Milo didn’t let the door slam behind him as he pushed his way out of Assets, his chest heaving as he tried to get himself under control. Seeing Tess dance like that – God, the woman was gorgeous, athletic, impressive – drove home how very little claim he really had over the woman. He’d wanted to yank her down off the catwalk, toss her over his shoulder, and drag her back to his cave like some caveman. He’d had to bite back a shout at this Sammy character, who’d been watching her with such a carefully appraising look, and slap the other women who’d been watching her from the side of the bar, whispering behind their hands and giving Tess sideways glances. He wanted none of this and all of her.
He couldn’t have that. He knew better than to think he could. Wanting out of this life wasn’t the same as being out of this life, and it was absolutely fucking crucial that he remembers that. He was quite sure he could get Tess and the baby set up for the rest of their lives, but he didn’t know – couldn’t think – whether or not he’d ever be able to be with them. There were too many factors to consider.
First: he had to track down Toro and deal with this situation before Silk Road decided to deal with it – and him – permanently.
Second: he had to figure out why the fuck Bastille was back in town. They’d grown up together, seen the worst parts of their lives, and Bastille had been there the day that Milo left their instructors in bloody shreds behind him. He would understand why Milo had never looked back – but Milo had also ruined the closest thing to a home, perverted and twisted as it was, that either of them had ever known.
Third: could he even be the kind of man who went home to a family? He’d never considered it, and now it was being shoved in his face. It was one thing to play house with a sexy woman in a hotel room, thinking about setting her up like a little family he could visit when he wanted and leave when the itch got back, but the truth was that he’d never done anything but murder. Could he really wake up and go to sleep in the same place, day after day? In the front of his head, it sounded happy and reassuring. But it was the back of his head, as always, that concerned him.
What if he tried, really tried, and found out he was still a monster? That his hands were bloody, no matter how hard he washed them. What would he do? Who would he be then? What would happen with Tess – with the baby – if he up and left after saying he’d stay?
For the first time in his life, he thought he might understand what panic felt like.
Milo put his hands on his knees and forced himself to slow his breathing. Slow his heartbeat. Focus on the physical sensations around him, just like he did when he was following a target, and the adrenaline started to get too high. Cool and dispassionate; that was how the job got done.
Tess was in there a lot longer than a person needed to be to get hired – and after that routine, there was no chance Sammy wouldn’t offer her a job. Milo had been to enough strip clubs and dance clubs to know that Tess was something else, even if she was rusty like she’d said – but he forced himself to stay cool. She’d insisted that Sammy wasn’t the type who’d want to sample the goods and be sure the girl would put out before he’d make an offer. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t offer her some kind of bonus. Tess wasn’t Milo’s; she could do whatever she wanted. Hell, if she thought he needed the information about Toro enough, she might be willing.
He wanted to shove the door open, demand that Tess come with him right now, and never ever walk through the door again. He clenched his hand into a fist, drove it into his thigh until he stopped thinking like a madman, and then made himself continue to breathe.
It was about fifteen minutes after that when Tess came out of the club, beaming. She was back in her street clothes – the real ones he’d bought her, not the slutty “give me an interview” outfit she’d put together to catch Sammy’s eye. He liked that, and he didn’t much care if he was a caveman or not. He wanted his woman just a little hidden away. He wanted to show her off, but he didn’t want anyone to see everything that was his.
“How’d it go?” Milo asked.
Tess grinned and leaned up to kiss his cheek. His cock jumped in his pants, and he tried to pretend it hadn’t. He doubted he was very successful. “Sammy hasn’t heard anything about where Toro is, but he says the paychecks are coming in the same as always, so he doubts that Toro’s really left town. Wouldn’t he close up his accounts and run for it if he was running? There are a million places better to store money than banks in the U.S. so there’s no way he’d do that. Right?”
Milo nodded slowly. “I can’t believe he’d be stupid enough to still be drawing from those accounts directly, but it’s been a long time since he had to run. Maybe he’s that stupid. It’s worth checking out.” Tess absolutely beamed, looking so proud of herself that he wanted to pick her up, spin her in a circle, and kiss her until she begged for him to fuck her right there in the street.
