No, he needs no extra time. Not when he wasn’t even part ofthisfight. Unharmed, sitting on his fucking throne in Cat’s family home with his minions drinking and fucking and fighting around him.
You walked out.
The thought flips over and over in my mind, accompanied by a solid dose of guilt that settles into my stomach like lead.
I just… left. Left him there and walked away.
I could havetried, could have tried for Cat, but all I could think of was getting to her as soon as fucking possible.
Some fucking enforcer I am.
I wonder how he feels with his petkillermissing.
Gio is staring at me. When I meet his stare, he works a hand over his jaw. “We meet up with Luc. That – that has to be our priority right now.”
We both carefully avoid looking at Dante. At the photograph he grips tightly.
“And then,” Gio continues steadily, his tone brokering no disagreement, “Werest. We’ll be no good to anyone if we’re exhausted. We rest, we rebuild, and then –thenwe can plan.”
Rest.
My hands clench tighter. I can’t think of anything worse than fucking resting, than losing myself in my own thoughts.
I want tofight.
Want to feel blood beneath my nails, the crunch of bone. Ineedit, the pull in my veins urging me even now to pick a fight.
If I don’t find a way to release the fury bubbling beneath my skin, then it’s going to erupt.
Gio eyes me. My head jerks in a nod. “Where’s Asante?”
Blue eyes narrow. “In the back room. Checking on his mother.”
And avoiding us, no doubt.
Footsteps sound from behind me, and the man in question appears as I look over my shoulder. We all watch without trying to hide it as he leans over Cat and brushes her hair back, his broad shoulders hiding her briefly before he straightens.
He doesn’t shy away from our stares. Instead, he meets them before he nods to Gio’s empty glass. “Any left?”
Stefano Asante looks just as exhausted as any of us, but my shoulders tense as Gio waves a hand toward the bar lining one side of the plane. “Help yourself.”
“Grazie.” The mutter as he brushes past us is near silent. We wait until he returns, several fingers of amber liquid filling the cut crystal glass. He throws it back like water, swallowing most of it in one before he faces us. He doesn’t bother to sit, to take the empty chair beside Dante. “So.”
Here we are, then. Minus one.
And I wish Luc was here, here with his fucking irreverent charm and his sarcasm to lighten the mood. Strange, to feel that need when I’ve spent most of the last three months desperately wishing he was anywhere but in my vicinity.
He played his role. Played the irreverent playboy to perfection, so well that we all doubted him – thought he had turned on us, on Cat, in favor of joining thewinningside in this clusterfuck of a war.
I wonder what scars it has left on him.
I haul myself up from the chair, shrugging past Stefano to grab my own drink. I don’t bother with a glass, instead gripping the neck of the bottle with my finger, and he stiffens as I push back past him to get to my seat. As if bracing for an altercation.
As he fucking should.
I have not forgotten.
I willneverforget.
