Page 92 of Resist

“Not the type of publicity you want, huh darlin’? And I’m sure this pretty boy would be welcomed with open arms behind bars.”

“Bradley, let me go.”

“I’m not sure that’s such a good ide—”

“Let me fucking go NOW!”

Brad released my arms but stayed close.

“What do you want, Colin? You obviously came here for something?”

“I told you what I want. I want to talk.”

“SO TALK!”

“Not here.” Colin tilted his head back and held his nose. “Dinner. Tomorrow night.”

Lucas laughed. “You’re fucking insane. She’s not going to have dinner with you.”

“If she doesn’t, I’ll head straight to the police and make a statement of how you assaulted me for no reason.”

I closed my eyes. The fucking prick had set us up. “Fine,” I sighed. “I’ll have dinner with you tomorrow night, here, in the hotel restaurant. You can talk and then you can leave.”

He ran a bloodstained hand through his hair and walked by me, his expression devilishly conceited. “Wear something nice.”

Josh’s arm’s locked tighter as Lucas once again scrambled to get to him, and when Colin had left the corridor, I turned to Lucas. “Will you just stop!”

His seething eyes found mine, and they softened, almost sad.

“Do you even know what you’ve done?”

“What I’ve done?” He shrugged Josh away.

“YES! Colin has the power to destroy Wild Nights, and you just gave him perfect ammunition.”

I paced the corridor, the enormity of the situation hitting me. “This is why I didn’t want you to know about him, didn’t want you to get too close.”

He reached for me. “Helena—”

“No. Just … just get cleaned up. I’ll see you all tomorrow.”

Unable to look any of them in the eye because I was horrified at what they’d all just witnessed, I turned around and headed for my room.

* * *

I’d spentthe past hourand a half in the shower, slumped to the ground, a bottle of red wine within an arm’s length. From the moment I’d left the guys standing in the corridor, I’d felt putrid and needed to cleanse Colin from my body and mind — the mind proving a harder task.

How could I have been so stupid? How could I have expected to visit Cairns and not see him? And now he knew Lucas and I were close. He knew Wild Nights meant more to me than just a business acquisition. And then there was Jason.No. No, no, no. Absolutely not.

There was no way in hell I’d let him see our son. He’d forgone that right when he threatened Jason’s life. If he wanted to fuck around with my head and my career, fine. I’d pack up, move to Perth, … sell the revue if I had to. But I sure as shit would not let him fuck around with my boy.

Over my dead body.

Prying my aching legs from the tiled floor, I stood up, grabbed my bottle of wine, and wrapped a towel around my body before heading into my bedroom. On the bed, my phone was lit up like a Christmas tree and buzzing around the mattress. I picked it up to see the name Dimps together with five missed calls … from Dimps.

“Hello?”

“Where are you?”