It was the ultimate manipulation. He was asking her to become the victim to save the suspect. He was asking her to cross the most sacred line of her profession.
And for a split second—a terrifying, insane split second—Lauren considered it. Her body was still humming from his touch. The curiosity was a dark pit opening up inside her. She wanted to know. She wanted to know what Elara felt. She wanted to know what he felt.
He saw the hesitation in her eyes. He took it as a yes.
He reached out, bringing the silk toward her neck.
The fabric brushed her skin.
SNAP.
The spell broke.
Reality crashed back into the room with the force of a freight train. The image of Elara's dead body from the autopsy file flashed in Lauren's mind. The purple bruising. The silence of the grave.
Adrenaline surged through her.
Lauren's hand moved faster than her thoughts. She swung her arm in a wide, frantic arc.
CRACK.
Her open palm connected with Grey's cheek with a sound like a pistol shot.
Grey's head snapped to the side.
Silence. absolute, ringing silence.
Lauren stood there, chest heaving, her hand stinging furiously. She stared at him in horror. She had just assaulted her client. She had just slapped a man accused of strangling women.
Grey slowly turned his face back to look at her.
There was a red mark blooming on his cheekbone, stark against his pale skin.
He didn't look angry.
He touched his tongue to the corner of his mouth, and then, slowly, a smile spread across his face. It wasn't the charming smile from the magazines. It was dark. It was hungry. It was the smile of a man who had just found a worthy opponent.
"Lauren," he murmured.
Lauren didn't wait for him to finish.
"Don't," she gasped, backing away, stumbling over her own feet. "Don't come near me. Don't ever touch me again."
She grabbed her briefcase from the table, her hands shaking so badly she almost dropped it.
"Lauren," Grey called out, his voice calm, unmoving. "Running doesn't change what happened here."
"Nothing happened here!" she shouted, her voice cracking. "This meeting is over!"
She turned and bolted.
She ran out of the library, her heels clattering frantically on the marble floors of the hallway. She didn't look back. She didn't wait for the blind maid. She wrenched the heavy front door open and burst out into the storm.
The rain soaked her instantly, plastering her hair to her face, ruining her blouse, but she didn't care. She scrambled into her car, fumbling with the keys, her heart hammering against her ribs like it was trying to break them.
She started the engine and tore down the driveway, the tires spinning on the wet gravel.
As she sped through the gates, leaving the fortress behind, she looked in the rearview mirror.
Through the rain and the distance, she could see the silhouette of a man standing in the window of the library, watching her go.
She drove for miles without knowing where she was going. She just drove.
When she finally pulled over, it was in a random parking lot of a 24-hour diner. She killed the engine and sat in the silence, the rain drumming on the roof of the car.
She looked down at her chest. Her nipples were still hard against the silk of her blouse. Her body was still vibrating with the memory of his hands.
She covered her face with her hands and let out a shaky, terrified breath.
Josephine. She should call Josephine. She should tell her best friend that the client was indeed a psychopath, that he had touched her, that she needed to drop the case.
She reached for her phone.
She unlocked it. She opened her messages.
But she didn't type.
What if she told her and Jo reported him to the police?
Why was she even worried that Jo would report him? Is that not what she was meant to do?
And the terrifying truth, the truth that made Lauren Hayes hate herself in that moment more than she had ever hated anyone… was that she wanted to know what happened next. After the choking, or the strangling, what next?
She lowered the phone. She deleted the draft.
She put the car in gear and drove home, carrying the secret of the silk and the slap like a burning coal in her chest.