Exiled for Saying No, I Came Back and Took the Boss's Chair novel · Chapter 13 of 24

Chapter 13: The Tenth Night

The last car left the hill after midnight.

Ignazio had gone out the front door in his best black suit, and nobody had stood to help him with his coat.

Tiernan Costigan had bowed to my father's photograph and gone down the porch steps on his son's arm.

Nonna had watched every guest out, and then she had climbed the front stairs without a word to me.

I locked both doors and came back to a kitchen full of sixty plates.

Ronan stood at the sink with his sleeves pushed up and the water running over his burnt forearms.

He did not turn around.

"You said nine nights," he said to the window.

"I did," I said.

"That was the ninth. This is the tenth."

"I know what night it is," I said.

"Then you know the terms are finished."

His voice was slow and dry, and it was not steady.

I crossed the kitchen and shut off the tap.

"You said no families in the bed," I said.

He looked at me then.

"It was the families who lied to us both," I said. "Eleven years of it. I want to break every plate in this house."

"Break them."

"I don't want a plate."

I took a handful of his shirt.

"Upstairs," I said. "Now."

"Your grandmother."

"Is asleep on the front side of the house, and this is my house."

I dragged him through the dark hall and up the steep back stair, and the treads groaned under his boots.

I did not whisper.

At the end of the landing I pushed my door open, pulled him through it, and slammed it shut behind us.

Then I put him against it.

His back hit the wood, and the whole door shook in its frame.

"Lotta."

"Shut up."

← Chapter 12 · All chapters · Chapter 14 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend