“You didn’t do it. You broke up with him instead.”

I nodded. “Jock was so sweet. I really liked him, and I couldn’t have him caught up in Macon’s… meanness. No one would have believed that North Wainright had a shitty father. That her life was a nightmare. Not with a house like this, not with Billionaire Ranch. I did the one thing I could. I told your dad he should stay away from mine, that whatever he was offering, he didn’t want. Then I left.”

“You destroyed his deal.”

I nodded.

“What did Macon do?”

I didn’t respond, so he lifted my chin so I had to look in his eyes. “What did he do?”

“This talk… we did it out of order. Jock was first. He couldn’t do anything about the deal with your parents falling through. He learned something then, that there were no consequences if I stepped out of line. Nothing happened. I went to Harvard while he bided his time. Until the following year and South. Then East and West.”

“Why didn’t you leave after that? Your brothers were gone. Never came back. You could’ve. You had your degrees. You could have gotten a job anywhere.”

We could talk all night about all the ways Macon had controlled me. This was enough. He knew now why I didn’t trust. Why I’d accused him of wanting something from me.

I cupped his jaw, felt the softness of his beard under my palm. “So many little cuts, Jed. They barely bleed. But they hurt just the same.”

“I don’t know what the fuck that means.”

“It means he cut me to pieces. Only the jaded, cold parts of me are left. I’m the ice princess, remember?”

His eyes flared because he remembered his words.

“It means I have to wonder why you’re here with me,” I continued. “What your motive is. Your plan. What you’re going to take from me.”

He reached for the hem of my shirt and lifted it, slowly baring me to him. Then he shifted his knees so I slipped off. He carefully lowered me to the carpeted floor so I was kneeling before him.

“I’m not taking, princess,” he said. “You’re giving. Willingly and because you want to. Because beneath all the shit that’s happened to you, you can tell a good thing. Something real.”

“The ice princess and the fallen FBI man.”

The corner of his mouth tipped up. “You read up on me.”

I nodded, looking up at him. For some reason, being on the floor in front of him was… comforting. “What did you do?”

“It didn’t say?” he asked.

“No.”

“I made deals with the bad guys. Do you believe that, princess? You, more than anyone else, should know that not everything you read is the truth.”