But no. No. He’d arranged a surprise for her, and she was going to get the damned surprise.
“I set up a thing. You should see it.”
She gave him a long, slow look. He couldn’t blame her; he wondered how many really positive surprises she’d gotten in her life. He made himself put on the big smile, the one that made people believe that he was such a nice guy. It didn’t fool her for a second, though, and he put enough effort in to make his face relax into a softer, more typical expression for him. That got her shoulders to settle down a little bit.
“Tell me about the thing.”
“It’s really more of something I need to show you. And it’s going to be a bit of a drive. Is that okay with you?”
She paused a little longer than he would have liked, but not as long as he’d been afraid of. “Yeah, okay.”
They drove for about forty minutes out of the city. They were out of the city proper and pushing out into the farthest suburbs when Milo pulled the car to the curb. They were in front of a white Victorian two-story home with an attached garage and a nice front lawn. Tess looked at it for a little bit, then looked at Milo, who was sitting with his hands on the steering wheel.
“It’s pretty,” she said. “Why are we here?”
Milo smiled a bit. “Let’s go inside.”
Tess stared some more, then shrugged. She unbuckled her seatbelt and slid out of the car, following Milo up the grass. For the second time today, Milo felt his heart slamming against his ribs. It shouldn’t matter what she thought of him. This was about setting her up after he’d put her in a tough situation. And he was only sort of thinking about the baby. He knew what life was like for girls who had to live on the largess of some kind of kingpin. It looked like nothing but silk and furs on the outside, but there was a lot of coerced sex, a lot of drugs, and not a lot of security on the inside. It would almost be better for her if he’d actually killed Toro; she could have cleaned out whatever cash she could find and taken off. She seemed like a girl who was smart enough to have survived on a couple hundred grand for a long time.
But she’d lost that protection, and she’d lost what chance she had to be remembered in the old bastard’s will. And maybe it was chauvinistic to assume she needed a man to take care of her, but also, he could, so he was going to damn well do it.
He led her up to the front door, fished a key out of his pocket, turned the deadbolt, and pushed the door open. “Welcome to your new home.”
She froze and stared at him, long and hard. “Milo.”
“Tess.”
“What are you talking about?” She was using the kind of slow, level voice that you used to talk a crazy person down off a ledge, and it made him want to laugh. He choked back the sound, but he wanted to laugh, very much. She wouldn’t understand if he burst out cackling.
“I have a number of houses in a number of places. In different names. It makes different identities more real and fleshed out if they’re paying monthly utility bills. This is just one of them. It’s closest, so I figured it would do for now while we’re figuring out – while I’m figuring out – what my next step is in terms of Toro. If you like this one, you can keep it. If you don’t, I’ll take you to every one I own until you find one that suits you.”
She stared at him with narrowed eyes. “What are my choices?”
He shrugged. “London, Paris, Beijing, Kyoto, Moscow. Small towns you haven’t heard of. Pick a climate.”
“You’re serious.”
“I told you. I’ll take care of you. Baby or no baby, I want to help.”
He wondered if Tess realized that she’d crossed her arms over her belly, just a little bit. “Tell me why.”
“What?”
She shook her head hard, and he thought maybe she was biting back tears. “Tell me why you want to help.”
He was pretty sure that an answer about how he was just that kind of guy wasn’t going to get the job done. He needed – wanted – her to believe what he was saying. “I had a pretty shitty childhood. I know I told you about some of it. There’s worse stuff in there that I just—I don’t talk about. Not to anyone. Not ever. And whether I’m in this kid’s life or not, I want—I need to know that it’s better off than I am. Then I was.”
She was quiet for a long time, her gaze focused on the floor. Her hand kept tracing over her belly, where it would swell in the coming months. Would he be around to feel the baby kick? To take her to OBGYN appointments and hear the heartbeat? Or would he be dead in a ditch or weighted down in a river because he didn’t know how to be an actual person?
It was time to find out.
“Let me take you on a tour.”