I let the glass slip from between my fingers, then smeared the streaks of blood against my thigh as I released a drawn-out exhale.
Tomorrow was another day. And I wouldn’t miss.
Crumbling into a loveseat, I reached for the cell phone I’d left behind before setting off in search of Si—of my mark. I glanced at the clock and calculated the time difference in Philly before pressing the contact of who’d become an unlikely close friend over the last year.
“Eva.”
“No.”
Fuck me. Derek.
“Why do you have Eva’s phone?”
The asshole was silent for several aggravating seconds before he decided to speak.
“What do you want with my wife?”
“Women shit, Derek. But if you must know, I’m on day three of my cycle and need tampon advice. Any other questions?”
Again, silence. But it was what I’d come to expect of Derek, even now. When I’d heard through Kai how he had transformed into a different person when it came to Evangelina, I refused to believe it—until I witnessed his utter devotion and sick obsession with my own eyes.
“Who is it?” I heard Eva ask in the background.
“Helena. Something about needing to get plugged.”
Fucker.
“Leni? Are you okay? What is he talking about?”
I pushed to my feet and made my way to the double doors leading to the balcony. “No offense, Eva, but your husband is a dick.”
She laughed, knowing well enough she couldn’t deny my claim.
“So, what’s up then? I heard you were in Dubai.”
She tried to hide it, but her voice held traces of suspicion. Eva knew Kai and I still had ties to The Six. But she looked the other way and knew not to ask questions to which she didn’t want to hear the answers. While Derek was officially retired, we all knew the blood would call to him again. Sooner or later, someone would cross his wife or child, and he’d do what came naturally. Though I wouldn’t fault him. What he had, disgustingly obsessive or not, was precious. Maybe Derek was an undeserving bastard, but he loved that woman with every beat of his black heart. Sometimes, I wondered what it would be like to be loved with such intensity, willing to set the world on fire without a second thought. Yet I knew that kind of passion would never be in my future.
“Business, Eva.”
“Right,” she said with slight hesitancy.
“How’s the baby?” The change of subject immediately brightened her tone.
“She’s good. Moving around a lot now.”
What resembled lip-smacking noises against skin reached my ear.
“My Vali girl,” I heard Derek croon, no doubt kissing Eva’s rounded belly.
God, that man was so whipped—times two.
“How’s Franco holding up without me?”
“Dad is good. Overworking himself like always. Leni…” She paused. “You didn’t call randomly to ask about me or my father and work—Is everything okay?”
The truth was, I had no fucking clue why I called. Maybe I just needed a comforting voice and an ear to listen to my bullshit, but at the end of the day, I had no one to whom I could genuinely spill my soul. Eva was great, but she was a cop. I wouldn’t burden her conscience any more than it already was.
And I couldn’t exactly tell her how close I’d gotten to sleeping with the man I was hired to kill. Mostly because I didn’t want to admit how much he’d rattled me, shaken my resolve like no one had ever done. I’d even gone as far as to spare him bloodshed by attempting to choke him out instead of putting a damn bullet through his face like I’d planned.
