Chapter Sixteen
It took all the strength I had to get up to go to work the next morning, and I hadn’t been able to bring myself to give Sayer a wake-up call. I knew there would be consequences, because he was a vindictive son of a bitch. But they were worth it. Even Juliet saw how drained I was from having to face him every day—although she didn’t understand the reason why.
“Mommy, are you sleepy?”
I looked down at her and saw Sayer looking back at me. She had his blazing blue eyes, his expressive eyebrows, his sly smile. I hated him just a little more every time I looked at her. Their similarities used to make my chest pinch with nostalgic regret and a healthy amount of guilt. Now I wanted to kick him in the shins for lending my daughter his looks.
He didn’t deserve her.
I closed my eyes, trying to relax a bit but saw him there too. My thoughts strayed to him pushing me against the cabin again, trapping my hands in his, pressing his thigh between mine. His lips were all over me. Softer, slower… and this time they didn’t stop.
“Fine,” I half shouted. “I’m fine. Sorry, Jules. I just need a cup of coffee.”
Francesca shot me a look from the couch. She was working nights the rest of the week, so she got to lounge in her pajamas until lunch. And then she got to go to work where her ex-boyfriends didn’t stalk her or bother her or try to make out with her.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she demanded, cradling a big cup of black coffee in her hands.
I shook my head back and forth, trying to brush off the weirdness that seemed to cling to me this morning. “Like what?”
“Like you want to push me off the balcony.”
Reaching for the coffee pot, I brushed off her accusation. “I need coffee.”
“You said that.”
God, I was losing it.
“Are you okay, Caroline?”
I hadn’t told Francesca about Sayer mauling me yesterday. Part of me felt like I already knew what she was going to say and I didn’t want to hear it. I knew it was a bad idea to kiss Sayer. We were so on the same page about that.
Another part of me wanted her shocked empathy. I wanted her honest reaction that I couldn’t get past. That kiss had completely and utterly stunned me. Where had it even come from? I would have been less surprised had he started strangling me. Or pulled out a gun. Or wrestled a black hood over my head and thrown me in the back of a windowless van.
But a kiss? With tongue and groping hands and sizzling heat? Uh, no. Until yesterday, I would have sworn with my life that those days were over between us. So where had it come from?
It wasn’t like it was this grand gesture to get me to go out with him again. It wasn’t even a kind kiss. It was cruel and savage and completely, one hundred percent wild. There was nothing seductive about it, other than it had been a very long time since I had been kissed like that. There was nothing even remotely gentle about it. It was not a request for us to get back together. It had been a punishment of some kind.
Although I had yet to suss out the whys and whats of it. There were plenty of other ways to punish me.
The skanky side of me shivered in anticipation.
That was so not what I meant, ho-bag.
Oh my God. I needed a mental health day.
“I’m fine,” I lied. “Just tired.” Turning around, I met her gaze, not even meaning to manipulate her. It was just part of it—part of who I was. “The last couple weeks have been exhausting.”
She raised her coffee cup to me in a toast of solidarity. “Agreed.” When Juliet ran back to her room to get some toys for her backpack, Francesca walked over to the kitchen island, trying to be secretive. “Any word on new identities?” she asked softly.
I shook my head, adding just the right amount of creamer to my coffee, turning it a rich caramel color. Black coffee was for the birds and the guilty—or so my dad used to say. Which was apparently Francesca. She preferred to chew her coffee. “Not yet.”
“We should leave anyway,” she murmured.
Juliet bounced around her room, looking for a doll to pack for school. I watched her from where I leaned against the island and felt my plan cracking, finger length fissures like a spider web along the edges, making it fragile and weak. “Juliet needs new records, Frankie. She needs a valid birth certificate and social security card. We could maybe make it, but how am I going to send her to school next year without some kind of paper trail. Immunization records, hospital and doctor’s records. Frankie, all the records. I don’t even know how to start the process without them. I can’t show up in a new city and not have at least birth records. They’ll call CPS. They’ll take one look at me and assume I kidnapped her from a nice, punctual, two-parent family. I can’t risk it… I can’t risk losing her because we weren’t careful.”
