Page 125 of Shattered Veil
“What in the hell is this?” He shoves the old note I wrote and left for Ella under my nose.
My scrawling mess speaks to how out of my mind I was that night:
Butterfly, I’ll pay you another twenty grand to suck my cock again -Balor.
“Dad, I can explain.” Ella steps in front of me.
“Explain how this man mistook you for a whore and paid you all this money?” He points to all the cash on my floor. “What else did you do to my daughter that you paid so much money?”
“Dad!” Ella shouts. “Talk to me. I’m right here. I’m an adult. I led Balor to believe I was an...escort.”
“And it was not hard to convince him since that is who hefucks, Ella.”
I go rigid at how easily Corvin spills my kink. The mastermind hacker knows me inside and out.
At least my sexual preferences were only escorts.Were. I’m done with all that.
But this mess with Covin... I need to clear it up immediately.
“I know, Dad,” Ella keeps talking. “He was just a handsome stranger on a plane. I wanted to live out a fantasy. After so many months, I wanted to feel something. Something that didn’t terrify me.”
“Exactly,”Corvin snaps through clenched teeth. “After what you’d been through with Wesley, how could you be so stupid?”
Snow’s anger and insults might be rooted in parentalterror, butno onespeaks to my woman like that.
“Donotcall her stupid or any other derogatory name. It will be the last thing your tongue ever does. Got it, Snow?” I seethe and claim her hand. “I know exactly what she’s been through. And now that it’s out in the open, we’re going to have a conversation about that motherfucker and how we punish him. Somethingyoushould have done.” I roughly poke him in the chest. “I caught him watching her at school.”
“What?” Ella shrieks.
“School? What school?” Corvin cries out.
“Dad, I took that part-time job at Fredricks. Iwantto teach. Not be a personal assistant.”
“He was school resource officer there. That is how he and Ella met,” Snow says, seething at me.
Rage heats my blood that Ella didn’t tell me this, that she let me walk into that fury without warning.
“And why didn’t you do anything about him?” I yell at Snow.
Ella steps between us. “Stop. Both of you. I love...” Her breath staggers. “You’re the most important men in my life, and I know you both want me safe. Can we please discuss this without blame?”
“No problem.” I kiss her forehead, “You’re mine now. I will handle Brennan.”
“I... I saw him one day at school, too,” Ella confesses. “That was it. Once. Before break. I should have told you.” She clears her throat. “Balor, I worry he can make trouble for you. For your family.”
“Myfamilycan handle it.” I level a gaze at Corvin, reminding him who he’s fucking with.
“None of this changes the fact that you slept with my daughter, who I asked you to hire and protect,” Snow keeps fighting me. “You breached my trust.”
“I will apologize for any perceived trust you think I’vebroken,” I argue. “But Ella is an adult. This didn’t happen again right away. What happened between us originally was two consenting adults in one moment of time. I admit, there was a miscommunication about who she was. Once it all came to light, I put my feelings aside to give her a job, like you asked.”
“Dad...” Ella breaks in. “I’m crazy about Balor. He’s everything I want in a man.”
When her eyes drift to me with a quivering lip, I know she’s about to pour gasoline on this fire...
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
Ella