Chapter 94 - NINETY FOUR

Chapter 94: Chapter NINETY FOUR

VINCENZO

Damien had done that to her. That fucker had probably used other women as weapons. Made her compete for affection she should have been given freely. And now she was wired to see every woman as a threat and every moment of my attention on someone else as evidence that she was about to be thrown away.

I understood it. That didn’t mean I could allow it.

I sighed, there was only one leverage I had now. It seemed to be the only currency she valued.

"Get up," I ordered.

Angel turned to me, shocked. Then, her face crumbled. The fury in her eyes dissolved into hurt so fast it nearly gave me whiplash. Her eyes filled with real tears this time — I could tell the difference now, the manufactured ones were quick and clean, the real ones came slower and sat heavier.

"But—"

"Off. Now."

She climbed off my lap and stood in front of me looking wounded and small in my oversized shirt.

Bad girls don’t get to cuddle Daddy.

I didn’t say it out loud. I didn’t need to. She read it in my face. The understanding moved through her eyes and I watched the hurt deepen into something raw. Being denied my body — my lap, my proximity — was the worst punishment I could deliver.

"Fine!" She spun toward Martha with a venom that made the older woman take a half-step back. "Fine. Go. Take your stupid two weeks. Send whoever you want. I don’t care."

She did care. She cared so much that it was eating her from the inside out. But she’d agreed, and that was what mattered.

Martha gave me a look — brief, loaded with things neither of us would ever say out loud. I read the layers in that glance. Concern. And underneath that, a question she would never ask: ’What have you done to that girl?’

The answer would have destroyed us both.

She left the room and Angel stood there. Vibrating with fury. Her fists clenched at her sides. I could see her mind working — calculating whether to escalate, to scream, to throw something. Whether to chase Martha down the hall and say something unforgivable. Testing the edges of what she could get away with.

I sat patiently, watching her anger fold. Her shoulders dropped and she turned back to me and her face was the face of a girl who’d just lost a fight and didn’t know what to do with the defeat.

She sat on the space next to me and leaned against me. Her head on my shoulder. She was still sulking. But seeking contact. Seeking me.

I buried my fingers in her hair and stroked slowly.

"You can’t act on impulse or behave badly just because you’re angry," I said, quiet but firm. "Daddy doesn’t like that."

"I don’t want another woman here," she whispered against my neck. "What if she’s pretty? What if you notice her?"

"I’m not going to notice her."

"You noticed Jillian. You noticed Dr. Moreau."

"Angel."

"You noticed the waitress last night. I saw you look at her when she brought our order."

I hadn’t looked at the waitress. I hadn’t noticed any woman in that restaurant except the one pouring ice cream down her own chest.

"I noticed you," I told her. "Only you. Getting angry and acting out will only make me upset, is that what you want?"

She pulled back, looking at me. Probably searching for the lie in my earlier statement.

"I’m sorry," she whispered, burrowing closer, her arms wrapping around my waist. "I just don’t want to share you. I can’t share you, Daddy. I’ll die if you look at someone else the way you looked at me last night."

"I won’t."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

She pressed her face into my neck. I felt the wetness of tears on my skin. Real ones.

I kept stroking her hair. Feeling her breath against me. I could feel the moment the tension slowly drained from her muscles.

I wondered how long before the next eruption. How long before the jealousy and the rage and the desperate possessiveness boiled over again? I was supposed to be helping her — teaching her that love didn’t require destruction, that attention wasn’t a competition, that she was safe with me.

Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to bring another woman into this house. Not with Angel wound this tight. Not with the way she’d looked at Martha— predatory, ready to eliminate a threat.

If I gave in, she’d get worse. If I pushed, she’d spiral. The line between discipline and indulgence was so thin it barely existed and I was walking it barefoot.

And the truth — the ugly, damning truth I couldn’t say out loud — was that part of me liked it. The jealousy. The possessiveness. The way she wanted to erase every woman from my world until she was the only one left. It fed something dark and primal in me. Something that wanted to be wanted this fiercely.

Fuck.

We both needed help. Real help. Professional help. Someone who could look at this situation and see it for what it was — two broken people tangled in something that was going to consume them both.

I wondered if therapy would work. If anything would work. Or if we were already past the point of no return, hurtling toward something that couldn’t be stopped or fixed, only survived.

Angel’s breathing had evened out against my chest. Calm now. The storm passed. My fingers in her hair.

"Can I sit on your lap again?" she murmured.

I pulled her back into my lap. She curled against me, warm and soft, her face tucked against my neck.

"Daddy?" she murmured against my neck.

"Mm."

"If the replacement is pretty, I’m going to fuck you in front of her too."

I closed my eyes. Inhaling a sharp breath, I held my daughter close to me, wondering how long before it was too late.

If it wasn’t already.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​