Chapter 19 #3
Her green eyes spark up at me, and there she is again, coming back to life. My relief is so sudden and palpable that I have to kiss her.
“I didn’t say that.” I lower my head and brush my mouth over hers.
She doesn’t push me away, kissing me back instead.
Her breathing is steady and calm now, her arms going around my neck in a tight hold like she’s afraid she’ll lose me.
And that’s inevitable, given the two different worlds we live in and the way mine is currently imploding. A week from now, she’ll be back in the Midwest where she belongs, teaching her students, typing away on her computer, forgetting me and all the mayhem that’s unfolded.
The thought shouldn’t leave a pang like a knife being lodged in my chest, but it does.
She’s the first to end the kiss. “You didn’t answer me with a no, though.”
Damn it. Isla’s still stuck on what’s happening to Ekaterina Sidorov.
“We’ve been over this before, sweetheart,” I tell her as gently as possible. “The less you know about any of our businesses, the better off you’ll be.”
“Killing an innocent woman is part of your business?”
There’s accusation in her eyes now, holding me there, daring me to look away. “Scorpion took her. What happens to her is up to him. Either way, he’s getting her out of here tonight.”
She stiffens in my lap. “But—”
“No.” I hold my index finger to her lips.
“She’s not innocent, Isla. Believe me. She’s a part of a very dangerous crime family, people who are capable of anything, however ruthless and sadistic.
Twisted fucks who bombed a restaurant that was filled with actually innocent people whose only crime was to be grabbing lunch.
Not to mention all the people on the sidewalk and street and side alleys they might have taken out with their bomb too. ”
“I thought you said it was timed perfectly and they didn’t want anyone to get hurt.”
“Yes, but they planted a bomb, tesoro. There’s no explaining that shit away as anything less than evil.”
“Yeah.” She shakes her head like she’s trying to clear it, looking suddenly dazed. “I guess you’re right. But one wrong doesn’t justify another.”
“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”
“So bomb their restaurant, then.”
I chuckle, wondering if she even realizes what she’s saying. “They don’t have a restaurant, and even if they did, we don’t stoop to their level.”
“How is kidnapping someone not stooping to their level?”
“I didn’t authorize what Scorpion did,” I tell her patiently. “And for the record, he didn’t kidnap anyone. She went with him willingly.”
At first, but I don’t tell Isla that part. She knows too much as it is, and with the Feds about to come knocking on our doors, I can’t afford a loose thread like her hanging out there in the wind, ready to spill all her secrets after a round of good cop/bad cop in the interrogation room.
“She doesn’t sound willing now,” Isla points out grimly.
Ekaterina shouts something in Russian.
I hope Scorpion gets her out of here soon.
Lucky will be showing up any minute now with our sisters and, unfortunately, Antonella.
I protested bringing her to the safe house.
She doesn’t fucking deserve our protection.
But Lucky was afraid she’d be taken as leverage, so I’ll just have to ignore her existence until this shit blows over.
Which I hope it does.
Soon.
“Whatever the case may be, just remember they started this war by following you and then handcuffing you to a bed, knocking out my men, and blowing up our restaurant. Anything that comes after that is fair fucking game.”
“I thought I wasn’t family, so I don’t matter. You can’t count me as part of this. Retaliate for your restaurant’s sake, but don’t pretend like it’s for me.”
I hear hurt in her voice, and I realize I fucked up earlier when I was talking to Scorpion.
What I said was technically true—she isn’t part of the family.
But I’m still grappling with what Isla means to me, and I was mad as hell at my brother for being a hothead and kidnapping a Russian Mafia princess, landing us in an even more dangerous and precarious position than we already were.
“I didn’t mean that you don’t matter,” I tell her, holding her stare so she knows how serious I am about this. “You do matter. A whole fucking lot.”
To me.
And Jesus, it’s terrifying. I’m not ready to admit that aloud just yet.
She doesn’t say anything. Just looks at me.
“I meant that what happened to you didn’t justify kidnapping the head of the Russian Mafia’s sister, damn it,” I burst out, essentially giving her the ammunition against Scorpion and me that I know she wouldn’t use unless she had to one day.
Shit.
“So, he did kidnap her, even though you said she went with him willingly,” she says.
“I’m not going to get into the specifics with you because I need you to be insulated from all this. I need to be sure that if the Feds were to come calling, you’d have nothing to offer them.”
“So now I’m going to be interrogated by law enforcement?”
“I can’t predict the future. All I can do is play it as safe with you as possible. Because you do fucking matter.”
I’m getting worked up now. We’re going down a road I wanted to do everything in my power to avoid, and I don’t like it. I need to change the damn subject.
