Page 97 of Ice Cold Christmas

Victor…

Victor had taken a bullet for her. Well, a graze. One that he still basically refused to acknowledge but…

Her head tilted. The past surged up to choke her. “Victor sends his regards. Drive the fucking car.” The words seemed to be playing in her head on an endless loop. Only in her head. She didn’t voice them. Couldn’t.

“I didn’t tell you about my past,” Victor spoke flatly. “I didn’t tell you about my plans for Mage. I didn’t tell you because everything changed when I met you.”

“Bullshit.” A sneer from Dario. “We’ve wasted enough time. Come on. We’ll wait down in the lobby for the detective.”

The past pulled harder at her. That stupid, grating voice… “Victor sends his regards. Drive the fucking car.”

Her breath shuddered out. Her gaze darted around the boardroom. So familiar. So different. “I’m done being your dirty little secret.” Her words. Her past. Her stare shifted back to Victor. She wet her lips. “I’m done being your dirty little secret.” The words were out loud, not just in her mind. She’d spoken them deliberately.

His eyes widened. “Melody?” One of his hands reached for her.

“Uh, Vic?” Hunter cleared his throat. “What the hell is my role here? You the good guy or the villain?”

“Both,” Victor snapped. “And if Melody leaves this room, you stay with her every second, understand me? Every. Second. I’ll give you a million damn dollars to keep her within sight at all times.”

Melody barely heard his words. Her heart pounded too fast. Echoed too loudly in her ears. “You’re breaking my heart,” she whispered. Again, familiar words and, in response, he was going to say back…

Didn’t think you could break a heart that someone didn’t have.

But instead of saying those words—the words that she knew he’d said in the past—pain twisted his face. “You own my heart,” he told her. The hand he’d lifted toward her hovered in the air. As if he was afraid to touch her.

Dario pulled at her. “Enough. Melody, he stole the company. He wanted to destroy us all from the beginning. You can never trust him.”

And, yet…Melody jerked away from Dario’s grip. She took a step closer to Victor.

Victor, who stood as still as a statue even as his eyes blazed at her.

“You two are done.” Dario’s voice cracked on the last word. “Over. You might have taken the company—for the moment—but you and Melody are over. Hear me? Done. She knows the truth about you?—”

“We’re not done.” Victor’s vow.

Those words—this room—she looked again, almost dizzy as her heart seemed ready to burst right out of her chest and as her temples throbbed. “Why not?” The words were an echo of the past. “You have everything you ever wanted.”

Victor’s head shook. One hard, negative swipe from left to right. “The hell I do.” Grim. An echo of the past that she could feel flooding through her. “But I will.” A vow.

Then he dropped to his knees right in front of her.

Chapter Twenty-Five

“What in the hell are you doing?” Dario blasted at Victor.

Victor ignored the prick, for the moment, because he didn’t matter. What mattered was Melody. Convincing her to stay. Proving to her that she was the one who had always mattered to him. She always would matter.

“You’re starting to remember, aren’t you?” Victor asked Melody. She had to be remembering because she was saying some of the exact words they’d used before in this very room.

Did he remember every fucking conversation of his life? Hell, no. But he did remember that one. Because he’d asked her to marry him. Because she’d said yes. Because Melody had said that she loved him. All things that had made the moment play in his head again and again.

And because…

Because she’d vanished after that talk. He’d gone from heaven to hell, and the words before the trip might as well have been tattooed on his freaking soul.

She rubbed her left temple. Dark shadows had swept under her eyes even as the rest of her face seemed far, far too pale. He wanted to grab her, swoop her into his arms. Run the hell away with her and never, ever look back.

But…