They fucking what?” I say into the phone.

“I’m telling you as a courtesy, Leo,” says Marco Bianchi. “The family still hasn’t forgiven you and your brother for the mess you made, but we’re also not about to accept the Morettis insult. As far as the rest of our world is concerned, you are still under the Bianchi wing, and the Morettis are targeting your woman. That means they are targeting us. You come back to Jersey, and we’ll extend our protection to you and your brother again.”

I don’t bother pointing out that Marco had no problem letting my brother, Carlito, and I get targeted for the past four years. Chances are he’s using this as an excuse to backstab us because the Morettis are probably breathing down his neck. Angelo was acting outside the will of the family when he killed Nico, and the only grudge between the two families is that my brother and I are alive. But if Marco wants to try to pull some shit on me, he is welcome to try. I’m coming back either way. Julia needs me.

I glance across the hotel room to Angelo, who is sitting cross-legged on the bed, cleaning his gun. He looks so much harder than the little brother I knew before prison, before we had to live these hard years on the run. There are lines on his once smooth face and a darkness in his eyes that was never there before.

“Good,” I say. “We’ll be in touch.” I hang up the phone, fuming. How the hell did the Morettis find out about Julia anyway? I would have thought they put two and two together the day they saw me at the restaurant, but it has been way too long for that. They would’ve figured it out a long time ago if they were going to. Knowing she’s in danger twists my insides.

It’s only five minutes later that I have Angelo and Carlito packed into the car. Once I explained, they both understood. They know I still hold a fire for Julia, and they know better than to get between me and my woman. My woman. I doubt she would agree with the sentiment, but tough shit. She’s mine, whether she realizes it or not, and the Morettis made the mistake of their lives when they brought her into this. I was content to just shoot back, until now. Now I’m going to go for the throat.

I left Carlito and Angelo to meet with the Bianchis and get us all set up with our own places to stay again. It will be strange living alone after our years on the run. I got used to having the two of them around.

I’m waiting outside Julia’s office, leaning on her same shitty Acura that has gathered a few more dents and scratches since I saw it last. The inside of her car is a mess, and it makes me grin. This was actually the last place I talked to her.

Damn. This girl turns me sentimental. My chest is hot and I can feel my heartbeat running a little faster than normal while I wait for her. I wonder what she’ll think when she sees me here after so long. I never had a chance to explain why I had to bail on our date, and she probably just thinks I lost interest. Hell, if she carries a gun, she might even take a shot at me. I wouldn’t blame her.

I eventually get tired of waiting and let myself into her office. There are a few people in the waiting room, but still no secretary, so I move through the waiting room and find her door. I open it and she’s sitting behind her desk, writing something on a legal pad while a depressed looking woman dabs at her eyes with tissues.

Julia’s eyes turn to saucers when she sees me. Her mouth hangs open and her pen freezes.

I look at the crying woman on the couch. “Get out,” I say.

She doesn’t need to be told twice. She scrambles out of the room, crying even harder.

I stand completely still, wanting nothing more than to just look at her again, to take in the soft lines of her face and her lush curves, to remember the color of her eyes and the way her lips curl up at the corners when she’s turned on. I missed her so fucking much.

I duck at the last second, barely dodging the stapler she throws at my head. I frown. “What the fuck?” I ask.

Her face is a ball of anger as she opens desk drawers, likely looking for more projectiles.

I rush toward her just as she hefts a glass paperweight the size of her hand. I clutch her wrist, staring into her eyes. “Stop it,” I growl. Being so close is distracting me. I can smell her perfume, something faint and vaguely like vanilla.

She looks back into my eyes, lips pressed angrily together. “You left. You just left me there.” Tears well in her eyes, but she just looks pissed, not sad.

“I’m back now.”

She shakes her head, making her long black hair curl around her neck, begging me to lean down and kiss her. “That’s not good enough. You left. You left me to do this all on my own.” One of the tears rolls down her cheek.

All this? What does she mean do all this on my own? “I’m not going to make excuses, Julia. I’m back. I missed you like hell, and I want to start making it up to you.”

Her eyebrows squeeze together and she shakes her head slowly. “It’s not that easy. You don’t get to just walk away when you feel like it and come back in here like nothing ever happened.”

I think about telling her she’s in danger, that I need to protect her, but she doesn’t need that weighing on her mind. If she refuses to be with me, I can still watch over her and protect her. I’ll just have to do it from a distance, but I can live with that. I deserve the anger she has towards me. I try to imagine how it all must have seemed from her perspective and realize what an asshole I must look like. I come into her life, fuck her, forget her, and then come back like it’s all going to be fine. I guess I forgot how much easier it was for me to hold a flame for her all this time when I got to walk away knowing she wanted things to continue. She has had four years to accept the fact that I threw her away, and it seems like she has done a good job of it.

“I understand,” I say, turning to walk from the room.