Francesca made a growling noise. “So many more details this time around.”
“I know.”
“What are we going to do, Caro?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
“I’m going to ask around at the hotel. There are some girls… I don’t think they’re students. You know what I mean?”
“Fake visas?”
She nodded. “Something like that.”
“Okay. Do it. Our only other choice is to run with cash and hope we can get these particulars sorted when we land somewhere.”
Neither of us liked that option. There were too many variables, too much potential for getting caught.
Frankie’s hand landed on mine. “Do you think it’s just the Volkov or do you think we need to worry about the feds too?”
Leaning forward, I dropped my voice even lower. “Frankie, I don’t know. Sayer says it’s innocent. He says he’s trying to start over. I don’t trust him, obviously. But whether or not he’s telling the truth, I do know trouble follows him wherever he goes. And if he’s hanging around here, it’s only a matter of time before trouble finds us too.”
“How do I look?” Juliet asked from her bedroom doorway. She was wearing black and white polka dot leggings beneath a purple paisley skirt and a bright pink sweater. Her ringlet curls clung to her face thanks to the static of her sweater and she had a red rain boot in each hand, ready to slip on.
“Beautiful,” I told her, absolutely meaning it. “Are you ready?”
“Yep!”
“K, kiddo, grab your jacket and your backpack and meet me by the door.”
She obeyed and I turned around to pour my coffee into a thermos. “Ask around at work, Frankie. See what you can come up with. In the meantime, let’s keep an extra low profile. I am confident he doesn’t know about Juliet yet and I plan to keep it that way.” Only I wasn’t confident. I just didn’t have any other options. I put my hope in Sayer’s silence. He hadn’t mentioned Juliet yet. He hadn’t tried to see her yet. I had to believe that meant he didn’t know about her. He’d changed a lot over the years, but I knew him well enough to expect absolute hell if he ever found out that I’d been keeping his daughter a secret from him for five years.
Frankie sighed, pulling her knees to her chest. “I’ll have to cancel all my weekend plans. That will disappoint so many of my friends. Oh, wait. You’re my only friend and I didn’t have any weekend plans. So, keeping an extra low profile shouldn’t be a problem.”
Her tone made me pause. Turning around to my moping best friend I set my coffee down and gave her my full attention. “Do you regret leaving?”
She took a deep breath and stared at her toes. “I regret who my uncles are. I regret that my mother died. I regret that my father had to die for her. I regret that I have to live in fear and that I won’t ever have a normal life and that I can’t ever just be… free of that world. But I don’t regret leaving. Not when it meant washing my hands of the bloodshed and the trafficking and the drugs. I just couldn’t… I didn’t want to be a part of any of that.”
“If we had stayed though… do you think we could have turned things around?”
She laughed, but it was dark and slightly hysterical. “And what? Turned them into a charity? No, Caro. My cousins would never have let that happen. If we would have stayed, I would have lost my soul to the bratva and you would still be paying off your dad’s debts. And just imagine—” She tossed her head to the side, indicating Juliet. “Imagine her life. Imagine how much they would have demanded from her. We did the right thing. It’s okay to be a good person. It’s okay to fight to stay a good person. Don’t let Sayer make you feel bad for leaving. You did the best thing for your family.”
I grabbed her hand and squeezed. “And you did the best thing for you.” She lifted her eyes, gratitude shining through. “We have each other. That’s the only kind of normal we need.”
She nodded, but didn’t add anything else. And I got her silence. I got her mood. It was hard to live remembering everything we’d left behind.
It hadn’t all been bad. We had a life in DC. We had family. And protection and danger and excitement. We’d been respected. We’d been taken care of.
