Chapter 10
LEO
I’m spending too much time with Emma Brennan, and it’s starting to become a problem.
Not just because Dante won’t stop giving me these pointed looks that say he knows exactly what’s happening even if I don’t want to admit it.
My mother called yesterday and spent fifteen minutes talking in circles about “matters of the heart” while never actually saying Emma’s name.
Valentina has been sending me increasingly aggressive texts demanding to know “what the fuck is going on with you.”
It’s a problem because I’m starting to look forward to it. To her. To the way she argues with me over dinner and how her eyes light up when she’s winning a debate and the way she unconsciously tucks her hair behind her ear when she’s reading.
It’s a problem because two and a half weeks ago I kidnapped this woman to make her father suffer, and now the highlight of my day is when she smiles at something I’ve said.
I’m fucked. Completely and utterly fucked.
Right now I’m supposed to be reviewing security reports in my office, but instead I’m standing in the doorway of the library watching Emma try to reach a book on the top shelf.
She’s on her tiptoes, stretching up with one arm extended, and her tee shirt rides up just enough that I can see a sliver of skin at her lower back.
Go back to your office, my mind orders me. Do actual work instead of watching Emma struggle with basic shelf access like some kind of goddamn creep.
But I don’t. Because apparently I’ve lost all sense of self-preservation where she’s concerned.
Emma makes a frustrated sound and stretches higher, the chair she’s standing on wobbling slightly.
Fuck it.
I cross the library in quick strides. “You’re going to break your neck,” I say, and Emma startles so badly that the chair tips.
I catch her before she can fall, my hands closing around her waist as I pull her back against my chest. For a second we’re both frozen—her back pressed against my front, my hands spanning her waist, her hair smelling like the shampoo I had stocked in her bathroom mixed with something that’s just… Emma.
I can feel her fast and shallow breathing and the heat of her skin through the thin material of her shirt. I can feel every point where our bodies are touching, and it’s doing things to my ability to think clearly.
“I had it,” Emma says, but her voice comes out breathless and I feel rather than see her swallow hard.
“You really didn’t.” My voice is rougher than it should be. I should let go of her before this moment becomes something I can’t take back.
But my hands don’t seem to have gotten that memo because they’re still on her waist, my thumbs resting just above her hipbones, and I can’t make myself move.
Emma turns her head slightly and suddenly we’re close enough that I can see the exact shade of green in her eyes—lighter near the pupil, darker around the edges, with these gold flecks I never noticed before.
Her lips are parted and her cheeks are flushed and she’s looking at me with something that definitely isn’t hatred.
“Which book did you want?” I ask, because I need to say something before I do something stupid like close the last few inches between us and find out if she tastes as good as she smells.
“What?” Emma blinks, like she’s forgotten what we’re talking about. Which is fair because I’ve also forgotten why my hands are on her waist except that I don’t want to move them.
“The book,” I repeat, forcing myself to focus. “Top shelf. Which one?”
“Oh.” Emma’s face flushes deeper. “The, um. The red one. With the gold lettering.”
I reach up—careful not to let go of her waist with my other hand because the chair is still unstable—and pull down the book she indicated. It’s one of the romance novels she asked for last week, something with a shirtless man on the cover and a title that promises adventure and passion.
“Here,” I say, handing it to her, and our fingers brush as she takes it.
The contact is brief, barely a second, but I feel it like an electric shock. Emma must feel it too because she inhales sharply and her eyes widen.
“Thanks,” she says quietly, and she’s still pressed against me, still close enough that I could—
I step back abruptly, letting go of her waist and putting necessary distance between us. “Get down from there before you actually fall.”
Emma climbs off the chair with more grace than I expected given how flustered she looks, smoothing down her shirt even though it doesn’t need smoothing. Her cheeks are still pink and she won’t quite meet my eyes.
“I could have gotten it myself,” she says, but there’s no real argument in her voice.
“Sure you could have,” I agree, even though we both know she absolutely could not have. “Right before you broke your neck and gave Dante a heart attack from the liability issues.”
That gets a laugh out of her—a real one, not the sarcastic snort she usually gives me. The sound makes warmth spread through me.
