Aria was sitting on the terrace next to the kitchen when Damian finally returned.

“Hello,” she said, feeling oddly shy. The last time she’d seen him his face had still been in shadow.

She’d spent the day wandering the beach, perusing the books on the shelves in the house, and napping on the big sofa. She’d picked up her phone twice, her fingers hovering over the voice mail button to check the messages from Primo, before she’d finally thrown it in the water. She didn’t know what she would do next, but she wasn’t ready to talk to him and she didn’t want to risk giving him a way to find her.

Damian walked to the fridge, removed two beers and made his way to the terrace. Stopping next to her, he leaned down, swept her mouth up in a kiss that surprised her with its tenderness. He handed her one of the beers.

“Hello.”

She took a drink of the beer, her mouth suddenly dry, words escaping her. What had she expected? That everything that had passed between them the night before would dissipate with the morning light?

It hadn’t. That much was clear both from the way her body responded to his kiss and the way he looked at her. The way he held out his hand when he sat in the chair next to her, closed it around hers when she met him halfway.

She looked over at him. “How bad is it?”

“Under control,” he said. “No casualties on our side yet. Primo and Malcolm are in hiding.”

She was surprised by the directness of his answer. She’d grown used to Primo’s hedging, the way he avoided telling her things in the name of protecting her when she was beginning to suspect it had more to do with protecting his own interests. It was unexpectedly refreshing to ask questions and get answers. She realized she had a lot of them.

“What about the police?” she asked.

“We have quite a few on our payroll,” Damian said. “I imagine Primo does as well. We can’t hold them off forever, but a few well-placed bribes mean they’re willing to look the other way until the heat from above gets too hot to handle.”

“What will happen to Primo when it’s over?” she asked.

He hesitated. “I don’t know. It depends on how he handles it at the end.”

“The end?”

“Primo’s organization will fall,” Damian said. “That’s a forgone conclusion. The only thing left to determine is how many resources I’ll have to call in to end it quickly. If it were just me, it might take longer, but with the backing of the Syndicate, I don’t expect it to last long.”

“Will you kill him?” she asked.

“Not if you don’t want me to.”

It was the first admission he’d made that she had sway over him. She didn’t know what to make of it. Wasn’t ready to further define her power and its limitations.

“What about me?”

“First you get rid of your cell phone,” he said.

“Already done.”

He reached into his pocket, handed her a phone. She recognized it as a burner phone that couldn’t be traced.

“Call Primo,” he said. “Tell him you’re safe and leaving the country, that he shouldn’t bother looking for you. You won’t be back until this is over.”

She laughed a little, tucked her legs up under her. “I’m not leaving the country.”

He met her gaze, his voice steely. “Yes, you are.”

She stood, walked to the edge of the terrace, crossed her arms over her body. “Fucking me doesn’t give you authority over me.”

The words were barely out of her mouth when he spun her around to face him, his hands firmly on her shoulders. “No, but the way I feel about you does. The city is on fire right now, Aria, and this isn’t far enough away for me to guarantee your safety.”

Her mind skipped over the first part of his sentence. She didn’t know what it meant, didn’t have the clarity of thought to figure it out, let alone to decipher the way she felt about him in return.

“I’ve never asked you to guarantee my safety.”

“Maybe not, but we’re in this together now.” He rubbed a hand over his face, and she saw suddenly how tired he was, wondered if he’d slept at all the night before. “And god help me, I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

She reached up, touched his face. “What are we doing, Damian?”

He shook his head, took her face in his hands. “I don’t know, but tell me you don’t feel it too.”

She met his eyes, tried to summon the words.

I don’t feel it. It was just sex. Nothing more.

She couldn’t. It was a lie.

She was still trying to figure out how it was possible to have feelings for a man she’d only met days earlier, a man who was the sworn enemy of her brother, who should therefore be her enemy as well. But with all the things she didn’t know, there was something she did.

There was something between them.

She didn’t know what it was or where it would lead, but it was there.

“I feel it too,” she finally said. “I can’t explain it, but I do.” She wondered if she was imagining the relief in his eyes.

“If you go back, there will be hell to pay. That’s if you can find Primo at all. My men haven’t even been able to find him yet, and there are hits out on every location you might try — the club, the apartment, all of it. It’s not safe for you anywhere near the city.”

She thought she should feel some sense of loss at the thought of the apartment, the club she’d decorated so lovingly, being torn apart by Damian’s men. Instead she felt absolutely nothing. It belonged to another person.

Another life.

She held out her hand. “Give me the phone.”

He handed it to her. “Keep it short. No details.”

She looked at the display for a few seconds before dialing. She was beginning to wonder if Primo would pick up on his private line — the burner phone would be an unknown number — when she heard his voice.

“Yes?”

“It’s me.”

“Ari?” There was a lift of hope in his voice that broke her heart. It wouldn’t last long. “Is that you?”

“It’s me,” she said. “I’m calling to tell you that I’m okay, but I’m leaving town… leaving the country for awhile.”

“What are you talking about?” A cold edge had crept into his voice. “You’re being ridiculous. We had a fight, that’s all. Tell me where you are and I’ll send someone for you.”

“I can’t do that, Primo. Not this time.” She drew in a breath, turned away from Damian like not looking at him would somehow make it less of a betrayal to Primo. “Do what you have to do, but leave me out of it.”

“Are you with him right now?” His voice was dangerously low. It was the way he talked when he was on the verge of losing control. When he was barely holding it together. “Is that why you’re doing this? Because you let him fuck you like a whore?”

“This is between you and me, Primo. It’s always been between you and me. Just let me go.”

“We’re family,” he yelled into the phone. “We don’t let each other go. Not now or ever.”

It was the one thing he could have said that made her second-guess her decision. Because he was right: they were family. They’d lost everything together. Had rebuilt it together too. They’d saved each other a hundred times.

And now she was leaving him when he was under siege.

She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to find Damian looking at her. The concern in his eyes was completely unfamiliar to her. How long had it been since she’d seen anything but anger or fear in Primo’s eyes? Since he’d cared about something besides impressing Malcolm or making more money or improving his standing among the men?

“That’s not your decision to make,” she said into the phone. “I’ll be in touch.”

She hung up and gave Damian the phone. He took it from her shaking hand and pulled her into his arms. She stood stiff against him for a moment before relaxing into him. It felt good to let go.

Strange, but good.

His arms were big and powerful, the kind of arms that could block out the world. She lay her head on his chest, breathed in the scent of him as he touched his lips to her hair.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know this can’t be easy.”

“I shouldn’t care,” she said. “Not after everything that’s happened.”

He pulled back a little, touched her face with his knuckles. “If it’s one thing I understand, it’s the complexity of family. He’s your brother. It’s understandable that you’d care. But right now you have to take care of you. I’d like to help if you’ll let me.”

It was a dangerously attractive offer. Let go. Let someone else take care of her. Let someone else keep making the decisions. Let herself be carried along by the decisions of others. It’s what she’d been doing since her parents died, long past the age when she should have willingly given up her agency to Primo.

She wasn’t a child anymore. At some point she would have to start making her own decisions, but right now there were precious few open to her. Damian was right; she had to take care of herself, and the best way she could do that was to remove herself from the war between him and Primo. Go someplace where she could regroup and figure out what was next.

And then there was him.

Damian.

There was something between them. She wanted to know what it was, what it meant, where it would lead.

She owed herself that much, didn’t she?

She looked up at him. “What do we do now?”