56. Bay
FIFTY-SIX
bay
I’m beginning to hate the day Friday.
Not only is it because I have to sit with Emilio Wildes and play Daughter of the Year, but because I’m surrounded by men who have been labeled as ex-boyfriends with chips on their shoulders and bruised egos.
There’s nothing worse than an emotionally distraught man.
I thought bitches were bad, but Torin and Reeve act as though…I ripped their whole world apart.
And I did.
Fuck me.
I haven’t even made it into the house yet, standing in front of the massive mansion and beginning the five steps up to hell because Daddy Dearest decided to get the whole gang together tonight.
Torin.
Reeve.
Cairo.
And Ozzy.
Who’s been up my whole ass since the other night and doesn’t allow me a bit of fucking peace except when I go pee or shower.
On the porch, I stare at the pristine white door and just continue to do so.
“How quick can you eat?” Ozzy comes up to my side, keeping a bit of a distance away, and he doesn’t answer me. “I don’t want to do this, Oz.”
The crickets chirp around us, coaxing me back to safety and solace, but I don’t follow their lead.
I go along with what I told Emilio I would do every Friday night and continue with the plan Levi and I set out.
“I’m here,” Ozzy whispers, and it’s sweet but not resolving anything.
“Every time I come here…I miss my dad even more. The fact he’s gone…and Emilio is still here, alive and breathing…I can’t make sense of it all. Why someone so good has to be taken away and someone so evil gets to stay.”
I inhale and try to settle my nerves. Even though Ozzy has been doing the least in the talking department, I’m getting used to him being around. Surprisingly, Mae hasn’t chased him away yet, and it’s impressive he hasn’t tried. I’m not sure what’s come over him lately, but maybe the other night he came into my bedroom and I spoke about trust means he’s trying.
Moving forward, I knock on the door, which is immediately opened by a middle-aged butler, and step inside the foyer.
Just to find Cairo waiting for me with his hands pulled behind his back.
He’s in an all-black dress shirt that’s unbuttoned on top, and matching slacks with his hair combed to the side in this casual-dangerous little vibe that makes him look equally delicious and dangerous.
“I’m surprised you decided not to use your kingly powers and skip this thing,” I divulge, feeling Ozzy come up to my side again.
Cairo ignores me and glances at his brother. “Do you mind giving us a second?”
Ozzy wastes no time giving up his close distance of me and heads for the dining hall while the butler has fucked off somewhere.
Meanwhile, Cairo’s dark brown eyes slowly pilot back to mine, and I feel as though I’m about to get into serious trouble with the way they’re glimmering with animosity.
I just don’t know what I did now.
Cairo jerks his head in a gesture for me to follow. On instinct, I don’t move.
Not yet.
Boys are dangerous creatures with weird ideas, but I find myself always attaching to one of them because girls are bitches.
And this boy and I have not had the best relationship to date.
However, I’m in Emilio’s house, so what’s the worst that could happen?
Slowly, I erase the space between the two of us and step inside the room.
It’s dark, and the door softly closes behind us, when I’m whipped around by my bicep, and Cairo’s mouth crashes viciously into mine.
He’s so fucking tall I rise a bit on my toes to get better access. My fingers thread through the fade of his hair and up to the back of his head where I can get a good grip.
I’m assaulted in the best possible way by his tongue next, lashing out and coaxing mine for a deeper kiss. A vibrating buzz thrums throughout my body as I ground myself into the moment when he tears his lips away, and I’m left heaving and breathless right before his fingers wrap around the edge of my jaw.
The pads of his fingers press slightly into my cheeks, alluding to the fact he may have just given me something sweet, but he’s not about to forget what he came to do.
And I bet, that’s going to be sour.
“You didn’t fuckin’ tell me,” he snarls out, his hot breath brushing along the bridge of my nose.
“Tell you what?”
“Bay…” My name is a warning shot. A break in his normally cool demeanor. Yet, since I’m still in the dark here—literally and figuratively—I don’t know what to do for him here.
“Cairo,” I slightly mock. “You wanna get a little more specific?”
“You thought…” The pad of his thumb grazes softly against my cheek in a comforting yet hostile caress. “You were gonna go to the grave with a secret that would obliterate my family, didn’t you?”
The hairs on my arms stand on end as I stare into darkness and the slight outline of his face. “What secret?”
“Were you biding your time, Little T? Did you think no one was ever going to find out that Torin dropped you in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean so no one could find your body?”
I freeze on impact when his words finally hit my ears because there’s no way.
No one knew.
No one.
We were the only two there.
“What are you talking about?” I force from my lips because I can’t rat him out.
I just can’t.
It doesn’t matter that I don’t want to be with Torin, or that the sheer nearness of him makes me quiver. It’s his mind that’s the most powerful thing of all.
A haunted man who is starting to get a little psychotic with his actions and how can I blame him when he believes I murdered Judah?
In hindsight, I’m nothing to him but a crush. Someone he always wanted. A girl on the other side of a line he can’t cross without Levi making a stink about it.
Every man wants what they can’t have.
And, thanks to Matteo’s and Torin’s stubborn asses, I’m suspect number one in his brother’s murder. Pretty Boy is too much in his grief to see color. He’s living in a world of black and white with no gray.
“Tell me it isn’t true,” Cairo argues, digging his fingers harder into my skin. “That it’s not why you look at him the way you do. It’s different. You shudder when he’s near.”
I shake my head. “It’s not like that.”
“Isn’t it? I want you to stand here…and lie right to my face.” I say nothing. “C’mon.”
“Let me go.”
“You lied to me,” he claims. “I asked you, and you flat out dodged that shit?—”
“You’ve got five seconds to fuck off me, or I’m poppin’ you in the fucking balls, Sinatra.”
His chest presses into mine, sandwiching me even harder into the door. “Lie to me.”
Those three words sound more like a plea than they do a command.
Why does he want to know so badly?
Why does it fucking matter?
I’m not going to tell anyone—I haven’t, so if he thinks I’m going to hold this over their heads until the end of time, I’m not.
“You don’t have to worry,” I reply through the rapid beat of my heart racing in my chest. “I’m never going to tell anybody.”
“I want you to tell me.”
My jaw ticks out of frustration because I can’t. “Cairo, please?—”
“He could’ve murdered you. Don’t you understand that?”
“I was there, so, yeah. I do. But he didn’t. So, let it go.”
“Let it go,” he repeats sardonically, sending a chill straight up my spine. “Are you fuckin’ serious?”
“Dead.”
I know it’s not funny, but I’m not talking about this anymore. It’s only adding to the point that I didn’t want to be here in the first place, and this is making it worse.
Cairo slowly loosens his grip before his thumb lightly brushes along the flesh of my face again. “All this time…I told you he wasn’t going to hurt you. And he did. You never said anything. How the fuck am I supposed to manage this now?”
My lips part to say something, but the answer isn’t the one he wants to hear.
There is no fixing this, and that’s what Cairo does. It seems to be the only thing he knows how to do.
“I need to go,” I reply, reminding him where we are and that we’re going to be looked for soon. There’s no way Emilio is going to sit his ass down and wait while Ozzy shows up without me.
“This isn’t over,” Cairo threatens. “We’re going to talk about this.”
“We’re not because I said we’re not,” I argue. “I’m done with this. You can do what you need to do, just leave me out of it. I’ve dealt with it enough.”
I pull my face out of his grip and slip through the limited space between us.
I’m quick to open the door and never have to speak of this again.
I meant what I said.
I’m done.