Miller accepts my overpowering clinch and holds on just as tightly, maybe even tighter. My rib cage is under incredible pressure, jeopardising my breathing, but I couldn’t care less. I’m never letting go. ‘I love you, too,’ he whispers, sinking his face firmly into my neck. ‘So much, Olivia.’
My eyes close and all of the anxiety from the horror scene falls away under his thing. ‘I wanted to see you do it,’ I admit, reasonably or not. I feel like I need that part of the puzzle. Or maybe I just need to be sure he really did kill that wicked arsehole.
‘Charlie has it.’ He doesn’t ease up on his hold, which is fine because I don’t want him to. He could squeeze even harder and I wouldn’t complain.
My mind settles, allowing me to think clearer. ‘He’ll take it to the police.’
Miller nods a little into my neck. ‘If I don’t play ball, then yes.’
‘And you’re not going to play ball, are you?’
‘I’m not doing it, Olivia. Not to you. I couldn’t live with myself.’
‘But you could live with blood on your hands?’
‘Yes.’ His answer is swift and decisive before he wrestles me from his arms and gazes down at me. ‘Because the alternative is your blood on my hands.’ I lose my breath but Miller continues, saving me the trouble of finding any words. There aren’t any. And I know now, one hundred per cent, that there’s nothing I can do to stop Miller from killing Charlie. ‘I have no remorse for what I did to that man. I’ll have even less for Charlie. But I would never forgive myself if any harm came to you, Olivia.’
My eyes clench in pain at his honest words and I finally allow myself to take some time and evaluate what they did to him. He was young in the video. Amid all the other shit this poor man has endured, when did that happen? How many times did it happen before he flipped? Did Charlie organise it? Undoubtedly. And now he wants to subject him to some Russian woman who wants to degrade him again. Never.
‘I need to get that,’ Miller says as the phone rings. He lifts me from my feet and carries me out of the studio into the kitchen. He doesn’t release me to take the call, instead holding me just as tightly with one arm and answering his phone with the other. ‘Hart,’ he greets shortly, resting his bum on the table and dropping me to my feet between his thighs. I’m still stuck to his front, but he doesn’t complain or ask for privacy.
‘Is she there?’ William’s irritated tone is perfectly clear to me and likely to be, considering my cheek is welded to one side of Miller’s face and his phone to the other.
‘She’s here.’
‘I just took a call,’ William tells Miller. He sounds hesitant.
‘From?’
‘Charlie.’ Just the mere mention of his name sets my panic off again. Why is he calling William? They’re archenemies.
‘So suffice it to say he knows for sure that I’m sleeping with the enemy?’ There’s a touch of irony tickling the corners of Miller’s question.
‘Hart, he has copies of the footage.’
My heart slows down. I feel it, and I know Miller feels it, too, because he clings on that little bit tighter. ‘Let me guess – if anything happens to Charlie,’ Miller says quietly, ‘there are two people with instructions on how to find the copies and what to do with them.’
There’s a long pause, and I see William in my imagination rubbing stressed circles into his grey temples. ‘How’d you know?’
‘Sophia told me. And she told me she destroyed all the footage.’
The shocked gasp that travels down the line cools my skin. ‘No.’ William sounds almost defensive in his counter. ‘And you believe her?’
‘Yes.’
‘Miller,’ William goes on carefully, using his Christian name for a change. ‘Charlie is untouchable.’
‘You almost sound like you don’t want me to kill him.’
‘Fuck.’ William heaves out a sigh.
‘Goodbye.’ Miller tosses his phone onto the table without care or attention and places his arm around me.
‘William knows,’ I mumble into his neck, only just comprehending the last few moments’ conversation. ‘He knows what’s in that footage?’
‘I guess he suspected. Charlie has only confirmed it. There have always been rumours about a night at the Temple that resulted in the death of a man by my hand, but that’s all it was. No one knew the circumstances and no one knew if it was true. It’s like the best-kept secret of the London underworld.’
Miller wrestles with me a little, encouraging me away from him. We’ve been stuck together so hard and for so long, it feels like he’s ripping a plaster slowly off my naked skin. I hiss a little, then grumble my protest, but he just smiles fondly. I have no idea what there is to smile about. Reaching up timidly, he gently strokes across my forehead, moving into my hair, pulling it away from my face. ‘I’m amazed you’ve still not turned to dust, sweet girl.’
I smile a little, searching his face. ‘I’m amazed you’re resting your naked bum on your dinner table.’
He reins in his smile, trying to scowl. ‘My table couldn’t be any more polluted than it already is, thanks to my beautiful girlfriend.’ He stops and seems to consider something for a moment. ‘Are you still my girlfriend?’
Albeit insanely inappropriate, I can’t help smiling brightly at my beautiful love. ‘Are you still my boyfriend?’