoulder blades. “Maybe it’s time to let it all go. Exorcise your demons once and for all.”
She smiled, surprised it was still possible to do so. “Exorcise or exercise?”
“It’s so efficient when you can accomplish two goals with one…act, isn’t it?” Heat seeped through her dress from his palms as he slid his hands around her, gliding down over her hips and thighs, then back up. His fingers curved around her waist and pulled her back so she could feel his erection.
Her breath caught in her chest. “Do you ever think about anything but sex?”
“Money. Power.” His soft laugh warmed her throat as he scraped his teeth over her skin there. “I think about you, bryaela.”
She refused to say, “You do?” like some innocent heroine in a novel, but the temptation was too much to resist. “Oh?”
“Yes.” His right hand sneaked under the neckline of her dress and down into her bra, finding her left nipple and rolling it gently. Her eyelids fluttered shut. The raging demon inside her changed its tune, finding another route to forgetfulness, seeking a different kind of release. “I wonder how your day is going, what you’re doing…when I’ll see you again…don’t you think about me? Don’t you, sheshissma?”
“What does that mean?”
He paused, nibbling her earlobe. “It doesn’t translate well. My desire.”
“I think your desire translates pretty well.” It came out as a gasp; he’d started tugging up her skirt with his left hand while his right still played beneath her top, and the feel of his skin on her bare thighs above her stockings sent a violent shiver through her body.
“That’s what it means. My desire.” His foot nudged hers, punctuating his words, urging her legs apart. His fingers stroked over her panties. “The thing I want.”
Her head fell back, resting on his shoulder as he rubbed the damp silk against her. All that energy inside her, that fierce need…she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. Every gasp of air was scented with him, tasted like him.