Something hard bangs into the back of my head. It hurts like hell. I slap a hand to the back of my head and turn, looking at the glass paperweight on the ground and at Julia, who’s standing behind her desk, arm still outstretched from throwing it at me. Fucking bitch. I rush to her desk and lift her by the shoulders, pressing her to the wall and pinning her there with my body. “You shouldn’t have done that,” I growl.

There’s a crazed recklessness in her eyes. “I shouldn’t have fucked you either, but I did. I guess I’m a slow learner.”

Just the mention of fucking gets my cock hard, and I feel it pressing into her as I pin her to the wall. I could take her right now. God, I’ve wanted this so badly, for so long. It’s taking everything in me right now not to kiss her, to run my hands across her body.

“If I let you go, will you stop attacking me?” I ask.

“No,” she says.

I press myself harder into her, face dangerously close to her lips. “I don’t want to let you go,” I say, voice low.

Her eyes fall to my lips and I see hers part. I crush my mouth against her. For a second, she’s stiff against me, but then her body melts into mine, hands squeezing into the hard muscle of my back. My tongue slides into her mouth and she moans against me. I slide my hand up her blouse, moving beneath her bra to cup her tit. Her hands tug at my belt and without warning, like cold ice water being poured on the heat of my passion, I know we need to stop. I push myself off her and see the confusion in her beautiful brown eyes. Her lips and cheeks are flushed red, and her shirt is in disarray. She looks so unbelievably fuckable that I can’t believe I’m stopping, but I won’t make the same mistake again.

The first time I took her in her office, I was selfish. I wanted what I came for and I took it when I wanted it, regardless of the consequences for her. This time I’m not going to sacrifice her well-being for my lust. I’m not going to risk her job or her happiness to get off. Not again. She deserves better than that.

“Not here,” I say.

It only takes a heartbeat for the last traces of passion to vanish from her face, replaced by a cold anger that has had years to fester. “Just leave then. That’s the only thing I can count on you to do.”

I don’t let her see how much her words bite, turning and walking out of the office without another word.

I look at the apartment building she lives in. I had to pull a favor with one of the Bianchi’s guys who finds information to get her address. It feels a little creepy, but I don’t really care. I’ll do whatever it takes to fix this mess I made for her. I’ve had a long time to think about everything that happened between us years ago, and I may not have all the answers, but I know she deserved better. She deserved a hell of a lot better, and if I can, I’m going to give it to her this time. The right way. I’m no saint though, I’m also hoping she’ll let me do more than just protect her. I want to be more than a guardian to her.

I enter the apartment building through the front door and find a single, narrow hallway with a row of doors on both sides and a staircase leading up. The first door has a yellowing plaque that says “Landlord”. I knock twice and wait, feeling a little crazy. The door opens and a small, hunched woman missing more than a few teeth squints up at me. “Well, hello handsome,” she says, laughing so hard that she starts to cough.

I smirk, moving closer to pat her back and help her to the couch inside her cramped apartment. “You okay, ma'am?” I ask.

“Keep holding me like that and I will be.” She laughs again in a husky way that seems to inevitably draw coughing fits.

I get her settled on the couch and then take a seat across from her on a folding lawn chair.

“Did God answer my prayer for a boy toy, or are you here about an apartment?” she asks. The hint of laughter in her eyes lets me know she’s just fucking with me.

“An apartment,” I say. “For now, at least.” I wink.

She laughs again, slapping her knees and rocking on the couch as she coughs up something from deep inside her chest. “I’ve got a few available. Did you want the first floor or second floor?”

“Second floor.”

“There’s 203. That’ll be the nicest one. Barely been lived in since I renovated it last year. There’s 207 as well, but that one has seen better days. Same price, so…”

“I’ll take 207,” I say. Julia’s room is 208, and I want to be as close as I can to her.

She raises her eyebrows. “You sure, handsome?”

“Yeah.” I stand, handing her an envelope with the first and last month’s rent and security deposit inside. “This should be everything.”

She frowns in confusion, opening to leaf through the money as she speaks. “But I haven’t told you...oh. This is the right amount.” She starts trying to stand on her own, but I move to her side, taking her in my arms and helping her up.

She hobbles to a drawer and opens it, rifling through what sounds like a pile of keys before she plucks one key out with a yellow piece of tape on the base that says “208”. I take the key and thank her, heading upstairs. The second floor is the same as the bottom floor, but someone wrote “Jazz” in red graffiti across the wall outside the staircase. I stand in the hallway, feeling my stomach turn over. I did this to her. I thought I was protecting her, but I abandoned her. I left her to this. Logically, I know I can’t be the only cause of her problems. She’s clearly still working as a therapist, which should be good money for a woman living on her own, but there must be something else going on. I hope it’s not drugs. Fuck. Thinking of Carlito and the way his eyes are always lidded and how his mind has been dulled is enough to know I never want her touching the stuff. But living in a place like this, I don’t know if I could blame her.

I clench my fist so hard the key digs into my skin, squeezing until it hurts. I’m going to fix this. I don’t know how yet, and I don’t know what problems she faces, but I’m going to do everything I can to keep her safe and get her out of this mess.