I wanted to give her everything she deserved. Everything that she’d missed out on because of the tragedies of her past. But what could I offer her? Nothing that was desirable. I couldn’t bring her into my family—in fact, the thought of her even so much as sharing the same air as my father or Hellen … that thought filled me with dread.

I could not make a life with her here. But I was trapped here by my title.

She deserved happiness after everything she had been through … everything that I was putting her through.

And badness knew I wished I could be the one to give it to her.

But I couldn’t. So, avoiding her was, for now, my best option. Until I could work out a way to release her from our contract and set her free.

33. Nobody’s Gonna Be Looking at Your Face …

Chapter 33

Nobody’s Gonna Be Looking at Your Face …

Jemma

I could have sworn I was being watched.

“Right about now would be a great time … hypothetically speaking … for someone to pop in unannounced.” I waited.

Nothing.

I raised my voice. “Someone who might like to help me review this contract from the Ferretcon ladies …”

Still nothing.

I cleared my throat. “Someone who loves a good, airtight contract, and who got all overprotective of me when I tried to agree to something without seeing it in writing first. That someone might like to drop by …”

Silence.

I sighed and turned back to the contract. Maybe I was just paranoid. Maybe this feeling of something … other … being in my home, was just residual from all the previous occasions he’d opened a portal right under my nose.

I had two days until Friday the thirteenth. And only the bare bones of a plan for how to disguise myself to survive this dangerous task he had set out for me and hopefully get him to fall hard enough that he decided to make task four an easy one for me. A plan that involved the contract on my screen. But my brain went immediately fuzzy the second the first legalese word popped up.

“Oh well, if no one is coming to rescue me from the tedium of this contract … I suppose I’ll just sign my life away without perusing it thoroughly!” I shouted.

Radio silence.

I huffed and clicked the ‘sign now’ button, sending the thing zooming back via the interwebs to Esther and Jules. My new business partners. Who, in addition to founding Ferretcon, conveniently ran a cosplay business specialising in special-effects makeup.

“Who are you shouting at?” Ezra asked, poking his head around the bedroom door. I snapped my laptop shut guiltily, which was stupid because it wasn’t like I’d been doing anything nefarious, like, I don’t know … watching German Scheizer Porn or something.

“No one!” I shouted.

Ezra wrinkled his nose. “Well, why are you shouting at me?”