Free Ultimate Sins by Lora Leigh Page B

before she had been released from the hospital after the twenty-four hours of observation, and an intense interrogation by the FBI, Sheriff Archer Tobias, and the Callahans’ lawyer Lucas Grace several weeks before, reporters had begun showing up.
    She’d had to turn her phones off. She knew better than to answer the door; no one was out there but reporters demanding a statement.
    â€œI wish they would just go away,” she burst out, pushing her hands through her hair before glaring back at him. “I hate having all the windows so tightly covered all the time.”
    â€œThey need their pound of flesh,” he told her. “But they’ll go away. Eventually.”
    She stared back at him angrily. “That’s easy for you to say. It’s not your pound of flesh they’re trying to strip off.”
    Without waiting for another one of his asinine comments, Amelia turned and stalked to the kitchen.
    â€œThat’s very true,” he agreed as he followed her. “But have no fear, sweetheart. Until I’ve taken what I want of your pretty little body, I promise not to allow anyone else to take what they want.”
    Amelia was certain she couldn’t have heard him correctly.
    She turned slowly and stared back at him. “What did you just say to me?”
    She hated the almost smile he gave her. That tight curve of his lips. There was no softness there, and no mercy.
    â€œYou heard me,” he told her. “You’re mine first. Until I’m finished with you, then no one else can have any part of that lush little body.” Leaning against the counter, Crowe crossed his arms over his chest and arched his brows with an arrogance that had her teeth gritting.
    â€œI don’t deserve this attitude or your smart-assed remarks.” And she didn’t think she could bear the hurtful, unemotional quality of them, either.
    He laughed, a merciless, hollow sound. “Logan, Rafe, and I didn’t deserve to be orphans, disowned and torn from our families. My sister didn’t deserve a life of emotional isolation, and every lover any of us had didn’t deserve to be raped and murdered. And I’ll be damned, but I didn’t deserve the nightmares I had nightly that one of us would fuck up, and you’d be next.”
    Before she could register the fact that he had moved, his hands were gripping her shoulders, his voice rasping furiously, his eyes blazing more brilliantly than ever.
    He wasn’t cold any longer, but now she felt as if her heart were suddenly in danger from the man standing in front of her.
    â€œDo you think I didn’t have nightmares, too?” Her voice broke on a sob, the memories of her haunting fears rushing over her. “But I wasn’t afraid for myself, Crowe.” She had to fight back the tears that would have fallen. “I was terrified you would disappear as Stoner did. That would have destroyed me.”
    As quickly as he had grabbed her, Crowe released her at the mention of her ex-husband.
    â€œYou think Wayne is the reason Stoner left you?” He turned back to her, his gaze suddenly shuttered, his face brooding.
    Did she think Wayne had been behind it?
    Amelia would have laughed at the question if the situation had been less nerve racking.
    She knew he had been behind it. “After he left, Wayne came to my room and assured me he had taken care of all of it,” she remembered bitterly. And she couldn’t help but feel the smallest measure of gratitude to the bastard for that. She was certain Wayne hadn’t meant to be merciful, but that one time—
    Crowe laughed, a hard, bitter sound that had her flinching. “Hell, Amelia. Did you really care that much for him?”
    â€œI hated him.” The sharp exclamation surprised him. “He was a bastard who deserved to be castrated and imprisoned—”
    â€œHe was a disease that needed to be eradicated. Trust me, Amelia, all he deserved