Page 5 of Hate Me Like You Mean It

My cheeks grew hot, but I kept my expression even, refusing to wither under his lazy gaze as it flicked a shameless trail of murmuring fire down my body, and back up.

Whatever he saw made the hatred in his eyes burn feral, though his smirk never faltered.

“It’s you, then?” I deadpanned, almost mocking in my accusation. “You’re the reason I’ve been getting fired?”

The significance of the fourteen-day mark finally made sense. His mother had worked as a housekeeper for my family for fourteen years before we’d… parted ways. This was just his way of returning the favor.

And here I’d been, under the blissful assumption that he’d forgotten all about little old me.

His head cocked to one side. “I have to be honest, I thought you’d catch on a lot sooner. I was starting to get bored.”

“I don’t think about you enough to have put two and two together.”

He raised a brow. “But you do think about me.”

“Sure. Sometimes. My old landlord had a Norwegian troll statue perched outside of her unit that reminded me of you.” Before I’d been forced to move into a family-owned apartment because I could no longer afford rent. “The resemblance was uncanny. My hand was forced.”

He scraped a knuckle over his chin, huffing a scathing chuckle under his breath.

My gaze flicked down to his mouth.

I always assumed he’d grow out of it, but tragically, he still suffered the unfortunate affliction of a perpetual pout. Nothing annoyed me quite as much as Dominic Crawford’s upper lip. The way it jutted out constantly, all pillowy and sweet, grated on my every damn nerve.

“Seems like I’ve been onyourmind quite a bit, though,” I noted lightly, feigning the boredom I desperately wished I felt. Here was to hoping he couldn’t see my heart slamming against my chest, because it felt like my whole body was vibrating with the assault. “Stalking me, are you?”

“Just helping karma along.”

“By threatening whoever hires me?”

“Not threatening, no. Crawford Capital has been expanding its portfolio.”

Wait. He wasbuyingthese companies?Just sohe could have me fired from them? I caught my mouth before it could fall open. “What’s Crawford Capital?”

I got him.

His smirk faltered, and I bit back a smile. He never did like having his accomplishments undermined, did he?

“That’s my bad,” he drawled, recovering. “I forgot you don’t care to consume anything that doesn’t have the word‘Housewives’ stuffed in the title. It’s the largest private equityfirm in the country. We own the 6Queue Media network. Ever heard ofthem?”

My amusement withered.

6Queue Media was the first failing company Dominic had reportedly scooped up for “mere pennies,” ruthlessly gutted, and rebuilt from the ground up. Five years later, it was one of the biggest media networks in the country—thanks in no small part to a revolutionary social-media-slash-news-outlet of his own creation, and the bane of my family’s existence: Gossip Gorilla.

The second my dad announced he was going to retire early and named Adrien as the new CEO, Dominic had weaponized the platform against my family, using it to ruthlessly drag my brother’s reputation through the mud with speculative bullshit, his goons citing unnamed “sources” for their defamatory lies.

We all knew it was him, we all knewwhyhe was doing it, and every time I’d made mention of taking legal action, Gampy had stepped in, arguing that it would only make things worse—that Dominic was operating from a place of hurt, and fighting back with fire would only aggravate the situation. “He’ll eventually leave us alone on his own.Just give him a little more time.”

He was right. Dominic had eventually stopped.

Except by then, it was too late. The negative social sentiment he’d manufactured against Adrien had already taken a life of its own, and all the other outlets were foaming at the mouth over how many clicks my brother’s name could get.

My mask slipped. “You know damn well Adrien didn’t deserve the bullshit you put him through. It was our fight, Dominic. You should have kept my family out of it.”

“Why? Because you so generously leftmineout of it?” He was sitting close enough that I had to tip my chin up to maintain eye contact. He loved it—lording over me in all his unholy glory. Making sure I knew I was beneath him. “Tit for tat, Alice. Youspread lies about my family; I’m more than entitled to do the same with yours.”

“Inever lied.”Thatwas the difference. Not that he believed me. Not that he was even willing to listen.

“Oh, but you did,” he muttered, his tone drenched in contempt. His dilated pupils were pure onyx now. Two black holes sucking the light out of anything unfortunate enough to draw their scrutiny. “She never stole from you, and we both fucking know it.”