We’d also been sheltered from the worst of the syndicate. We were thieves. We were con artists. We didn’t have to deal in the hardcore drugs and the trafficking of women and young girls and the killing. When conflict broke out with other families or with gangs, we went into hiding. When the news reported overdoses and underage girls in strip clubs and murders, we pretended like they had nothing to do with us.
We took the money and gifts given to us by the family and lived for each new adventure. It was crazy to think about where we would be now if I hadn’t gotten pregnant. Juliet was the wake-up call we needed to get out.
We had been out for a long time… and we were never going back.
I left Frankie to take Juliet to her preschool. It was only a seven-minute drive, not too far from Main Street. We held hands as we walked inside and talked about worms and bugs and all the little things on the sidewalk that fascinated four year olds. I checked her in with her amazing teachers, Miss Beth and Miss Harmony, and headed to work.
This used to be my favorite drive. I loved leaving town and heading up the mountain, winding around the twisting roads. But now it felt like a march to my funeral. Someone honked behind me and I realized I was going painfully slow—even for mountain roads.
By the time I got to work, I was already a tangle of nerves and trepidation. What was Sayer going to do now? Would he tell Maggie all my secrets? Or worse? Were Roman, Aleksander and Dymetrus going to be waiting for me?
I had to figure this out. I had to devise a freaking game plan.
Maggie was in her usual spot in the office when I arrived, thumbing through a book. She didn’t even look up when I walked in. Seeing her leaned over the counter, glasses perched on her nose was so familiar that my heart hurt. This woman had somehow become such a big part of my life even though I’d made a concerted effort to keep her out of it.
I was supposed to be hard. And callous. And totally willing to give up every comfort to keep Juliet safe. And I was… kind of. But the thought of leaving Maggie or having her find out my dirty secrets killed me. I felt the same about Jesse.
Yes, I had bigger things to worry about than their good opinions, but the thought of them thinking badly of me still stung.
I wasn’t the criminal to them. They didn’t use me for my skills or my connections or what I could get them. They genuinely liked me.
I didn’t want to lose that.
Or them.
“Must be a good one,” I said to Maggie when she still hadn’t looked up at me. “Let me guess, the duchess is destitute so she agrees to marry the wealthy duke that doesn’t want to settle down, but needs a wife to give him a legitimate heir?”
She still didn’t look up. “That was last week’s. This duke is enamored with the idiot. He’s totally in love with her and she has no idea.”
“Well, then he’s not doing a very good job of showing his affection.”
“Pride,” Maggie murmured. “He’s an arrogant asshole.”
I laughed. “Aren’t they all?”
She sighed wistfully. Maggie’s romances were the one thing that could distract her from work. She was all slave driving workaholic until she started a regency romance. Then she would lock herself in her office for days at a time while I took care of business for her.
I didn’t mind. She needed more breaks. If she wanted to get lost in her romances occasionally, more power to her.
“I need to run into town,” she told me. “I have to go to the bank and the hardware store and meet with my accountant.”
“And probably take a long lunch so you can finish that book.”
She tapped the book on the counter. “Wouldn’t that be nice?”
“Go for it,” I encouraged. “I’ve got things here. Just be back by three-thirty so I can grab Jules.”
“You sure? Cabin eleven came in this morning to complain about his wake-up call? He said he never got it.”
I busied myself with restacking the outgoing mail. “That’s weird, when I called this morning nobody answered. He must have slept through it.”
“You didn’t put him on the automated system?”
“I will today. He wants a personal call every morning, but that is too far above and beyond the call of duty.”
She grabbed her jacket from the office and stopped by the counter to pick up her book again. “Honey, is everything all right between you two?”
A cold splash of panic trickled through me, but I kept my expression curious when I asked, “What do you mean?”
She raised her eyebrows. “I mean, there’s a hell of a lot of something going on between you two and I can’t decide if you’re welcoming it or running from it.”
Unexpected laughter bubbled out of me. Did I sound crazy? I was running from it. I was running as fast as I could from it. But to Maggie, I added a shrug and said, “Can’t a girl do a little of both?”
