“I signed that contract under false pretenses. I would never have signed a contract with you, Aidan.”

“Nevertheless, you signed it, and you owe me the respect you would give any Dom. As for having fun, I suspect you’re accusing me of cheating on you and Lexi. I haven’t put my dick in anyone the entire time we’ve been apart. Can you say the same?”

Lucas’s eyes came up. “Are you kidding me?”

“I have been utterly faithful, even when I was walking away.”

“I don’t understand you.” Lucas scrubbed a hand through his hair, his frustration easy to read.

“You will. Just give me a chance.”

Lucas’s cell phone trilled. He pulled it out. “Lexi.” He turned away, leaving Aidan feeling left out. When he finally turned back there was a stricken look on his face. “Lexi was supposed to go up to our suite.”

Aidan knew exactly what was coming. Lexi had always been a hellcat. She’d never taken anything lying down. “She left, I take it?”

Lucas nodded. “She went home, but someone broke in. She says it’s bad.”

Aidan popped off the barstool. This he could handle. “Then we should go get her and bring her back to where she’s supposed to be.”

Lucas sighed. “It’s not that easy with Lexi.”

Aidan felt his blood start to pump again. Lucas was the one he had to play slow and easy. Lexi was a different type altogether. They had always been fiery. Lexi liked to yell and fight, and submit as sweet as a kitten when he’d finally won the battle. “That’s what I like about it, Lucas. And she will do what I say in the end. I promise you.”

Aidan could have sworn Lucas breathed a sigh of relief as they started for the parking garage.

* * *

Lexi kicked at her sofa. It was in utter ruins. It was the perfectly awful end to a perfectly awful day. And now her damn head was pounding. Fuck. She shouldn’t have called Lucas, but it had been instinctive. Something bad had happened, and she pulled Lucas in.

Lucas was going to kill her. She went into the bathroom and quickly brushed her teeth. Maybe he wouldn’t notice. She’d only had three shots of tequila. She’d been so pissed off at her stepfather and Aidan and Julian. Even Leo had been in on it. She’d meant to go up to the suite, but she just hadn’t been able to force herself inside. Aidan was obviously staying in The Club, and he probably had the damn key to the place. He seemed to have taken over everything else. The last thing she’d wanted was another confrontation with him. She’d gotten dressed and walked out of The Club. Her anger had been brewing, simmering just below the surface. Her stepfather’s accusations had really pissed her off. She’d decided to show him. She was an adult, not some kid. If she wanted a drink, she could have one. So she’d stopped at a bar across the street from The Club before hopping on the Blue Line and heading home.

Then she’d walked up to her apartment only to find someone had kicked the door in and trashed the place. They’d taken a knife to her couch and smashed her TV. The mirror in the entryway was smashed and her plants were all over the floor. She hadn’t thought at all. She’d just called Lucas. Maybe she should have called the cops and left Lucas out of it.

Her hands were shaking. All of Jack’s words were coming back to her now. Was she really so self-destructive? She looked in the mirror. There were dark smudges under her eyes. She hadn’t even bothered to clean herself up. When had she let everything go? Lexi quickly washed her face, trying to forget. She knew the day it had happened. It was burned in her brain, but knowing didn’t seem to stop her. Maybe she did need rehab.

“What the hell? Lexi?” Lucas’s voice rang out. Lexi could hear his panic.

“I’m fine,” she called out.

She took a towel to her face. The bathroom door swung open. Lucas wasn’t a great believer in privacy these days. When had she gone from being a partner to being a burden?

“What are you doing here? Where are the cops? What the hell happened?” Lucas spat the questions out like a rapid-fire pistol, his hands cupping her shoulders. He looked her over as if discerning whether or not she was physically fine.

Lexi let her eyes slide away from his, hoping he didn’t see too much. “I found it like this.”

“And you just decided to hang out? What if they had still been here?”

Lexi heard another voice coming from her living room. This one was deep and authoritative. “Yes, I need someone out here. My girlfriend’s apartment has been broken into.”

“I’m not your girlfriend!” Lexi shouted at Aidan. What was he doing here?

Lucas stood in her way, shaking his head. “That’s not helpful, Lexi.”

“Maybe, but it’s true.” The fact that Aidan was here in her apartment made her a little restless.

