Page 392 of Double or Nothing

Recognition.

The disgust of a man who spent a lifetime watching morality used as costume, and control presented as love.

“Let me give you a reminder,” Eli says. “You entered our premises without an appointment. You brought legal representatives into a private area, demanded personal information about an adult woman and refused to respect our boundaries. And then Christopher Otley shoved Bryce. Assaulted him.”

“That isn’t how it happened!”

“I think you’ll find it was.”

“Bullshit!”

“Like I said, the camera footage won’t lie.”

Eli opens the office door and whistles. Raises his hand.

Two security officers enter. Brutal and imposing. Eli doesn’t need to acknowledge them, they already know the job in hand.

“They will escort you from The Argent. If you resist, the police can resolve the matter.”

Parker looks at Alice, hands back on hips.

“This is your final opportunity, Alice Rose. Stop this debaucherous craziness and come to your senses.”

Alice walks over to me, taking hold of Bryce on the way.

She takes one of my hands and one of his. The one he didn’t punch Otley with.

Red and purple.

“This isn’t debaucherous craziness, it’s the truth. I’m in love with two men,” she says. “Two amazing men. Fantastic men. Men that treat me as Alice, not just Alice fucking Parker. I don’t want to be Alice fucking Parker anymore.”

Her father’s face drains of blood when he hears the strength in her voice. He looks dazed. Broken with the severity.

“Alice! Darling.”

“No!”

Her grip tightens around mine.

“Your Parker Otley empire doesn’t include me anymore. Find some other womb to use.”

But there isn’t one.

He knows it as well as she does.

Suddenly, William Parker looks older. Stripped of certainty.

“You will regret humiliating our family,” he says. “When I tell your mother…”

His voice trails off on purpose.

Alice’s eyes fill, but she doesn’t lower them.

“You humiliated me by making the family name more important than I was. That’s not being a dad, Dad. That’s being a fucking dictator.”

Eli’s gaze sharpens. Alice’s line reaches him, that much is clear. But only to me.

He swallows once, but barely. Hardly readable, unless you’re in the know.