My lips froze with a teasing grin in place when a familiar black SUV drove slowly down my street the next evening.
Don’t stop.
Don’t stop.
I wasn’t sure I took a breath or blinked during the time it took for the SUV to disappear around the corner a couple blocks down.
But just when my heart started to beat normally and my body loosened up again, the vehicle had returned and was crawling down the street toward me.
No.
My chest tightened like someone was trying to steal my air as I stared at the offending car now waiting ten feet away.
As though if I stared long enough, it would disappear.
As though if I wished hard enough . . . this might all go away.
Weak. So, so weak.
Head up.
Shoulders back.
Lips twisted.
Eyes laughing.
I forced myself from my place, walking slowly but purposefully toward the door that both beckoned and warned.
I didn’t wait to be invited in—I never did with him. Once the locks gave, I grabbed the handle and opened the rear passenger door to get in, and prayed my shaking was unnoticeable.
“Miss me?” I asked the driver in a teasing voice.
He didn’t respond.
He never had.
The man simply held a phone behind him to where I sat in the backseat, waiting for me to take it from his large, tattooed hands.
“What?” I asked into the phone. “Still can’t be seen with little ol’ me?”
“I think I am.”
Four simple words, and it suddenly felt hard to breathe again.
Chills skated down my spine, but I refused to look around to see where he might be.
I lifted a brow. “Then why am I talking into a phone and staring at your ton-of-fun errand boy?”
“Missing you,” he clarified. “I think I’m missing you.”
My stomach rolled when he laughed. The sound low and mocking and full of every evil thing this world possessed.
“I wasn’t asking you,” I said, my words full of tease. “After all . . . you always send your errand boy instead of coming yourself.”
His laughter abruptly stopped. “Don’t push me, Jessica.”
“Maybe I wouldn’t if you would stop stalking me.” My tone was light and flirtatious, but my eyes were narrowed into slits on the driver. “It’s hard to miss this car driving up and down my street every night. I know you’re having me followed everywhere I go. Last I checked, stalking was illegal.”
“Last I checked, you belong to me,” he said on a growl.
My grip on the phone tightened. “I belong to no man.”
“This is your last warning.”
“Again with the warning?” I asked with a dull sigh. “I think the last twelve were my last warnings. Or was it twenty?” I leaned in toward the driver and dropped my voice to a whisper. “Was it twenty?”
“Jessica.”
My chest hitched from the venom in his voice. My breaths became shallow.
He waited, probably enjoying the fear he could feel through the phone. And I hated him even more for it.
“Don’t let me catch you on the streets again.”
I swallowed past the lump in my throat and forced a smile on my lips. “Funny,” I said with a soft laugh. “You aren’t the one who ever catches me.”
I hung up before he could say another word and dropped the phone on the center console. Unable to muster a taunt for the driver, I slid out of the car and kept walking until I was off my street and headed home.
As soon as I finished putting my mom in bed that night, I scanned her room for any needles she may have stashed then slowly slipped my knife out from its spot on my hip as I stepped out of her room, shutting the door behind me.
My eyes darted to the living room curtains, faintly moving from the night breeze. Forcing my gaze elsewhere, I opened the knife soundlessly as I walked to my room and flipped on the light as if it were a normal night.
But it wasn’t.
I’d known it wasn’t from the second I’d stepped into the trailer.
My mom had been lying on the couch, passed out with an empty bag near her. A spoon and needle on the floor next to her. The band still loosely around her arm.
That hadn’t alarmed me. I’d walked in on my mom in that exact state since before I could remember.
It was the moving curtains.
Momma would’ve lost her mind if she’d known the window was open, which is why it always stayed firmly shut unless I was airing out the trailer. And since her other addict friends would’ve just gone through the door, I had a hunch on who it might be . . . considering our run-in the night before and what he would know was missing.
I’d only taken three steps into my room before I felt him. My body tensed with awareness but my stomach curled in anticipation.
And I hated him for that.
Hated the feeling.
I sighed and let my knife slip down so the handle was in the tips of my fingers.
“We’ve got to stop meeting like this, Nightshade.”
As soon as I heard him shift, I whirled around, throwing the knife in that direction blindly.
My eyes landed on his a second before my knife embedded itself in the wall a few inches from his head. He never flinched.
His arms were folded over his chest, a blade peeking out beneath one.
I lifted a brow. “Getting slow, Nightshade.”
“Kieran.”
I shrugged. “Nightshade.” I walked to him and forced my outward appearance to remain normal though everything inside had just shifted into madness.
I hated him for that too.
Keeping my eyes locked on his, I grabbed the handle of my knife and yanked it out of the wall. “You didn’t even flinch.”
“Your aim is off.”
