Prima by Alta Hensley & Maggie Ryan

Author:Alta Hensley & Maggie Ryan [Hensley, Alta]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-11-22T16:00:00+00:00

18

Alek

I was ready to find the bastard and teach Nikolai Kosloff a lesson or two of his own. Like how any man who lifted a hand in anger against a woman was a goddamned coward and one who raped a woman — well, let’s just say I felt a burning desire to make sure he’d no longer own any equipment to even make that a fucking possibility. I wanted to… I raged inside, and yet I knew the woman seated on my lap was as fragile as the crystal globe I could see sitting in a place of honor on my mantel. There was a small figurine of a ballerina inside that globe, protected by the glass surrounding it, and I had to be satisfied my job was to protect Clara from the memories that had haunted her for years.

“Why didn’t you ever tell the media the truth?” I asked. “Why have you always allowed yourself to be abused? If people understood your reasoning behind it, they’d be much more willing to forgive you. You made a mistake. People understand that. You were in pain from watching your grandmother’s health begin to deteriorate. You grew addicted to drugs and drank too much. There are valid reasons for what you did. Not right, but at least reasons some people would understand and maybe relate to. We all would do whatever it took to take care of a loved one.”

Clara took a moment as if to seriously consider my words and then shook her head. “Why did I never try to defend myself? Why didn’t Lara ever come forward and talk about what really happened that night? I suppose because neither of us thought we’d be believed. I was barely twenty, and Nikolai was not only twice my age, he had so much power. I became used to hearing I was nothing more than a jealous, conniving bitch, to being told dancing with the devil would send me straight to where I belonged… Hell. And, to be honest, a lot of it had to do with the fact I knew I deserved their disgust and all that came with it.”

“You didn’t deserve all of that, Clara. A great number of the media would have printed shit, that’s true, but there are still honest journalists out there. Men like Baker.” I paused and shook my head. “Did you know his editor informed him the interview he did with you wasn’t worth the paper it was written on because there was no real ‘dirt’ in it?”

She shook her head. “No. I didn’t even know when it was supposed to come out. To be honest, when I saw you get out of your car in your sexy suit, my first thought was you’d read the story and had come to see what else you might get.”

“Sexy, huh?” I said, unable to keep from grinning though the story she’d shared was as far from amusing as one could get. Still, the words had begun to cut

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