Her eyes narrowed. I’d executed my lie perfectly. There had been no quaver in my voice or nervous glancing around. I had delivered my lie with every ounce of confidence I possessed.
She still didn’t believe me.
“All right, darlin’, if you say so.”
“Have fun in town,” I teased her. “Enjoy your duke.”
She paused at the door, halfway inside and halfway outside. Shooting me a wink I was not expecting she said, “You too.” Then she was gone and I was left foundering and furious and trying not to text her a hundred messages correcting her.
By the time Gus pulled into the parking lot out front, I wasn’t even surprised.
Let me clarify, I wasn’t surprised to see him. I was a little concerned to see that he drove a red Subaru Forester and not a black Mercedes sedan.
“Cabin eleven,” I told him as soon as the office door jingled. “Here’s a map.” I pushed the directions across the counter that I had hastily prepared for him.
His eyebrows jumped to his hairline. “Huh?”
“Sayer’s cabin,” I said slower, “is number eleven. This map will show you how to get there.”
He matched my tone and speed. “I already know where Sayer is staying. So I don’t need a map.”
Oh.
“Well, why are you here?”
His top lip curled. “Do you mind telling me what I ever did to you? Fuck, Caroline. We used to be friends. Now the stick up your ass is so big, I can’t even get a hello out of you.”
I blinked at him. “You’re not here to rekindle our friendship, Gus. I’m not an idiot.”
He made a sound in the back of his throat. “You are, in fact, an idiot. But that’s a different discussion.” He walked over to the counter, setting his hands carefully on top of it. “We should talk for real.” He glanced over his shoulder.
I was torn between interrogating him and covering my ears with my hands and running away before he could say anything else. The old Caro jerked to life inside me. This was my opportunity. Gus had never been a good liar. It was why he’d moved to technologies when we were kids, and later accounting. Sayer was a locked box and a master manipulator. I couldn’t trust anything he said. But I might be able to get something out of Gus.
“All right, Augustus, let’s talk. Have you been following me around town?”
He tugged at his stocking cap and shrugged. “I got a business to run, Caroline. I don’t have time for that.”
“What about before you launched your bar? I mean, you knew we were here, right? That’s why you came. You came to interrupt our lives for some stupid reason. So how long did you follow us around and dig into our shit?”
His eyes bugged. “Do you know what you did to Sayer? When you left? Do you know how much you fucked him up? Caro, he went outside of his mind. He did things that he should never have done. Made a lot of enemies. Because of you. Because you disappeared.”
This was not where I wanted this conversation to go. “So that gives you the right to stalk me?”
He pulled back, staring at me incredulously. “He thought someone took you. The Italians… the Ukranians… Fucking Irish retaliation or some shit. That’s the only explanation he would accept for two years. Think about that for a second. Stop thinking about yourself and put yourself in his shoes—in prison. He went fucking berserk in there. He went after each family until he’d exhausted his resources. He had me go after them on the outside. He tapped Roman’s resources all over the city. He got desperate and started trading his collection. Priceless pieces. Trophies. All of that fortune you two had amassed over the years, dwindled to what you saw in our office.”
“Everything in your office was mine.”
He made a face. “Exactly.”
“You’re saying Sayer only sold his pieces? Not mine?”
“Ding ding ding. Maybe you’re not a total idiot after all.”
“Why would he do that, Gus? It doesn’t make any sense. That was his future. He only had to get out of prison, and he was set for life.”
“Are you clueless? He thought someone had taken you. He was going to move fucking heaven and earth to find you.”
“Why did he give up?” At the look Gus gave me, I rephrased the sentence. “I mean, why did he stop thinking I was taken? You said he looked for me for two years.”
Gus looked away. His casual shrug wasn’t as convincing as he probably wanted it to be. “You’ll have to ask him that question. I just know the plan switched.”
“And you do whatever he does?”