“Considering I didn’t aim, I would say that was a damn good throw.” I grinned widely and ran the tip of the blade over one of his arms before folding it and tossing it on my bed. “So, are you going to tell me why I have the pleasure of finding you in my bedroom, or am I going to have to guess?”
“You know why I’m here.” Those cold eyes narrowed on the curl of my lip before darting up to meet mine, a question hidden behind the ever-present hatred. “No laughing tonight?”
“Depends on whether I start finding you amusing. Right now, I only want to hate you.” I felt myself swaying toward him. Felt myself wanting to know what his chest and arms felt like beneath my fingertips.
And I had no idea why.
I shouldn’t feel that way. He was the enemy. A man who was disgusted by me. One I needed to hate. Yet, it was there. A slow burning in my veins that made me feel unbalanced and unhinged and weak. So weak. Because for the first time in my life, I wanted a man’s touch. A man’s lips against my own.
And that man was an assassin.
I took a step closer.
Idiot.
“If you planned on hurting my mom, you missed your chance. So you can leave now, because I won’t let you near her.”
A grin touched his face. It was challenging and taunting, menacing and threatening. And it made me tremble in a way that nearly brought me to my knees.
My fingers ached to reach out and touch those full, perfectly slanted lips.
What the hell is wrong with me?
“If I wanted to kill your mom, she’d be dead.”
He pushed away from the wall as his arms unfolded, and I watched while he put the knife in his boot in a movement as fluid as breathing.
“You know why I’m here,” he repeated in a low, demanding tone.
“Do I?” I tried to make my tone challenging, but it came out as nothing more than a breath.
The truth was, he could be here for a dozen reasons. And I had no intention of showing him my cards by assuming which one of those reasons had forced him to track me down after all these years.
He only lifted a blond brow in response.
“Why don’t you tell me why you’re here so I can help you leave that much faster?” I edged closer, silently cursing myself for the way my breath hitched when my body brushed against his. “As much as I’d love to make some money tonight, I somehow doubt an assassin is here to help fill my wallet.”
Kieran’s eyes narrowed, and he flinched at my words, the movement so slight it would’ve been unnoticeable if I hadn’t been pressed against him.
“Tell me how you know what I am.”
“Probably the same way you knew where I lived.” I lifted a shoulder. “Followed. Watched. Listened.”
“Asked Beck,” he ground out.
“Not a chance in . . .” My face fell when I realized Kieran was answering me rather than assuming what my next response would be. “That bastard.”
The betrayal cut through me fast, leaving a stinging sensation I couldn’t understand. All he’d ever done was betray me. I shouldn’t have been surprised he’d lead an assassin right to us.
“Find your way back out the window,” I sneered as I turned, storming across my tiny room and stripping out of my shirt.
I threw it into the hamper harder than necessary, and I knew even as the material left my fingers that I looked like a child throwing a tantrum. But I couldn’t find it in me to care. My frustration and hatred for the men who tried to control my life made me angry.
I stepped out of my heels and toed them toward the closet then shimmied out of my jeans and balled them up to throw them with the same force. Yanking open a drawer, I grabbed the oversized shirt sitting on top of the pile of clothes and started shrugging into it but paused when I felt the threatening presence behind me.
I turned to find Kieran where I’d left him—his eyes locked on my bed and jaw clenched tight. His chest was expanding with rough jerks, and that hatred in his eyes was more evident than ever.
Feeling is mutual, Nightshade.
Forcing my mouth to crack into a smile, I sauntered toward him as I let the shirt fall over my body, covering me.
“Does seeing another woman undress make you uncomfortable after the little mob princess slipped through your fingers?” I giggled darkly when his cruel glare locked on me and shifted my arms into the shirt to work off my bra. I pulled it off slowly, palming the smaller knife I kept clipped to the front of it before tossing the bra onto my bed. “What does he give her that you couldn’t?”
The muscles in Kieran’s jaw ticked, and the anger rolling off his body suddenly felt like a living thing. But his stare never wavered from mine as I soundlessly opened the knife at my side.
“Or did I hit a little too close for comfort last night?” I asked, my voice both seductive and mocking as I took another step closer to him and then another. “Could you just not satisfy her?”
“Enough.”
My brows rose at the growl behind his demand. “Is that right?”
His eyes held so much warning as I took the last step to press my body against his.
My body trembled and begged to get closer still, but I forced myself not to move.
I hated him for the way he felt.
I hated him for the way my body craved more and betrayed me.
I hated him for everything he was and for making me want him in a way I’d never wanted a man.
I hated him.
“Who knew the mob’s feared assassin was lacking.”
One second I was in front of him, staring into those wild eyes, the next I was pressed face-first to the wall with Kieran’s hard body caging me against it. His strong hands were pinning mine to the wall. My knife was gone.
His chest moved roughly against my back, his breath made my hair dance along my cheek and lips, and I ached to push against where I could feel his hardened length in his jeans.
