King of Greed (Kings of Sin #3) by Ana Huang

Don’t dwell on it. This is what you wanted. Remember?

“You signed the papers.” I pulled free from his grasp. The imprint of his touch burned, and it took all my willpower not to touch my wrist.

“I signed the papers because you asked me to, not because I wanted to.”

“And yet you’re here against my wishes.”

A small smile touched his lips while his eyes remained solemn. “You never told me you didn’t want me here, so I’m technically not going against your wishes.”

I sighed, exhaustion outpacing adrenaline. “What do you want, Dominic?”

“I want you back.”

My pulse spiked. Thank God he was no longer holding me or he would’ve felt the exact moment his words sank in.

“You can’t have me back.” Maybe if I said it enough times, he would believe it, and I wouldn’t feel this dull ache behind my ribcage.

“I know.”

“Then what— ”

“Specifically, I want a fresh start for us.” Dominic didn’t take his eyes off mine. “You said we didn’t know each other anymore, and you were right. You said I neglected you and took you for granted during our marriage, and you were right. I lost my perspective of what was most important. I can’t change what I did in the past, but I can do things differently in the future. Give me a chance to prove it to you.”

“How?” The question scraped out in a whisper. I couldn’t help it. I was too curious, too ensnared by the intimate honesty reflected on his face. It was honesty that had been missing from our relationship for years, and in that moment, he wasn’t Dominic Davenport, the king of Wall Street. He was simply Dominic, the beautiful, smart, tortured boy I’d fallen in love with so many moons go.

“By not pushing me away.” His throat flexed. “That’s all I ask. A chance for us to talk and get to know each other as we are now. I want to know what makes you laugh, what makes you cry, what your dreams look like when you sleep and what keeps you up when you can’t. I’ll spend however many lifetimes I need to rediscover those parts of you, because you’re it for me. In every iteration of every life. Things may have changed since we got married, but you and me? We were always meant for forever.”





CHAPTER 20



Dominic




SEEING ALESSANDRA AND NOT BEING ABLE TO HOLD her was a special kind of torture. It’d been two days, thirteen hours, and thirty-three minutes since our dinner together, and I had spent every waking moment since replaying it. She was right next door, but I was afraid that if I didn’t etch her into my mind deeply enough, she would slip away like grains of sand through my fingers.

Fortunately, Buzios was small, and we ran into each other everywhere. At the beach. At the boardwalk. At the supermarket shopping for fruits and vegetables. Unfortunately, our interactions in those places were limited at best.

Alessandra was still wary of me. Her response to my plea on Monday night had been a mere “I need to go,” and she eyed me like I was a cobra waiting to strike every time she saw me. It made me feel like shit because I knew she had every right not to believe me, but at the same time, I loved watching her in the quick moments before she realized I was there. The flash of her smile, the glow of her face, the untouchable, intangible something that harkened back to the girl who’d taken me under her wing at Thayer and hadn’t let go until I could fly on my own.



“Here’s your coffee. Black with no sugar or cream. Just the way you like it, for whatever reason.” Alessandra was the first person I saw when I walked out of Professor Ruth’s classroom. She handed me the cardboard cup, her expression a mix of anticipation and trepidation. “So, how did it go?”

“Fine.” I took a sip, savoring the bitterness she always wrinkled her nose at. “Professor Ruth didn’t imprison us until we could recite Shakespeare’s full body of work by memory, which I count as a win.”

“Ha ha. Very funny.” She pinned me with a droll stare even as her mouth twitched. “I’m talking about your final exam, smartass. Did you…did you pass?”

Alessandra looked so nervous, I abandoned my original plan to drag this out and fuck with her a little longer.

“Seventy-eight.” I couldn’t stop the slow spread of a smile. “I passed.” It wasn’t the best grade in the class, but fuck it, it was leagues better than what I’d gotten the last time I took English comp. Thanks to Alessandra, I’d done fairly well on my midterms, and I’d needed at least a seventy-five on the final to pass the class.

“You passed? Oh my God, you passed!” Alessandra squealed and threw her arms around me, nearly knocking me over. I hastily tossed the coffee into a nearby trash can before I spilled it over both of us. “You did it! I never doubted you for a second.”

“That’s why you looked like you wanted to throw up when you asked how I did, right?”

“Well, my reputation as a tutor was on the line. I couldn’t ruin my one-hundred-percent success rate, you know.” She pulled back, her eyes sparkling with pride. My stomach clenched. She was the only person who’d ever cared about my accomplishments. Hell, she probably cared more than me, and I had no idea how to deal with that sort of thing. “But seriously, I knew you could do it. You’re one of the smartest people I know, Dominic. You just show it in a different way.”