Chapter 17 #2
Her head comes up immediately, but her features are filled with confusion. “You did?”
“Yeah.”
She studies me for a second, trying to read it. “Why?”
“Because I believe Beatriz and Isabel have been taken against their will,” I say.
Her jaw goes slack.
“And because,” I add, holding her gaze now, “I do believe in justice being served, and don’t mind dishing it up with a side of revenge either.”
I’ve never been one to turn the other cheek.
She goes still, her grip tightening slightly on the spoon before she sets it down.
I need to know more about Delilah and Luther’s relationship. That’s the part about this whole thing that still doesn’t add up.
“Tell me what’s going on with the alliance, Delilah. The truth. And I’ll listen.”
She scoffs. “You won’t believe me.”
“If it’s the truth, I’ll know. And I’ll believe you.”
I’m pretty damn good at seeing through people. The only reason I haven’t stopped to take a good, hard look at who Delilah is because I’ve been more concerned with myself and what she could do to my family.
But now, I offer her my full attention. Undivided.
Her gaze slips past me as she looks for somewhere else to put it. I’ve seen people lie a thousand times. This isn’t that. She’s not searching for a lie—she’s searching for a way to tell the truth.
“It’s hard to start at the beginning,” she says, smoothing some of her long dark strands behind her ear. “But the engagement to Luther is basically a forced marriage.”
Fuck. Marcus Cross is playing mafia don with his daughter?
She continues, almost matter-of-fact. “Obviously, there’s some kind of business arrangement going down with the two clubs, and I’m part of sealing the trust.” Her emerald gaze is defiant. “I wasn’t going to stay and be a pawn.”
I’m surprised any man could ever believe the woman before me would.
“I’d been saving to leave for a while, and figured I’d escape before the marriage, but then,” she exhales sharply.
“The Chileans came. Dad asked me to entertain them, make them comfortable. I thought Beatriz and Isabel were feature dancers for Dad’s strip club, but then less than a week later, Dad said they decided to travel and left Sacramento.
Only they never left because…” she pauses, her gaze faraway, as if remembering the moment. “I saw the confiscated passports.”
She picks her spoon back up and twirls it between her fingers nervously.
“I have to find them, Rio. It’s my fault they got comfortable and didn’t have their wits about them. I even bought them stuff on shopping trips, which I read is a way traffickers create debt with their victims.”
Her voice has taken on a tone she’s never used with me before. Sadness. Regret. Even a bit of defeat.
I save her from the next part. “And you feel like you can’t run away unless you know they’re safe first.”
Her conscience won’t let her.
“Pretty much.” She mindlessly stirs the soup again. “I knew I had to do something. Then, when I was wandering around Luther’s at our engagement party, I snooped. That’s when I found your details in Luther’s office.”
I want to ask more about it. Were the details in the open? Does she think others know about me?
But this moment, it isn’t mine. It’s hers.
“I’m going to help you, Delilah.”
At that, she gazes up at me, hope back on every angle of her ethereal face.
“Really?”
I nod, both resigned and determined. “Really.”
I don’t know how it’ll pan out. If I can cover my ass and find these women, but there has to be a way. And there has to be a way to contain Delilah when she leaves here, too. Maybe we’ll have to trust each other. She’ll never tell anyone I’m Jackal, and I’ll never say where she’s going.
I’ve gotten this far in my life by calculation; I have to be able to get out of this, too.
“But one thing,” I say. “You said you started at the beginning, but you didn’t.”
She furrows her brow. “What do you mean?”
“Luther wasn’t the beginning. You planned to run away before then, didn’t you?”
Her lips form a thin line of affirmation.
“You’re not running from Luther. You’re running from whatever triggered you in the barn.” I repeat the questions that’ve burned through me since the moment I saw her like that, seized by haunting memories.
“What was the barn about?” I ask directly.
She adopts a casual, cool tone. “My mom got sick when I was younger. My dad cheated on her lots and when he did, she took out her anger on me. With a belt.”
Fury races in my veins. She doesn’t need my protection.
But she has it anyway.
“Where was your dad in all of this?”
She never had a single parent in her corner.
Her laugh is one of vile contempt. “Somewhere in another room, waiting for his belt back, I guess.”
He knew her mom was beating her because of his cheating?
It’s fucking sick. Twisted.
I imagine a younger version of Delilah, tear-stained, youthful cheeks, and white-hot anger flashes in my chest.
She reads me all wrong.
"See? You feel sorry for me." She hardens. "I said I don't want your pity."
"I don't waste my time on pity." I hold her gaze. "I use it to make people pay."
For one unguarded moment, she shows me everything. A lock turns in my chest, and I'm not sure which one of us has the key.
“So do I," she says.
I reach across the island, take the spoon from her fingers, and set it down. Then I take her hand in mine and hold it.
"You want vengeance, Princess? You got it."
Her fingers tighten around mine, but I can’t read the feeling. Gratitude. Solidarity. A vicious vow only two people like us could make. No matter what, it’s somehow agreed.
I don’t make promises I can’t keep, and right now, I don’t see a way I can save these women, Delilah and keep my company away from Black Ridge.
I’m stepping back toward it.
Not for the job.
For her.
I hold her hand for longer than I should.
Long enough for it to start to feel less like a pact and more like a promise.