Shattered Then Healed By His Love (by Haley Blanton) novel Chapter 178

Marcus could sense the hostility radiating from Noah, and he suspected it had something to do with Jackson.

“I don’t understand your animosity toward me,” he said, his voice even. “We’ve only just met.”

Noah looked him directly in the eye. “I don’t have a high opinion of your family. When Natalie was wrongfully imprisoned, did a single one of you lift a finger to help her?”

Natalie froze. She never expected him to bring up the past, especially not now. The words ‘wrongfully imprisoned‘ hung in the air, and she saw a flicker of something unreadable in Marcus’s eyes as he looked at her.

The lively, bustling atmosphere of the food street was a stark contrast to the heavy, charged silence that had fallen between them.

“I don’t care who you are,” Noah continued, his voice rising with anger. “Stay away from Natalie. Since your nephew has divorced her, you have no right to overstep your bounds. Especially not by having her followed.”

“Noah, don’t,” Natalie said, tugging on his sleeve.

“It’s the truth,” he insisted. “If he wasn’t having you followed, how would he have found us here? What are his intentions?”

A knot of dread tightened in Natalie’s stomach. She could feel the shift in the air, the dangerous change in Marcus’s demeanor. She grabbed Noah’s arm. “We have to go,” she said to Marcus, then, without waiting for a reply, she pulled Noah toward the street.

Marcus watched them go, his eyes fixed on her hand, which was still holding Noah’s. The coldness in his gaze deepened. His hands, at his sides, clenched into tight fists. Their relationship was clearly not as simple as she had claimed.

It was after nine by the time they got back to The Sanctuary. After a shower, Natalie went out onto the terrace to look at the night sky, but a familiar figure in the distance caught her eye.

Beyond the small bamboo grove at the edge of the property, a man was leaning against a car, a cigarette held between his fingers. He looked up, and their eyes met across the darkness.

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