Chapter 14
FOURTEEN
ASPEN
Cade stares down at me with a million stories running through his eyes. Whether he tells me the truth or not will be what’s important.
He slides off the bed but tucks the blanket over me. I’m half-dressed, bare from the waist down, and the space between my thighs is wetter than I’ve ever gotten.
“The flowers were left on orders from a man named Victor. He runs the Vendettas—a street gang. He did so because his brother, Gunnar, is in prison, and I’m behind his captivity.
They’re seeking vengeance, but when you visited me last year, Gunnar must have clocked you as potentially important.
By your second visit, I inadvertently made it so, and he got word to his brother.
” His jaw ticks. “I’d say I’m sorry for it, but it was inevitable.
The flowers were a threat to you, and the threat on you was a warning to me. ”
My stomach drops. “Wait…a gang?” When he nods, everything else comes crashing down. “Will they hurt me?”
Death flashes through his eyes, right to his fists. A shade he’s never directed at me before. “I’m the target, but I’m not counting it out, which is why Bones has been hanging around. And he’ll continue to do so until I find Victor, who’s wisely hiding, and put this to rest.”
Bones. Okay. That’s another answer.
None of this leaves me satisfied, how I assumed I’d feel when learning the truth. I figured it might help process today—this morning—but it doesn’t. Instead, the idea of ever leaving this room terrifies me. Visiting a prison inmate once involved stepping beyond the boundaries, but a gang?
“They’re targeting you because you helped put him in jail too?”
He steps back, which I appreciate. The fists don’t unfold, though, nor does the rest of him. He’s all hard lines and sharp edges, a bite as cold as frost when he replies, “That…and because I’m the head of the Fangs. Another gang.”
Oh my god.
I’d always known there was more to Cade. A person doesn’t end up in prison if they’re boring. But a gang isn’t what I envisioned. I barely understand what it means, having my entire experience taken from movies and TV. Crime, I imagine, though. He’s a criminal, and who knows what he’s done.
To whom he’s done it to.
“For a while, we were both battling for dominion on the streets. A long time ago, street wars between us and them were frequent. Eleven years ago, they conceded all territory to us after being forced out of the area, ending the war when the Corsettis, a family of mobsters based out of Montreal, stepped in. With their own rise in control, they were organizing all criminal groups they could track down. At that point, we were technically at odds with them, dealing on territory they claimed. They gave us an ultimatum: either we ceased operations immediately and disbanded, they’d send the cops our way and the law could shut us down, or we worked for them.
We deal their shit exclusively and do whatever orders filter down to us—local jobs essentially—and hand over forty percent of profits.
Otherwise, they leave us alone to run the area how we see fit.
It’s a win-win. I took the deal for my crew—Victor didn’t. ”
Mobsters. Criminals. Drugs. Everything gets filed under little mental categories as I process what it means, and how I’m positioned beneath him, a place without power.
“What I didn’t know is how vindictive the Vendettas can be.
When they left the area, Victor had someone watching us, who somehow learned about the bank I was planning to rob.
It would have been a payday of a lifetime, but when Victor somehow figured it out, he called the cops.
By the time I was in place, they were on their way.
Just as I heard the sirens, Gunnar stepped out from behind a car.
Moron was filming my downfall for his brother, so when the cops landed on scene, I grabbed him.
We’re both marked with symbols they’ve been tracking for years.
” He flashes his wrist, revealing the F tattoo etched there.
“They drew their own conclusions—that he’d been doing the job alongside me.
I’d been lucky, it being the first offence they caught me on, and the fact I was barely inside the bank when they arrived.
They tried me for ten years for attempted robbery with a firearm, but Gunnar got fifteen.
He came strapped with two weapons, and his assumed role in the robbery broke the parole he was apparently out on for prior convictions.
That’s it, Aspen. That’s all of me. Who and what I am, why I was in prison, and what happened today. ”
Fuck. It’s…a lot.
Too much. Nothing my mind can wrap around. The fact I’m half-naked with a convicted felon standing above me, waiting for me to turn him out again. A felon who served his sentence, but it nonetheless doesn’t change what he did—does?
“Do you still run them?”
“For life.” He glances at his wrist again. “Bones stepped up in my place while I was gone.”
I want to believe this is still the same Cade who wrote me all those letters, but that Cade was fake. That Cade was designed to play nice for a pen pal program.
I slide off the bed, skirt the room to my dresser, and pull on my pyjama pants. Then I linger by the door, as far away as possible.
He watches without moving. “You once told me you don’t judge by a person’s exterior. I’m asking for that again.”
“Except you just gave me your interior.”
“It’s the same interior as the man you met. I won’t hurt you. I swear it on my life.” His knuckles marked with my name come up to rest over his heart. “Say something, sweetheart.”
His expression is something only ever seen once before. It takes me back to the day he stopped me from leaving visitation, when he touched my hand and asked me to return. He was the same man standing across from me now. The man I’d been gradually growing enthralled with.
Oh, PhD studies will love me!
“I know you won’t hurt me. I trust that much.” Words that are equivalent to three other words, given his reaction and the quick steps he takes to my side, stopped only by a palm to his chest. “But it’s a lot to take in, too. How do I go on now that I know this?”
“With me.” He reaches for me, his hand hovering midair before lowering again. A little action that says everything. “Once I take care of Victor and whoever else he has following us, I’ll introduce you to my guys. You’ll be the safest woman in the city. I promise you that.”
“This still feels so…I mean…” Words frazzle in my mind, and I shake my head. “What if I don’t want to be?”
“You lost that choice when you came to see me. When you cried my name not even ten minutes ago. I need one more thing from you…for now.”
There could be so much he asks for. “I’m scared to wonder, but what?”
“That you trust me enough to not scream when I do what’s next.”
“As long as you don’t hurt me, I can promise that.” A strange agreement, but I’ll play along. Better to keep the bigger threat contained until determining how to defend.
Cade deletes the rest of the space between us and swoops me into his arms, carrying me bridal style to bed. He pulls back the sheets and rests me beneath them. “It’s late, and we have a big day planned tomorrow.”
This is all he wants right now? Rest, I can do. If we’re not talking or touching, it’ll allow me to consider everything he’s told me tonight.
“We do?”
“Mhm,” is all he replies with as he shucks off his shoes and slides his cell from his pocket.
He checks the text reflecting up at him and mumbles something that sounds like “Fuckin’ A.
I got you, asshole.” He drops it screen side down and looks up at me.
“It’ll be over soon, sweetheart.” He slides into bed beside me, wrapping his arm around my waist as he buries his head into my hair.
“You’re so much warmer than the cell. At least give me this, Aspen. ”
This…this I think I can do.
And I manage it, my eyes sliding shut as my body proves I do unwisely trust him, passing out in his arms.
When I wake, Cade is gone, the space beside me cool, and I’m so confused.
There’s a note on my pillow.
Don’t run. I have the city on lockdown. If I have to chase you again, I’ll be pissed.
See you tonight.
Happy V-Day.
Cade.