Off Limit: Claimed by My Ex-Fiancé's Stepdad novel · Chapter 22 of 32

Chapter 22: The Fly Gallery

On the third monitor, Ward's gloved hand was closed around Bettina's wrist.

The pin was still in her fist. The bracelet hung below it, gold in the camera light.

Her face was turned up to his, eight inches away, and she was perfectly clear. Every pearl. Every tooth.

"Lights ninety-four, go," I said.

The wheelhouse number rolled on. The house was clapping on the beat.

Thirty feet over their heads, my stepmother opened her mouth.

"Don't," Ward said into his headset, low, so it was really for her. "Make one sound and twelve hundred people look up. Every critic in New York. Every phone."

Her mouth closed.

"Cleo," Ward said. "Your call."

The bridge was stored up in the flies with nothing through its lock. The storm wasn't until act two.

I had twenty minutes before anybody needed it.

"Rail," I said. "Go up and re-pin. Quiet."

"Going," the flyman said.

I watched him climb on the monitor, slow and steady, sixty-four years old, one rung at a time.

He walked past Bettina without looking at her. He took the spare pin from his belt and slid it through the lock.

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