He pulled back, shaking his head at me. “You’ve known since we were kids that I wanted nothing to do with that hell hole. I’ve always wanted out. I finally got my chance.” His snarl was cruel, tortured and completely honest. “Sayer and I got out together. He wouldn’t have left without me. And I wouldn’t have left without him.”
Guilt. So much of it I nearly choked on it. “Good thing you waited until he got out of prison then.”
He made a humming noise. “Good thing.”
We noticed Sayer at the same time, walking up the gravel drive. I only had seconds left with Gus to get what I could out of him. “Hey, answer a question for me.”
“What?”
“If your dad’s dead, how are you here?” His expression didn’t give anything away. “I mean, how did you get out? Don’t they need you back in DC?”
His expression softened, turning curious and more… gentle. It was disconcerting. I immediately put my guard up.
“Caro, the operation in DC was shut down.”
My spinning mind screeched to a halt. The earth and time and all of space tripping over their feet, slamming to a stop right behind me. One colossal rear-end collision after another. What? What did he say?
“Say that again?”
“The entire upper echelon of management was arrested. Did you not see it on the news? Roman, Dymetrus, Aleksander, the two spies… all of them. It was a giant FBI takedown.”
“H-how is that possible?”
“There’s nothing left in DC.”
While I stood there dumbfounded and completely upended, Sayer walked into the office. My glare turned to him. He didn’t think this was a piece of information I would want to know? He didn’t think mentioning it might have been helpful? When he was practically dry-humping me against his cabin?
And then—and then—he had the nerve to speak.
“Did you forget something this morning, Six?”
My mind was too jumbled to figure out what he meant. “No?”
“My wake-up call,” he bit out. “At seven. That’s what I’m paying for.”
I chomped down on my bottom lip and contemplated the best way to dispose of a body. I glanced up at the security camera that focused on the front office. I couldn’t have witnesses. “Can I, uh, talk to you for a second? In the back?”
He raised his eyebrows and I noticed he was without glasses today. I wanted to know what the deal was with them. I wanted to know if he was wearing contacts now and when he’d gotten them and how bad his eyesight was and why I even cared. Good grief.
“Lead the way.”
I was surprised he was so willing to follow me. Maybe he didn’t realize how murderous I was. Or maybe he thought his big, tough muscles could protect him. But he was about to find out that hell hath no fury like a woman left in the complete dark!
Pushing open the door to Maggie’s office, I gestured for him to go walk inside. He did. I shut the door behind us and glanced around for the closest weapon.
He took a seat on the top of Maggie’s ultra clean desk, his legs spread wide, a boyish smirk tilting that wicked mouth of his. “Got something on your mind, Six?”
My hands were perched on my hips and my toe was tapping a hole through the floor. “The DC syndicate is shut down?”
His head dropped back and his fists gripped the edge of the desk. I heard him growl, “Fucking, Gus,” at the ceiling.
I didn’t know what to think of that response. But I clung to my anger and decided to push for answers until one of us broke.
“Sayer, what the hell? You didn’t think that maybe you should have led with that when you rolled into town? You didn’t think that was maybe something I would want to know? Are you kidding me?”
He straightened, crushing me with that furious gaze of his. I thought he was going to yell at me again, but his careful words were ice cold, not explosive. “It’s not exactly a secret. It was all over the news.”
“I watch the news, Sayer. I never saw anything about it.” But had I been watching the news recently? I’d kind of let that slip. I’d been busy at work. And national news wasn’t necessarily something I wanted my four-year-old to see. So maybe I’d been slipping.
Maybe I hadn’t been quite as on top of things as I should have been.
Sayer lifted one shoulder. “Regardless, it was there.”
His lack of angry engagement let some of the air out of my fury. I was still pissed. And paranoid. And freaking irritated. But I was less… ragey. “So that’s how you got out? They went to prison. You got early release. And now you’re in retirement?”
“Something like that.”