“And because you matter,” I continued, “let’s talk about the panic attack you were having when I first came in. Is it because of the window issue?”
I’m recalling the panic attack that she had when I first suggested bringing her here.
“It’s that and everything else,” she admits. “I’m doing my best not to think about the windows.”
As she says the word, I can see the panic flaring in her eyes again.
So, I kiss her. Long and slow and deep. Kiss her like I’ve been longing to do since I left her in my kitchen this morning, what now may as well have been a lifetime ago. She kisses me back, making a needy sound that stirs my dick.
Now is not the time for a hard-on. I’ve got Lucky, our half sisters, and the woman who birthed us showing up at any second. And Scorpion’s going to be moving out his prisoner soon. I need to control myself.
Thinking about the Russian hellcat down the hall wilts my cock significantly.
I lick into Isla’s mouth, tasting her strawberry lip gloss. She’s summer and sunshine, everything I don’t deserve, everything I so desperately want but can’t have. The reminder has me breaking the kiss.
“I have a few things that might help.”
“You do?” She sounds surprised.
“Yeah. Let me show you.”
She wiggles off my lap, and I miss the feeling of her there, the rightness of it. There’s something about this woman that feels like she’s mine, on a primal level I’ve never known before. But then I stand up too, because that’s a fucking idiotic, dangerous thought I can’t entertain.
And most importantly, I don’t want her to suffer. When she hurts, it’s like someone ripped a hole in my chest, pulled out my veins, and cut them open just to watch me bleed out.
I go to the boxes of “virtual” window decals the men rounded up for me in record time and pull one out, showing her a scene of palm trees presiding over water that’s the same color as the ocean in St. Thomas.
When I told the guys beach-themed, I had no idea they’d find something exactly like what I had in mind.
“What is it?” Isla asks, her nose scrunched up as she eyes the rolled-up decal in my hand.
“It’s a window.” I unroll it slowly, then peel off the backing before affixing it to the nearest wall.
As I smooth out the bubbles, I tell myself it’s not terrible.
Out of the corner of my eye, I’d probably swear this was legit.
I know this isn’t a real solution. It’s probably not even a solution.
But I had to try, and lacking any other place to bring her on such short notice, this was the best I could do.
“Alessio. Did you buy me a fake window?”
I steal a glance back at her. “Technically, it’s a real window. There are shutters and everything. And I bought you fifteen of them. You can put them anywhere you like.”
“Nobody’s ever bought me stick-on windows before.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve never bought stick-on windows for anyone,” I say, keeping my tone light. “But don’t let it go to your head, okay?”
She laughs then, and it’s the best fucking sound I’ve heard all day. “You’re… This is… I have no words.”
A rush of tenderness bubbles up inside me, replacing the ruthlessness that usually lives there, and I can’t do a thing about it.
I reach out a hand to her. “Come over here, tesoro.”
She takes my hand and comes toward me tentatively, like a doe in the forest who’s scented a hunter and knows she’s perpetually one step away from something bad. I’m the something bad, but I’m not letting that acknowledgment slow me down.
I tug her into place, until she’s in front of me, staring at the window decal, and then I settle my hands on her shoulders, gently massaging.
“When you look at the wall, think about St. Thomas. Visualize yourself there. Know that everything is okay. This is the safest place you can be. No one knows about this place except for my family and our inner circle, all made men who would die for us. Do you understand?”
She nods slowly.
“Good. Look at the palm trees swaying in a gentle breeze. And that water. It matches the Caribbean Sea.”
“It matches your eyes.”
She doesn’t look at me when she says it and her voice is quiet, but I hear her loud and clear. I like that she noticed. I like that I can feel the tension draining from the muscles in her shoulders.
I kiss the top of her head, inhaling the scent of her hair because I can’t resist. “How do you feel now? Do you feel like you’re going to have another attack?”
“I…think I’m okay for now.”
“Good.” I kiss the side of her neck and let my hands continue their work, kneading her shoulders. “Where do you want the other windows?”
“Where am I sleeping?”
“In my bedroom.”
The instant the words are out, I know I can’t hit rewind and recall them. But also, I don’t want to. On the way over, I told myself to do the right thing and put her in a guest room, far out of reach. But Isla belongs to me. Even if I can never truly have her beyond this snippet in time.
“Your room?”
“There’s only one bed you’re sleeping in while you’re here, tesoro, and that’s mine,” I growl into her ear.
I half expect her to protest, but she doesn’t.
She just stands there, leaning against me like she needs me to hold her up, letting me ease the strain from her shoulders while I hold her close.
And as fucked up as everything has been today, it was worth it just to get to this moment, at the safe house with Isla in my arms.