Page 15 of It Destroys Me
But the only thing standing between Bolton and Astrid’s demise was me.
Nothing else.
If I stepped aside, he might kill her. “He’d understand.”
When Bolton realized my decision was final, the blood lust burned like a forest fire. No amount of leverage over me would ever get her back, not while I continued to draw breath. He was a smart man, so he’d tried to go around me rather than through me, but that plan had backfired in his face.
Now, he had no other choice but to go through me.
“May the best man win, Bolton.” There was no longer a choice for either of us. One of us had to die. Would it be a bomb in broad daylight? Would it be a knife to the throat in the middle of the night?
We were about to find out.
It was almost five in the morning when I got home. The sky was tinted blue because of the approaching sun, far over the horizon, inching slowly toward dawn. My butler was dead asleep and didn’t greet me. Probably got tired of waiting for me around midnight.
I headed upstairs and walked into my bedroom, the fatigue like weights behind my eyes. I pulled my shirt over my head as I moved through the sitting room, leaving the t-shirt on the back of the couch to be magically picked up later.
I entered my dark bedroom and slipped the watch off my wrist and left it on the dresser. I left my gun beside it, along with the knife kept hidden from sight in my jeans. The belt was next and then the shoes were kicked off, the jeans at the end.
I was so tired I didn’t notice that someone was already in my bed.
She stirred at my approach, giving a quiet gasp in fright, like I was the intruder in her bedroom.
I set my phone on the nightstand as I looked at her, too tired to ask all the questions that came to mind. She always stayed in her bedroom unless I explicitly invited her here. This was my space. Not open to the public.
“I—I had a nightmare. I came in here to see if you were home, but you weren’t.”
“So, you decided to stay?” I couldn’t keep the derision out of my tone. “In my private room?”
The sleepy haze slowly passed as she absorbed my anger. She sat up, wearing an oversized pink shirt. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think you would mind.”
“I do mind. I don’t barge into your room, so don’t barge into mine.”
“I didn’t go through your things. I just got in bed?—”
“I don’t give a shit,” I snapped. “Did I say you were free to come and go? I said I would tell you if I wanted you gone, so I’m telling you now. Entry into my personal space is only allowed with permission.” I didn’t know why I was being such an asshole right now. The sight of her waiting in my bed should turn me on, not piss me the fuck off.
Shocked by my outburst, she took a second to get out of the bed. “You let me stay in here before. Let me paint. Let me sleep in. Let me stay for days at a time?—”
“Different circumstances.”
A fiery rage replaced her meek sleepiness. “Under these circumstances, you said you would try, but you’re doing the exact opposite of trying. You’re trying to sabotage this before we’ve even had a chance. Congratulations—it’s working.” She turned and stormed out of my bedroom barefoot, with the bottom part of her ass showing where her shirt ended.
I gave a quiet sigh, pissed at what, I didn’t know. Her. Me. Everything.
Mostly me. “Astrid.”
The door slammed shut, and she was gone.
I stood there beside the bed, looking at the rumpled sheets from where she’d slept. I used to share it with someone else, but just for six weeks. She’d somehow claimed the room as her own with just her spirit and her smell. A vase of fresh flowers was always on her nightstand. She took off her wedding ring every night before she went to sleep and left it in a little stone bowl next to the flowers.
The beauty of the room had changed with a beeping monitor and needles in her skin. A full-time nurse who made her comfortable. The pain at the end had been unbearable, so they’d pushed all the drugs they could so she could die in comfort.
I’d watched her take her last breath…and felt her hand go limp in mine.
It was noon when I knocked on Astrid’s door.
I would have normally slept until the late afternoon, but the shitshow from last night had made me wake up far earlier than usual.