I tapped my fingers against my hip bones, trying to decide if my next question was worth it, if I even cared. After I’d sufficiently chewed my lip and worn holes in my jeans, I huffed out a breath and gave into my curiosity. “And my dad? Was he one of the guys arrested?”
Sayer watched me for a minute without answering. We were yin and yang, total opposites. I was nothing but nervous energy, a ball of frenetic electrons that couldn’t sit still or be still or do anything but wait in uptight anxiety.
And he was nothing but calm. His body was relaxed on the desk, his expression reserved, thoughtful. His hands still rested on the desk, not fidgeting, not moving, not trying to convince himself he didn’t care.
“Listen, I don’t have a lot of love for your dad,” he told me.
“Yeah, me either.”
“But.” I stopped wiggling and blew out a steadying breath. Sayer continued, “Before Gus and I left there were rumors that he was in debt in a big way. Severed hands kind of big way.”
A nervous flutter circled in my hollowed belly. The bratva were brutal with people that crossed them or didn’t live up to their promises. A bookie that couldn’t settle his own debts would be high on their intolerance list.
Which meant they would take a hand.
Depending on how bad his debt was, they could take both.
“So is he okay now that everyone is gone?”
Sayer’s head bobbed back and forth. “He didn’t necessarily owe the Volkov money, Six. He had debts all over town.”
“If he didn’t owe the pakhan money, why would they take his hands?”
He looked away. “Shame? They’re embarrassed of him? He’d dragged their name through the dirt. I don’t know, Caroline. Why do they do anything that they do? All I heard was that they wanted their pound of flesh and planned to get it. Then… I don’t know. There was a deal or something. Leon figured out how to pay them some other way.”
“But now he doesn’t have protection. Is that what you’re saying? The bratva is gone and my dad is on his own?”
“The bosses were pretty much done with him before they went away. It’s possible that he hasn’t had protection for a long time.”
There was a moment of insanity where I thought about going back to save him. Again. Just a tiny pinch in my gut that felt sorry for him because he was my family. I wondered how much he owed. Did I even have enough to cover it? Some of it? Surely I could cover some of it. Just enough to get the whole city to stop breathing down his neck.
“Stop,” Sayer ordered.
I looked back to him. “What?”
“Stop trying to figure out how to rescue him. You can’t.”
“You don’t know—”
“Think it all the way through, Caro. You’d have to resurface. You’d have to step into the open. The bratva is spread out, but they’re not dead. And the pakhan are locked away for now, but how long will that last? Think of the consequences. You knew what you were doing when you left five years ago. He is not worth stepping out of hiding to save. You know that.”
I couldn’t believe what he was saying. “He’s my dad.”
“Yeah? And I was the fucking love of your life and you didn’t save me. Don’t you dare throw this away for that piece of shit. He’s used you your entire life. You’re not going to let him use you now. Not after you got out.”
He was right. And I hated him for it. “You should have told me sooner.”
“Because we’re being so open and honest with each other?”
His snide comment reminded me that I did want him to be open and honest with me. The information about the Volkov was easily searchable, so I doubted he was lying about that. But there was more I wanted to know. Was he seriously out? Or was Colorado his attempt to lie low? What did he really want here? How did I get all my stuff back? When was he going to leave?
I decided to change tactics. Nagging him clearly wasn’t working. But there were other ways to kill a man. Like with kindness. Running a hand through my hair, I let out a puff of air. “Thanks for telling me.” I let real emotion roughen my voice and tears fill my eyes. I was a wide-eyed puppy begging for attention. “Thanks for being honest.”
His laser eyes moved over me, taking me in, noticing every small detail. “Come here,” he demanded.
Why was on the tip of my tongue. But contrite girls weren’t paranoid, they were compliant. I stepped toward him, slumping my shoulders and giving him the best poor me I could manage.
He hooked his finger in the pocket of my jeans and tugged me into the space between his legs. He pulled me closer, until I was pressed against him, his inner thighs, his abdomen, the space between those two places.