“Your consigliere worries about liability?” Emma moves to sink into her usual reading chair. “Aren’t you all criminals? Isn’t the whole point that you don’t care about legal liability?”
“Dante cares about everything.” I lean against the bookshelf and watch her get comfortable. She tucks her socked feet under her and leans one slim arm on the arm of the chair. She looks comfortable, like she belongs here in my library and my house. “It’s his job to worry so I don’t have to.”
“Must be nice.” Emma opens her book but doesn’t actually look at it. “Having someone else worry for you.”
“You have someone who worries for you,” I point out.
“Your father hasn’t stopped threatening war since the day I took you.
” I think about the message Dante had received the other day from the Brennans, threatening severe retribution if we didn’t return Emma in twenty-four hours. I burned the message in the fireplace.
Emma’s expression becomes more guarded. “That’s different. He’s not worried about me. He’s worried about losing his reputation.”
“You don’t actually believe that,” I say, surprised by how certain I sound.
“Don’t I?” Emma looks up at me, and there’s something challenging in her gaze.
“He hasn’t tried to get me since he stormed the estate a week or so ago.
You’re the one who keeps telling me I’m just leverage against my father.
” She puts her book down and turns that sharp green-eyed gaze on me.
“So which is it, Leo? Am I his beloved daughter he’s desperate to save, or am I a political tool he’s angry about losing? ”
The question feels like a trap, and I’m not sure how to answer it without revealing more than I want to. “You can be both,” I supply lamely.
“That’s a cop-out answer,” Emma says, but her full lips are twitching like she’s fighting a smile.
“It’s an honest answer,” I counter. “Your father is complicated. He’s capable of loving you and using you at the same time. Most people in our world are.”
“Are you?” Emma asks, and the question catches me completely off guard.
“Am I what?”
“Complicated,” she clarifies, and now she’s definitely smiling. “Capable of feeling multiple things at once?”
I should make a joke or deflect or change the subject. I should do anything except engage with this line of questioning that feels increasingly like flirting.
“Very complicated,” I hear myself say instead. “I’m feeling at least seven different things right now, and they’re all contradictory.”
“Only seven?” Emma’s eyebrow raises—a gesture she’s picked up from me, I realize with warmth. “I’m feeling at least ten.”
I roll my eyes. “Overachiever,” I accuse, and her smile widens.
“Slacker,” she shoots back.
We’re grinning at each other like idiots, flirting. Emma Brennan, the woman I kidnapped nearly three weeks ago, is flirting with me in my library while making jokes.
And I’m flirting back.
This is such a colossally bad idea.
“I should,” I start, gesturing vaguely toward the door, needing to leave before I say or do something fucking dumb. But before I can do that, my phone buzzes in my pocket. I pull it out to find a text from Valentina.
I’m at the gate. Let me in or I’m breaking down the door.
Fuck.
“Everything okay?” Emma asks, her features drawn together in concern. I must have unconsciously made a face.
“My sister’s here.” I’m already dreading the next hour of my life. “Unannounced. This should be interesting.”
“Your sister?” Emma sits up straighter, and I can see her mentally preparing herself. “The one who had the panic attacks?”
I’m surprised she remembers that detail from when I helped her through her own panic attack. “Valentina, yeah. Fair warning—she’s not going to be as understanding as my mother was.”
“Your mother wasn’t that understanding,” Emma points out. “She told me I had fire then left me completely confused.”
“That’s Mamma being understanding,” I reply dryly before deciding to be honest with what Emma is going to hear. “Valentina’s going to be worse. She blames your father for Gabriel’s death, which means she’s probably going to blame you by extension.”
Emma’s expression hardens slightly and she tilts her chin up stubbornly. “Then she and I are going to have words,” she says shortly.
Goddamn, this is going to be a sight. Emma Brennan isn’t afraid of my sister, nor is she going to back down or apologize for existing. Of course she isn’t. She’s been confounding me since I first brought her here. Valentina doesn’t stand a chance.
“Try not to kill each other,” I say, heading for the door. “I’ll be back in a few minutes with her.”
“No promises,” Emma calls after me, and I’m smiling as I leave the library to go collect my sister.
This is definitely going to be a disaster.