Page 51 of Tangled Roses
Walter smiles. “Of course. I will ask Marsha herself to arrange our connection.”
Arman shrugs and glances past him at another man standing nearby and says politely, “Excuse me, Walter. I must have a word with Sam.”
As we walk away, I snarl, “You fucking bastard. How dare you?”
He tightens his grip on my hand. “Relax. It was done for a good reason.”
“What? To embarrass me, humiliate me even. Well, fuck you, Arman. I don’t want to play your games anymore.”
He spins me around so I am flush against his chest and anchors me to his body with a strong arm around my waist and whispers huskily, “You must trust me, Ellie. There is a reason for this and is the fastest way to get us the truth. Play along. It’s in your best interests.”
He pulls away and tugs me with him to the man he called Sam, who stares with interest as we approach.
“Good evening, Sam.” Arman says coolly and Sam nods.
“Likewise. I heard about your visit to Eglantine House. It was a successful one, I hope.”
“Most successful. Thank you.”
I am quivering with rage but say nothing at all because the way he has made me feel is inexcusable.
As the men talk, I allow my attention to wander and I catch the eye of a glamorous woman who is staring at me with daggers in her eyes. I feel uncomfortable and look away but when I glance back she is still staring, which unnerves me a little.
I notice she is heading our way and I don’t know why my heart is thumping so hard as she joins us and smiles at Arman.
“Arman Romanov. I heard you were in town.”
She blanks me and smiles at Sam. “Mr. Richards. It’s lovely to see you again. My father is here somewhere.”
“I’ll go and find him. Excuse me, Arman, I’ll look forward to our meeting tomorrow.”
As Sam heads off, he nods respectfully to me and Arman says coolly, “Estelle. You’re looking good.”
“Same, but then again, you always did scrub up well, Arman.”
She blanks me, despite the fact he is holding my hand even tighter and to be completely honest, I am bored with it already and say abruptly, “Excuse me. I see, um, a friend. I’ll catch you both later.”
Arman tightens his grip. “I’ll come with you.”
“No.” I wrench my fingers from his grasp and smile at Estelle. “It was nice to nearly meet you, um, Estelle. Maybe next time you will actually acknowledge I am here. Enjoy.”
I move away because I am so done with this shit. With this world and with the entire lot of them and as I head at speed toward the exit, I don’t have a clue where I’m even going.
CHAPTER 30
ARMAN
Fuck! I watch Ellie leave with tears in her eyes and I’m the man responsible for that. I made her feel worthless. I may as well have called her a whore, and yet it was for a very good reason. I want everyone to think she’s an escort from Burning Roses because it makes things easier for me and hides her real identity. We can be seen together in public and nobody would question our relationship.
My enemies would believe she is nothing to me and not even consider her at all.
Now I’m stuck with Estelle and it would look suspicious if I ran after her, so I do the next best thing and say politely, “Excuse me while I answer this text.”
“It’s always business with you, honey.” She purrs as she flutters her lashes in my direction.
I conceal my frown as I dash off a text to Luka and resign myself to fending off a woman who believes she has ownership of my body.
I dated her the last time I was in town and she was a lousy fuck. All she cared about was that I didn’t mess up her hair and lay there like a plank of wood while I did all the work. She is boring to talk to and even more boring to fuck and yet she considers she has a diamond encrusted pussy to match her daddy’s billions that she lives off.