Sayer captured my gaze in his, a prisoner held hostage by the enemy. I tried to take a step back, fear nipping at my resolve to stay in character. He tugged me back against him.
“Don’t stop now,” he murmured, his voice throaty with promise and vengeance and a dare. “You want something. Now isn’t the time to back down.”
“I don’t,” I whispered, my voice choked with fear. “I shouldn’t have—” I couldn’t finish my sentence. What shouldn’t I have done? Any of this.
Any of it starting with when I was a little girl before Sayer even showed up.
Sayer’s nose brushed along my jaw causing a shiver to work its way through me. I needed to disentangle myself from this mess. I needed to get out of here and Google a few things.
“Don’t give up, Six. You’re so close to getting what you want.” He nipped at my ear, quickly soothing the bite with his tongue.
I bit back a weak whimper, refusing to let Sayer get the better of this exchange. Yes, he was the boy I had fallen in love with and had never really fallen out of love with. Yes, his body felt amazing pressed against mine, all hot, hard man and dirty promises. Yes, I was finding it hard to step away from him and shake off his hands and the crazy power he had over me.
But. But I was good at this game too.
Sometimes.
Er, I used to be.
He reclaimed my attention by pressing a wet, slow kiss to the hollow of my throat. My hands fell on his shoulders, clutching at his shirt. I needed help balancing. Standing. Thinking.
Empowerment, I internally hissed at myself. Independent. Free. You are more than your feelings.
Swallowing a big dose of my pep talk, I dropped my cheek against his. He kissed the underside of my jaw and I took the opportunity to move my lips to his ear.
He stilled, freezing with the anticipation of what I was going to do next. Not wanting to disappoint him, in a vindictive way I moved my lips over the shell of his ear, letting my tongue taste and give and drive him crazy.
I pulled his earlobe between my teeth and had the pleasure of feeling his hands grip my waist, holding me against him with a helpless grip. When his jaw muscle ticked against my chin, I took that as a sign.
I kept my voice breathy, soft, feminine. He had recently gotten out of prison. I mean, it probably wouldn’t hurt to remind him that I was a woman and that he had been locked up for a very long time. “What are you doing here, Sayer?”
He leaned his head back, keeping our bodies close. His eyes had darkened with want, his face was an open book. He was going to tell me.
This was it.
“I wanted to redeem myself,” he said.
My blood rushed so loudly I almost couldn’t hear him. “You do?”
He nodded slowly. My fingers curled into his shirt.
And then he leaned in and let his lips touch mine. It wasn’t at all like yesterday. He wasn’t rough. He wasn’t punishing. This time he was achingly sweet. Careful and gentle and considerate.
His tongue brushed over my bottom lip until I opened my mouth for him, a Pavlovian response from years of life with him, of old habits and remembered need.
He kissed me like I was breakable and delicate and his. He kissed me like he couldn’t stand being apart for a second longer. He kissed me like I was his breath and he needed me to keep living.
Our mouths were a symphony, a chorus in unison. We were striking art and perfect sound and a homecoming of touch.
It didn’t take long before he’d coaxed me to kiss him back. My resolve and fury and years of hurt didn’t stand a chance in the reality of his mouth on mine. Leaning into him, I took more, deepening our kiss until he made a growling sound in the back of his throat.
His teeth captured my lip with more pressure, reminding me of the veiled strength that hid behind this careful kiss. We deepened together, at the same moment, breaking in the same tangle of tongues and taste. I pressed into him, letting all of my body feel all of his. My arms were around his neck, desperate to hold him close. I gasped a sound that was an invitation for so much more. This wasn’t enough. I wanted more. I needed more.
I needed him.
Which was, of course, his plan. He pulled back, separating our mouths, and then scooted back so there was space between our bodies too. His eyes were half-lidded, dark with the same need I felt coursing through my body. But his smile was all smug victory. “For yesterday.”
I was a gooey pile of lust and desire. His words made no sense to me. “Huh?”
