make me a better man.”
Atlas regarded her stonily as she jerked a bit at that, though something in him...eased, almost. He’d spent all those years fuming, seething, plotting. He’d discarded more byzantine, labyrinthine plots than he cared to recall. That was what life in prison did to a man. It was fertile ground for grudges, the deeper, the better. But he’d never been entirely sure he’d get the opportunity to put all of this into motion.
“I won’t lie to you, Lexi. I expected this to be harder.”
“Your return?”
He watched, fascinated despite himself, as she pressed her lips together. As if they were dry. Or she was nervous. And Atlas was a man who had gone without female companionship for longer than he ever would have believed possible, before. No matter what else happened, he was still a man.
He could think of several ways to wet those lips.
But that was getting ahead of himself.
“I don’t expect you to believe this,” Lexi was saying with an intense earnestness that made him feel almost...restless. “But everyone feels terrible. My uncle. My cousins. All of us. Me especially. If I could change what happened, you have to believe I would.”
“You’re right,” Atlas murmured. He waited for that faint bit of hope to kindle in her gaze, because he was nothing if not the monster they’d made him. “I don’t believe it.”
And really, she was too easy. He could read her too well. He saw the way she drooped, then collected herself. He watched her straighten again, then twist her hands together again. Harder this time.
“I know why you came here,” she said after a moment. Quietly. “I expect your hatred, Atlas. I know I earned it.”
“Aren’t you the perfect little martyr?” When she shook a bit at that, he felt his mouth curve. “But it’s not going to be that easy, Lexi. Nothing about this is going to be easy at all. If you come to a place of peace with that now, perhaps you will find this all less distressing.” He shrugged. “Or perhaps not.”
She looked panicked, but to her credit, she didn’t move. She didn’t swoon or scream or do any of the things Philippa would have done. No tantrums, no drama.
But then, Lexi had never been about theatrics.
That was precisely why she’d been such an effective witness for the prosecution, all starchy and matter-of-fact until she’d turned the knife in him, one glassy-eyed half sob at a time.
And what was wrong with him that he was tempted to forget that? For even a moment? He felt no connection to this woman. He couldn’t. She was a pawn, nothing more.
It irritated him that he seemed to need reminding of that fact.
“What exactly is to come?” she asked, her voice hardly more than a breath and her eyes much too big in her face.
“I’m so glad you asked.” He stood where he was, watching her. Studying her. Then he crooked a finger, and liked it a little too much when she jolted, as if he’d shot her through with lightning when he wasn’t even touching her. Yet. “Come here.”
She swayed on her feet and he was bastard enough to enjoy it. Hell, he more than enjoyed it. He figured it was as close as Lexi ever got to a full-on faint, and it was only a drop in the bucket next to the pain he owed her.
She swallowed, hard. He watched her throat move and braced himself for a spate of complaints. Or excuses. Anything to avoid what was coming.
But she didn’t say anything. She didn’t argue or dawdle. She straightened that blouse of hers that was already precise to a near military level, and then she stepped out from behind her desk.
“Closer,” Atlas ordered her when she only rounded the desk and stopped, leaving several feet between them.
Another hard, audible swallow. He could see her terror beat in her neck. He could see the flushed state of her skin. He could see fear and apprehension in her gaze, and the truth was, it was better than he’d imagined.
And God knew, he’d imagined this moment again and again and again. He’d imagined it so many times it was as if it had already happened. As if it was set in stone and made memory and prophecy at once.
She took one step. Then another.
“Here,” Atlas said, gruff and cruel. And nodded his head to a spot on the floor about one inch in front of him.
And she surprised him yet again. There was no denying the uneasiness in her gaze, her expression. But she didn’t carry on about it. She simply stepped forward, putting herself exactly where he’d indicated she should go.
Then he got to watch her tip her head back, way back, so she could hold his gaze with hers. And they could both spend a little moment or two recalling how much bigger and taller and more dangerous he was than she could ever dream of becoming.
He, at least, enjoyed the hell out of it.
“I think we can both agree that you owe me, can we not?” he asked.
It wasn’t really a question. He didn’t think she would confuse it for one, and he wasn’t disappointed.
Her nod was jerky. “I wish I could change the past, but I can’t.”
“Indeed, you cannot. You cannot change one moment of the past eleven years.”
“Atlas...”
He ignored her. “Your uncle has invited me to dinner tonight up at the manor house,” he told her. “Perhaps you already know this.”
“I know that was his intention, yes.”
“Your uncle believes that breaking bread with me rather than squabbling in a boardroom or court of law will make this all go away.” He could tell exactly how cruel his smile was by the way her brown eyes widened at the sight of it. “It won’t.”
“I don’t think anyone expects any of this to go away.”
“Wonderful. Then no one will be surprised by anything that happens now, I’m sure.”
“Atlas. Please. No one meant to hurt you. You have to believe that.”
It was an impassioned plea. He thought she even believed it. But he only shook his head at her.
“Let me tell you what I believe, Lexi. I believe that you were a teenager. That you saw something you didn’t understand and put a spin on it that made sense to you. On some level, I don’t even blame you for it. You were little more than a child, and of all the vultures and liars in this family, Philippa was at least the most genuine. In that I suspect she actually liked you.”
She sucked in a breath, ragged and sharp at once. “They’re my family. They all like me.”
But he doubted even she thought that sounded convincing.
His mouth twisted into something as hard as it was sardonic. “Tell yourself those lies if you must. I cannot stop you. But do not tell them to me.”
“You
