Page 69 of Ruined

“Aldrich isn’t someone I test when it comes to his threats,” I said, trying to keep my answer brief but neutral. I didn’t want to scare her any more than she already was. “But I won’t let anything happen to you.”

“What did he mean, with Bella?” she asked.

I stared at her, wanting to take the pain away. To lie to her would soothe her nerves, but Haley deserved the truth.

“He made a bet that she would leave me for him,” I said.

“A bet?” Her focus fell to her lap, looking at her empty hands. “And he won, didn’t he?”

“Isa was his first wife.”

“Bella.”

She moved slowly, her body inching away from mine. As if I was a part of the cruelty.

And I was. I hated myself for it.

“Do you think he…” She paused, her eyes frantic once again. “Did he kill them? Isa? And his second wife?”

I kept a calm expression. I needed to figure out a way to soothe Haley. This discussion wasn’t helping. But I had to answer her first.

“His wives died mysteriously,” I said. “You knew that.”

“That sickness. I remember thinking it was rare for someone to die from something like that. Eating that food. How Aldrich hadn’t gotten sick like them at all. Not even hospitalized.”

Her mind was working overtime. Rapidly connecting facts. It wouldn’t take long before she realized why I was there.

“Maybe I could stay with you, for a while?” Then she shook her head. “No. I couldn’t do that.”

“You could,” I said. But she shook her head frantically.

“No, I can’t. I can’t, Lucas. Not even if I wanted to.”

That last part hurt. A dull ache grew in my chest. She didn’t want to. She felt safer here, of all fucking places. My mind was raging and I needed to recenter myself, to focus on what needed to be said.

Money won’t buy you love. But it will buy you a whore.

Those words haunted me. The only reason Haley had given me a second glance was because I paid her to give me that glance. For all I knew, acting like she had feelings for me could have been another way to get to me, to use her soul to ensnare my heart and crush it, squeezing out all of the power I had.

If I didn’t have money, did I have anything worth a damn to give Haley?

“You don’t think I’m a real whore, do you?” she said. “You called me a whore. But you said I wasyourwhore. That was different somehow.”

We were thinking over those same words from Aldrich.

Her question irritated me. I thought we had gotten past this. “I paid for your time. Then we happened to have sex.” There was still all of this pent up shame she was dealing with when it came to sex and work, but we didn’t have time to go over what each word meant. “Who cares if someone pays for sex? If a person decides to sell their body?” I threw up a hand. “That’s a decision to work. Nothing more.”

She blinked up at me, sudden clarity washing over her. I hadn’t answered her question, but she took the implications to heart.

She looked down at her lap again. “At least we know where we stand,” she said.

I didn’t correct her. We both knew that I shouldn’t trust her actions, just like she shouldn’t trust mine.