“Redemption,” he repeated. “I kissed you yesterday to prove a point. But I was angry and got carried away.”
My head was still wrapped up in the kiss we’d just had. If I had any less willpower, I would be leaning forward right now with an open mouth, trying to continue what he started. “You got carried away?”
His half smile was triumphant. Conquering. “I did.”
My anger returned and I took a few steps back, needing separation. “So what was that?”
His smiled kicked up a notch and a wicked look flashed in his eyes. “Five years without sex, Caro. That’s what it was.”
“Are you punishing me?”
He leaned forward, as casual and relaxed as I had ever seen him since he’d shown up in Frisco. “I wouldn’t really call that a punishment. You seemed pretty into it.”
“Are you serious?”
He jumped off the desk and prowled toward me. I took quick steps back, afraid he was going to punish me again. But more afraid I wasn’t going to be able to tell him to stop.
“You can ask for more, Six,” he murmured, pulling the thoughts straight from my addled brain. “I won’t tell anyone.”
My back hit the closed door. His hands came up on either side of me, bracing his body just an inch from mine. “You’re a bastard,” I told him.
“You’re the one trying to get in my head. You’re the one playing games, Six.”
I pushed against his chest and he captured my hand and held it against his rapidly beating heart. “This whole thing is a game to you,” I accused. “Since you walked into town, you’ve been up to something. Spare me the high and mighty scolding.”
His head dropped to hide his dark smile. “You really are a piece of work.”
“Then give me something real.” I’d meant to demand it, order his truth from his lips and then throw it in his face. But my words came out as a plea, a broken beg.
He lifted his head again, his blue eyes shining with raw, unfiltered openness. “It’s not a secret why I’m here, Caroline. Try and listen this time. I had an opportunity to get out of a life that had taken a lot from me and not given enough in return. I took that opportunity. I found a quiet life in a quiet town where I can do the things I like without being bothered by my past. If you find that threatening, I’m afraid that’s your issue.”
“You told me not to leave town,” I reminded him. “More than once. You said people would find us.”
His jaw ticked. “The brotherhood is finished. That’s true. But there are certain people out there that blame that on me. They would hurt you to get to me.”
Where is he?
Found you.
The box of fish guts from Ohio.
The floor dropped out from beneath me and I slumped back against the door. The black Mercedes. It wasn’t Gus or Sayer. I was being followed.
Juliet.
My only thought. My only motive.
I focused back on Sayer, the source of so many of my problems. I wanted him gone. I wanted him as far away from me as possible. And if I couldn’t get him to leave this city, then I would be the one to go.
I pushed him away from me and yanked open the door. “Get out,” I hissed at him, breathless with concern for my daughter. I had paid the ultimate price to get her away from that world only to have Sayer bring the world straight to her. “Go away.”
Something dark flashed in his eyes. In any other circumstance, with any other man I would have said he was surprised. But I knew that wasn’t true with Sayer.
It was a different emotion. Something more sinister. Something more calculated.
He snorted, but didn’t fight me. Although he did throw out an annoyed, “If you think that’s smart.”
When he was halfway through the door, I had to get the last word in. I was compelled to say something by the evil, vindictive demon inside me. “They should know by now you’re over me.”
He paused, dipping his head and looking at me out of the corner of his eye. “Yeah, I’m over you. That’s why I keep kissing you.”
Then he was gone, leaving me to reel and fight for breath and try not to pass out.
There was someone after Sayer. There was someone after me to get to Sayer. My peaceful, idyllic little town was no longer safe.
I was sucked back into the world I had fought so hard to escape.
And not just me, but Juliet too.
The door to the office jingled. I heard car doors slam and Gus’s Subaru drive away, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave the office. I couldn’t bring myself to move.
Because on top of everything, overshadowing the danger and exposure and life-threatening risk, was Sayer’s last words to me.
That’s why I keep kissing you.
It was time to leave. I had to get Juliet and Frankie and get the hell out of here. Because even if my body survived this time, my heart would not.