Oh God.
What is wrong with me?
I tried to force a wild laugh from my lungs.
I tried to taunt him.
But there was nothing.
“How long?” he demanded, his voice hoarse.
I curled my hands against the wall and shivered beneath him when he moved closer and pressed our hands harder to the wall.
“What?” I asked breathlessly.
“How long have you been watching us?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
A huff tumbled from my lips when his mouth met my ear. The sound ended on a whimper when the movement forced my butt against his erection.
I needed the heavy, sickening feeling weighing my body down. I needed the disgust and hatred at having a man so close. I needed the reminder of who I was and why I did what I did.
But all I could smell was the subtle hint of his soap.
All I could see was his tattooed arms twisting over mine.
All I could feel was his lean muscles crowding around me in a way that felt so foreign and good.
And I wanted more . . .
Weak. So weak.
“How long?”
My body tensed.
If he had yelled the question, it might have been easier. But there was something truly terrifying in the soft tenor of his voice. And for the first time, I was afraid to be in the same room as him.
But I wasn’t scared for my life.
I was scared for my soul.
I slowly looked over my shoulder and forced myself to hold his disturbing stare. “Nearly half my life.”
“Why?”
“I have my reasons.”
His eyes burned coldly, maliciously . . . and with something I couldn’t define. “Then tell me why I shouldn’t kill you now.”
“Because you don’t want to.”
“I wouldn’t be sure about that.”
“If you wanted me dead, I would be,” I said. “Besides, the only reason you know now is because Beck can’t keep his damn mouth shut. If you hadn’t been there last night, you’d go on with your life, never knowing I existed. Never knowing that I slip onto the estate that houses the men trying to tear my mom from me.”
His mouth set in a hard line when I finished speaking. As if he was waiting for me to continue . . . as if he was searching for some hidden message in my words when there was none.
“Now tell me why you’re here.”
“I have my reasons,” he murmured, throwing my words back at me.
“I bet you do.” I arched against the wall in an attempt to push him back, but another whimper tumbled from my lips. “I’m sure my winning personality isn’t one of them,” I said breathlessly.
Weak . . . so weak.
“My wallet is.”
A smile broke free. “Now I know you’re here just to see me since I put it where it belongs.”
I was turned as quickly as before. Within a beat of my heart, my back was against the wall, and an assassin was pressing me harder against it, towering over me.
My legs felt unsteady.
“Where?”
The corner of my mouth lifted in a mocking grin. “Anywhere you want me.”
He forced me back, this time rougher, and I somehow managed a wild slip of a laugh when all I wanted was to beg to feel his lips on my own.
How can you want him?
He’ll ruin you.
“Where is it?” he growled through clenched teeth.
“You’re a heavy sleeper,” I hinted.
It was then I realized I was shaking.
Except I wasn’t.
Kieran was vibrating so violently it was shaking me too.
With a hard shove, he pushed away from the wall and me, forcing a huff from my chest at the sudden loss of his body.
His chest rose and fell roughly as he watched for immeasurable seconds, his hateful glare searing me, making me feel even more horrified for the parts of me that had wanted him.
When he stepped back to leave, I nodded toward the door of my room. “Don’t forget to close the window this time.”
“What window?”
“The one you left open. When you let yourself in,” I said slowly when he didn’t react in any way.
Kieran’s head tilted slightly, like he was listening for something. His eyes drifted from my room toward the hall, and then with another hard glare at me, he turned to leave.
My heart raced when he only made it a few steps before stopping.
That small voice inside was begging him to turn around. To close the distance between us.
To make me feel something other than the hatred and fear and disgust I’d felt my entire life.
Weak.
Head up.
Shoulders back.
Lips twisted.
Eyes laughing.
He gripped the door in one hand and the frame in the other before finally looking over his shoulder.
“Tell me something.”
I lifted a brow and waited.
“Why did you turn Beck down?”
I lost my hold on my strength at the unexpected turn in the question. “What, he didn’t tell you?” When Kieran didn’t respond, I huffed and folded my arms under my chest. “He knows. That’s all that matters.”
“Jessica.”
I refused to acknowledge the way my knees shook when my name crawled from his throat. Refused to acknowledge the way my stomach swirled with heat. “Yes, Nightshade?”
“Why did you turn Beck down?”
“What was this, gossip hour between the boys? I hate him. Isn’t that enough of a reason?”
“Not when you’ve been following him and watching us despite turning him down.”
I lifted my chin and stared down the assassin in front of me. “He wanted me to belong to him. I belong to no man. I have my reasons for continuing to watch.”
Kieran studied me for a few seconds. Then with a hard nod, he slipped from my room.
I didn’t hear his steps down the hall.
I didn’t hear him leave.
And he took my damn knife.