Page 70 of Bad Bishop

With that, the bastard sailed toward the hallway. He stopped before disappearing inside the corridor, snapping his fingers as he glanced at me over his shoulder.

“Oh, two more things. One—you’re never to miss dinner again without a good reason. This is a sacred time between us.”

Sacred, my ass. We spend the entire duration of it every night trying to kill each other with hate glares.

“And the second thing?”

“Don’t feel so sorry for yourself. Tragedies are excellent teachers, Lila. Learn, absorb, and conquer.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

TIERNAN

243 DAYS TO SELF-DESTRUCTION

Deaf.

Not intellectually impaired.

Not developmentally delayed.

Deaf.

Sharp. Intelligent. Cunning. Talented. Slightly unhinged, which—let’s admit it—only added to her allure.

Beautiful beyond words, art, and cultural standards.

A mixture between sweet, naive, and goodhearted, yet bloodthirsty enough to put a bullet in someone who crossed her.

Thank fuck I had no heart, or we’d have one hell of a problem.

I fell into a recliner in my bedroom, rolling my tongue over my upper teeth. I already had another stiff drink in hand, but there wasn’t enough alcohol on this continent to numb the fuckery that was going on in my head.

The last forty-eight hours were a disaster. First, there was the OB-GYN appointment. She was so small the doctor wrestled to push the ultrasound wand inside her. Beads had actually formed across the old hag’s forehead, and I was ready to tear the doctor’s head off her neck.

When Lila placed those baby blues on my face and held my hand, all the sadist in me could think about was plowing my massive cock inside that sweet little cunt.

She squirmed and moaned with discomfort, but it was me who had to adjust myself seven times sitting next to her so my cock wouldn’t rip a hole through my trousers.

The doctor noticed, too. I was pretty sure I’d be banned from the establishment if it wasn’t for my notoriety.

And her body.Jaysus. That body would be the death of any straight man. She straddled the seam between willowy and youthfully plump. With a trim waist, long legs, and dainty arms, all sun-kissed to perfection. Her tits were heavy and full, the curve of her arse round and bold.

The reception bimbo was a cheap plot device on my end. I’d recognized her as a former exotic dancer who worked for one of my establishments a few years back. She’d recognized me as the man who once left her a five-hundred-buck gratuity after doing unholy things to her.

I knew she’d be the tipping point for my wife. I’d studied Lila in recent weeks. She was a hotheaded Italian under all those pink frocks and innocent stares.

For the first time in my life, my thoughts were scattered in a dozen different directions. I usually prided myself on my ability to dissect the micro from the macro, the important from the neglectable.

Until now.

There were too many moving parts.

First—the baby.

Lila wanted to have it. Didn’t surprise me. She was incapable of hurting anything innocent, even an unborn fetus the size of a fucking grape.

Second—what the fuck was Chiara playing at, making her daughter pretend to have no intellectual abilities, denying her pleasures and opportunities?