Page 118 of The Husband Contract

“What exactly do you expect to happen here today?” I demand. I tower over him as he looks up at me.

“I don’t know. I figure maybe Willow would feel like she owes it to me to?—”

“Towhat?” I say, voice dripping with venom. “Be in a relationship with you? Sleep with you?”

“What do you care?” he says. “Like, fuck off. This is my girl.”

“She is not your girl and never will be.” Ice drips off of my tongue. “That is my wife and if you continue to speak to her with disrespect, I will have to show you how a man protects his woman.”

“How can she be your wife, when she told me she wanted to be my girl?” I’m about to grab a hold of him, when Willow starts screaming.

“I’m not your girl, Clark!” she screams. “How many times do I have to tell you I’m not even interested in you?”

“Do you know how much money I have?”

“I don’t care how much money you have!” she shouts. “I don’t care how much money either of you have! I’ve never been about money. Yeah, money makes the world go round and it would make my life easier, but I don’t get into relationships for that reason. I want you both to leave.”

“Willow, I—” I start, panic rising up inside me.

“I don’t care, Sebastian. I’m tired. I’m fed up. Let Charlotte do whatever she wants. I’ll find a way. Brielle, Katherine, and I—we can all get other jobs.”

“But you want to open your own bed and breakfast. You want to?—”

“And maybe one day it will happen, but right now all I care about is getting both of you out of my life.”

She walks over to Clark Kent. “I want you to leave me alone. I don’t know what happened between you and my cousin, but I have no interest in you. I don’t care about you. I don’t care about your money. Stop messaging me.”

“But what about the fact that I told people I’m going to have a date to a very special luncheon next week?”

“Then you need to get online and find another one. Please leave.”

He stands there, huffing. “This isn’t over.”

I grab hold of his arm and squeeze tight.

“That hurts,” he says, as he grimaces.

I squeeze harder. I’ll show him what real pain looks and feels like.

“Ow!”

“You listen to me, Benjamin Theodore Cornelius Montague III. I will ruin you and not just you. I will ruin your company. You ever come and harass Willow again in any way—in person, on the phone, via text—or you sendanyone, you’re done. If I even get a whiff of you Googling her, you’re fucking done.”

He blinks up at me and swallows hard. “You’re bluffing. You?—”

“I love that woman,” I say, looking back at her. Her face is white. “I would do anything for her, and when I say anything, I mean anything. I would rot in a jail cell for murder if I had to.” He swallows hard. I let him go and push him back. “Now, get out of here.”

“But what about Louisa and Charlotte and the money they stole?”

“Don’t worry,” I say. “I’ll make sure they get their just desserts. But you need to let it go.”

“Fine,” he grumbles. “I don’t even care.” He looks over at Willow. “You weren’t even that hot anyway.”

We watch as he leaves the hotel. She’s shaking.

“Are you okay?” I ask as I stand next to her.

She nods slowly. “You don’t have to do that. I can take care of myself.”