“Thank you.” Her words gave me hope that we could get through this and have a future together on the other side.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Willow

“Are you ready?” Ronan asked, a couple of hours later. His eyes were filled with concern. He knew this was going to be hard on me, but I was going to do it anyway because this was the easiest way to get our message to Tom.

“Yes. I’ve got this.” I straightened my shoulders. I’d opted to stand rather than sit because standing made it seem more like I was in control.

“You do.” He cupped my face between his hands and kissed me, then stepped back and nodded to Zeke and Oliver, who’d set up a station to record and trace the call in case things didn’t go the way we wanted.

Zeke pressed a button and nodded. “Go for it.”

I used my phone to call the number Tom had contacted me from yesterday. I felt a pang of guilt for what I was about to do, but when I met Ronan’s eyes, the awful sensation subsided.

This was the right thing. It was time for me to put myself first.

I half expected Tom not to answer, but after a few rings, he did.

“Willow, how are you?”

As if he cared.

A potent combination of rage and hurt sizzled along my nerves. He wasn’t even brave enough to admit what he’d done.

Across the room, Oliver caught my eyes. Both he and Zeke had headsets so they could listen to our conversation.

“Not great, actually. It turns out my brother is trying to coerce me into a marriage I’ve already refused.” I placed my free hand on my hip. “How could you do that?”

“I didn’t have a choice.” His voice was strained. “I told you how dangerous our situation is.”

“Your situation,” I reminded him. “And I told you I wouldn’t marry Petrov, yet he seemed to be under the impression we’re engaged. Lucky for you, I fixed that.”

“What did you do?” He sounded panicky.

“Did you expect me to go along with your lie?” Angry tears welled in my eyes, but I blinked them back. He didn’t deserve them. “I told Petrov there wasn’t going to be a wedding.”

Deathly silence followed.

“Tom?”

“You’ve killed us both,” he said baldly. “All you had to do was go along with it for a little while and everything would have been fine.” Each word grew louder than the last. “Petrov would have let me off the hook and treated you like the goddamn princess you think you are. You’d have had all the dresses and jewelry you could ever want. Holidays in Europe. A fucking house in the Maldives. A husband who would leave you alone most of the time to enjoy it. Yeah, that sounds like a real fucking hardship.”

I gaped. The man didn’t know me at all. “I don’t give a shit about material things. People should marry for love, not because their brother fucked up and is trying to avoid the consequences.”