Build And Break novel Chapter 3

"I can't. I don't want to." Her voice broke. But she forced herself to remain strong. She couldn't allow herself to break down before the man who had caused her so much heartache. She couldn't give him the satisfaction of knowing how fragile she was.

"You can't live out here, Angela. You're living in a hole. You literally need a stable ceiling on your head." Steven motioned a finger at the long cracks in the ceiling. "My apartment is brand new. You'll be like living alone there. I'm working over the top at the moment and am barely at home." He checked the expensive watch on his wrist. "Truth be told, I had to cancel a few meetings just to be here right now and I can't really afford to lose any more time here. So we should go."

How dare he say he was losing time. He was the one who sought after her. "You didn't even cancel a meeting when we were married."

"Just come with me, Angie and you don't ever have to steal any more 'unattended things'."

"No." She asserted.

"Angela, if you don't want to anger your father any more, you should just walk out that door and get in the car." Damn him, he was using her father as a weapon against her. He knew she feared her father.

Angela crossed her arms under her breasts. "You can't force me to."

"Well, I'm not going to put you over my shoulder and force you, no. But I can threaten to stop the negotiations with your father to merge his company with mine. It's the reason why we want you back home, Angela, to be the loving daughter and doting wife. What would your father say then?"

She realized Steven would keep using her father against her until she surrendered. "Why don't you just go away and leave me alone in this 'hole'. In case you haven't noticed I started a new life the day I left you."

Steven scanned the shabby ancient room around him. "This place really shows the good life you're living now." He swaggered towards the lone table in the corner where a photo frame sat. Picked it up. "Oh, I forgot. There's you and Tony."

"You don't know anything." Angela snitched the photo of her and Tony from Steven's hold.

"Too bad you're not going to have a chance to say goodbye to him. You're leaving here within two minutes." And he began his march to the door.

"Two minutes?" Angela's brows furrowed in shock. "I can't just leave here. I have people here. I have my life here. I can't just leave." Angela's pleading voice cried.

Steven stopped at the door, in his always prominently towering posture. "I'm going to wait in the car and if you don't get out of here in the next minute, I'll be calling your landlord to evict everyone from here because Morris Corporation is interested in building twenty apartments and would demolish this place tomorrow."

Angela's jaw dropped at his arrogance. She knew that tone. It was ruthless business man voice. And she knew he kept his word. But that? "You wouldn't."

"You'll see in fifty seconds if you're still standing there." And he disappeared out the door.

Steven peeled off his jacket to hang it on the hanger near the elevator door. He proceeded to free the tie from around his neck, hanging it up as well. "It was time you came home."

She scoffed. "No, it wasn't. You only brought me here because you need me to be the poster trophy wife. Except I'm not your wife anymore." Angela watched him position his wallet and a set of keys in a neat order on the side table near the door. Just as she remembered him doing, Angela thought. Steven always left the things he didn't want to forget to take with him in one place.

"Nobody knows that except us." He reminded her while Steven removed the wedding ring from his finger and set it on the table too.

Angela realized his ring was another thing he wanted to remember to take on his next exit. Of course, he only needed the outside world to know he was married. When he was in the comfort of his home, why should he remember about her.

"Oh, right. I forgot I was away at my aunt's." She mentioned sarcastically. "The same aunt who hated me since the day I was born. Must have been a very convincing story to tell."

"Better than telling the story of how I found a naked man in our bed."

Angela raised a hand in defence. "He wasn't naked. Tony was only shirtless."