‘I figured out that I loved you.’

‘You already knew that you loved me,’ she said, hooking her hands onto a shelf behind her. ‘You had already married me.’

‘Yeah, but I hadn’t lost you yet. I only married you so that he couldn’t.’ At least at the time, that was what Dax told himself, Ivy would never have married him if she hadn’t been sure that he reciprocated her feelings.

Dax turned to leave, but she sprang forward to hold him back. ‘You went to that midnight meeting, you told me that you did.’

‘Yeah,’ he said.

‘What happened?’

‘I told them to go to hell, told them that I wanted to be with you and that I didn’t care about them anymore.’

‘What did they say to you?’ she asked. His countenance betrayed that there was something he didn’t want to share, he got irritated, and his attention went everywhere except to her. ‘Please, tell me, it will sound better coming from you, whatever it is, I’d rather know. Was it about me? Were they disrespectful? Do you think that you’re protecting me?’

‘I am protecting you,’ he said. ‘You know everything that you need to know.’

Removing her hand from his arm, Dax continued out into the bedroom, and she trailed after him. ‘Just like that,’ she said. ‘You expect me to just accept that?’

‘I expect you to keep your mouth shut. I don’t answer to you.’

‘Oh, so you’re going to get defensive and start snapping at me? Yeah, that really tells me that nothing happened. Dax, we’re going over there tonight, and I don’t know what’s going to happen when we get there.’

‘It’s a party,’ Dax said, taking his phone and his wallet from the nightstand to stuff them into his jeans pockets. ‘There will be music and dancing and food, it’s a fucking party.’

‘This might be easy for you, but I am going back to a place that… the last time I was there they were fitting me for a wedding dress, remember? I was locked in a room and told that I was expected to be part of the family, to be Trystan’s wife. Has all of that slipped your mind?’

‘You’re not in danger when I’m around,’ he said.

‘Really? Because I seem to remember you telling me that you’d take care of everything and we ended up hightailing it out of there on your motorcycle, hoping that no one would catch us. You took me to Vegas and married me because you were too scared to stand up to Mauri.’

‘Except I’ve done it now,’ he said, heading for the door. ‘I’m going out.’

‘What about the party?’

‘It’s not for a few hours. I’m going to the bar to talk to Serg. I’ll pick you up at nine.’

‘Nine,’ she muttered because he was already storming out, slamming the front door behind him in the process.

Going back to the Stark mansion did set her on edge. This wasn’t easy for either of them, but being married to a man as masculine as Dax meant he wasn’t the type to sit and talk about his feelings. She didn’t need his reassurances, what Ivy needed were the facts. Something had happened at that midnight meeting, and it was something he’d always hidden from her.

Dax was a straightforward guy under normal circumstances. When he wanted something, he took it or found a way to get it. Ivy had been living the easy life with him back east, they went to work, came home, enjoyed each other, and then did it all over again the next day.

When it came to his upbringing, or their day-to-day lives, Dax had no trouble sharing with her. What had happened at the midnight meeting was the only thing he refused to talk to her about.

The meeting must have been difficult for him, Dax went into the mansion to explain her conspicuous absence and he must have assumed that Mauri would accept his explanations. Except Mauri was a master manipulator, he’d managed once to convince Dax that the relationship was a sham and that Ivy had used Dax to ensure her own safety.

Regardless of that, Dax had let her walk away alone, so he hadn’t gone to the midnight meeting expecting to cut ties with the Starks. If he had, then they could have arranged to meet up somewhere safe after it instead of going their separate ways.

Something went on that night and she was completely in the dark as to what it was.

Right on time, Dax came back to the apartment at nine o’clock, and although she smelled liquor on him, Ivy didn’t begrudge him needing the courage. He took a shower and she was ready by the time he emerged, dressed, from the bathroom.

Seeing him in a suit made her smile. ‘What are you smiling at?’ he asked as she put in his cufflinks for him.

‘You’re not usually so put together,’ she said. ‘Seeing you like this reminds me of Vegas.’

‘When we got married I was wearing jeans.’

‘Not then; the night we met,’ she said, finding his eyes. ‘You were dressed up that night, sitting in the corner of that couch, you kept looking at me.’

‘You were the one who couldn’t take your eyes off me, babygirl,’ he said, resting his fingers around her hips.

‘You weren’t like any of them,’ she murmured, stroking down his arms. ‘They were all drunk idiots, but you… I could tell that you didn’t want to be there. That your purpose wasn’t to get drunk and laid like Trystan’s.’

‘I used to babysit him all the time, parties like that were a normal affair for him.’

‘And how many other hotel employees did he violate?’

His intense gaze exuded a pain when she asked that question. ‘I was in deep. You were right when you said I was desensitised to what they had me doing. Trystan’s a jerk, and I promise you that you’ll never be in that position again. I won’t let any man harm you, I promise you, babygirl.’

‘I know,’ she said, levering up to kiss him then wiping the gloss residue from his lips.

At nine fifteen, a limo, sent by Mauri, pulled up outside their apartment. It remained parked outside until they went down about twenty minutes later. Neither said much in the back of the car, Dax poured her a flute of champagne, but he didn’t have anything to drink himself. He probably assumed she’d need some courage too, but she didn’t really want any alcohol, still, she sipped it throughout the trip.

By the time they drove through the open Stark gates, Ivy had finished about half of her drink, but she didn’t mind putting it aside when Dax took her hand and helped her out of the limo.

The mansion was as imposing as it had been the last time she was here. But with the glittering white lights around the driveway and marking the entrance, it did seem warmer than it had when she was imprisoned here. During that time, she hadn’t seen very much of the interior.

Once they were inside, she was given another glass of champagne in the entrance foyer, while Dax refused a drink. There were plenty of people milling around, but Dax didn’t wait to speak to anyone. Instead of being taken up the stairs, as she was the last time she was here, Dax took her down a corridor and into a grand double-storey space filled with people.

Women wore beautiful gowns and glittering jewels that drew her eye. These people wanted to be admired, they wanted to be respected and revered, but Ivy felt no sense of wonder.

Ensconcing themselves in a far corner, they separated themselves from everyone else. Ivy tightened her grip on Dax’s hand to get his attention. ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.

‘I want to go home.’

She wasn’t even sure where home was, she had started to think of her home as the man as opposed to any specific location. Dax had told her that they belonged next to each other, and that was right, but this was the enemy lair, so relaxing here was nigh on impossible.

‘We just have to stay long enough to be seen,’ Dax said.

Turning to observe the room behind them, his frown remained static. He kept her back to the wall to shelter her from the false smiles and handshakes which accompanied the string quartet in the opposite corner.

This was a crazy scenario, the Starks were crime bosses, meaning that everyone else in the room was either a criminal or turned a blind eye to the glaring fact that everything here was bought with dirty money. Did these people know how Maurice Stark made his fortune? Or did they believe that the companies built in the Stark name to launder drug money were legitimate?