Suddenly Aidan was standing in the doorway, his big, muscular body taking up all the space. He was taller than Lucas, but he seemed so much bigger as he stared down at her, a stern frown on his face. She could believe the man in front of her had been a soldier.

“Would you have preferred I announced to the 911 operator that my submissive’s apartment had been robbed? I chose to forgo an explanation of D/s relationships in favor of something she would understand.”

He said it in an even voice that set her teeth on edge. He was calm and collected, cool and attractive, while she looked ghastly from crying and drinking—over him.

“I am not your sub. I am Lucas’s sub.”

Aidan just stood there, an immovable object. “And Lucas belongs to me, according to our contract. He signed over rights to top you. Or are you going to give up your rights to The Club and force Lucas to find someplace new, someplace less safe? Perhaps you can convince him to give up BDSM all together, and he can live a half-life. Is that your choice, Alexis?”

“That was rough,” Lucas muttered under his breath.

Aidan turned slightly toward Lucas. “Yes, I believe I mentioned this would get rough. She won’t have it any other way.”

Lexi pushed away from Lucas. It sounded like the two of them had been talking. She damn straight didn’t like that. “What are the two of you talking about?”

“It means that Lucas and I are of the same mind. It’s far past time you got yourself together.” Aidan held up a small white piece of paper. Lexi’s blood went cold as she realized what it was. “You overpaid, angel. A shot of Patron at The Club only costs twelve dollars. And this is far inferior. Though it looks like you bought in bulk.”

Lucas turned her back around, and his face had flushed, his brows coming together in a V. “You promised me.”

She shook her head. She ignored the way her heart had clenched when Aidan called her angel. That had been his pet name for her. “No, I didn’t. I promised Jack, but it’s not a big deal. I’m fine. Jack is overreacting.”

“Jack is scared for you, and so am I.” Lucas dropped his hands, and his jaw tightened as he turned from her. “I’ll pack a bag for her.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Lexi said as Lucas brushed by Aidan. He didn’t stop, but Aidan moved back into his place, his broad shoulders forming a wall she couldn’t get around.

“Are you going to make this easy on me, Lexi?”

“Not on your life, asshole. You get out of my apartment, and maybe I won’t tell the cops that I think you did this.” Lexi felt overwhelmed. He took up all the space in her tiny bathroom.

“You’re welcome to try. Let me give you the lowdown on how this is going to go. You’re going to be given one of two choices. As always, it’s up to you. You can come back to the ranch with me and spend the next few weeks drying out and dealing with your issues, or Jack is prepared to have you committed to a rehab facility.”

Lexi felt her eyes go wide. “He can’t do that.”

“Oh, I assure you that with your stepfather’s money and Julian’s influence, we can get just about anything done. If you make the wrong choice there is a very nice rehab center in Malibu. You’ll be on a plane tonight, and you won’t see the light of day for twenty-eight days. Lucas will be miserable. Your mother will be heartbroken. Are you willing to be the cause of that?”

She was willing to be the cause of his broken nose, but she doubted that he would take that well. Frustration welled up in Lexi. She took a step back, but stumbled, her balance fleeing in an instant. Before she could hit the tiled floor, Aidan scooped her up in his arms.

“Damn it, Lexi. This is serious. You can’t go on like this. How many?”

“You snooped through my purse.” She didn’t like the way the room was slightly off-kilter, or the way his arms held her so securely. She felt delicate against him. He was so much bigger than he had been. Aidan had been gorgeous before, and the scars had taken some of his beauty, but whatever he had been through had left a solid alpha male in the place of a lovely boy. This new Aidan could prove just as dangerous as the last.

“I just read the amount. With the tab as big as it was, I figured it was more than one. Now, I want to know how many.”

“Three,” she admitted.

“This ends, Lexi. One way or another, this can’t go on.”

“That is not for you to say.” But the words sounded stupid coming out of her mouth. She knew she was on the edge of something really bad. She was hurting the people she loved. She was acting irrationally, but it didn’t matter. She couldn’t tell him he was right. “You can go to hell, Aidan.”

“Already been there, angel. I have the T-shirt to prove it.” There was a little smile on his face, the dimple she’d always loved on display. How had she missed it? His hands tightened on her as though he didn’t want to even contemplate letting her go.