I nodded. “I guess he wants to apologize for yesterday.”
Carmine nodded off toward the door. “Go. If Illiana asks, you’re reconnecting with Callista. We’ll discuss the specifics later.”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Positive. Go.”
He didn’t need to tell me a third time. I stood up from the table and walked around to where he was sitting. I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him into a huge, warm hug before turning and running out into the hallway, already navigating through my phone to an app to get a rideshare. I was about to press the button to order the car when Cherri whistled from the stairs. She tossed her keys down, and I caught them, mouthed a thank you, and rushed out the door.
It was troublesome that the drive from the Costa estate to the safe house was so long, but it helped build the anticipation. My heart was racing as I tried to figure out what I was going to say and what order I was going to say it in. He had to know that Illiana was onto me, but I also just wanted to get my feelings out before I got scared again.
Being careful to make sure that I wasn’t being watched or followed, I parked Cherri’s car a block away from the safe house and walked to it as stealthily as I could. I let myself into the apartment. My heart leaped up into my throat when the door opened. I saw Ashton standing in the center of the room.
“Hey.” I bolted toward him. “We’ll talk later.”
I tossed my arms around his shoulders and pulled him into a kiss. His arms curled around my waist and held onto me tight, and it felt so good to just beheldby someone. We backed our way toward the bed and collapsed down onto it. With his strong arms braced on either side of me, Ashton started at my lips before kissing his way over my jaw, down my neck, and onto my chest. Though it wasn’t really like him to just go with the flow without asking any questions, I was glad for it as his chilled hands snaked up my stomach to where the top of my sundress was and rolled it down to expose my white strapless bra.
One hand smoothed around my back and started to pull at the clasp of the bra. I grabbed the base of his shirt and started to work it over his stomach until, all of a sudden, the door to the safe house burst open. Ashton jumped, flipping to the side of me, and I clawed to hike my dress back up over my chest. I looked over toward the door, and Arturo was standing in the doorway with a look of shock on his face.
“What are you doing here? Get out!” I screamed.
From the doorway, Arturo shook his head. “I’m gonna fucking kill you.”
My skin started to prickle. The voice that came out of the man in the doorway was familiar. It was the one I’d been listening to consistently for the past couple of weeks. I slowly turned to look at the man next to me and reached out to pull the neck of his t-shirt down enough to expose the tattoo on his left pec. My heart sank at the image screaming back at me, a tattoo of his name.
“Arturo,” I growled at the man next to me.
He smiled. “Huh. I guess I cankindasee what my brother likes.”
I looked back at the man standing in the doorway, therealAshton, and the heartbreak all over his face told me that my day was about to go from bad to worse.
Chapter Thirteen:Denise
The only blessing I could acknowledge was that I’d opted to just jump Ashton the second I saw him as opposed to telling him what had happened with Illiana first. If I’d given Arturo all of that information instead of Ashton, I’d probably be in a pool of my own blood.
Ashton whipped his gun out of his waistband and pointed it at Arturo, but Arturo was right behind him, pulling his own gun and pointing it at me.
“You’re not even supposed to be here,” Arturo hissed with pride in his voice. “You couldn’t have waited an hour?”
“Denise,” Ashton hissed. “Get out of the bed.”
I shifted to move, but Arturo shoved his gun a little closer to me. “Ah, ah, ah. We’ve got work to finish here. You just wait right there.”
I considered myself a woman capable of standing up for herself, but I didn’t have a whole lot of power with the barrel of a gun set for my face, even though I was growing used to the feeling. I stopped moving and side-eyed Ashton, who was inching his way into the room. It was unsettling, to say the least, to be in the crosshairs between the two brothers. Sitting still and banking on Arturo not firing his gun when he’d made it perfectly clear he wanted me dead was not a position I relished being in. My eyes were shifting between the two, waiting for any opening to break out of the fray.
“It’s time to end this,” Arturo told Ashton. “She can’t be trusted anymore. Truthfully, neither can you, but you’re family. I can kill her.”
“You won’t make it out of here alive if you do,” Ashton growled. “I’m not kidding.”
“You’d kill your own brother over some stupid woman?” Arturo asked, legitimately shocked.
Ashton’s expression was harsh and resolved as he said, “In a heartbeat.”
It was life-altering for me to see it laid out so clearly. Ashtonwaswilling to stand up for me, simply because I was me. There was no ulterior motive. There was no benefit to keeping me around other than that he’d be keepingmearound. Ashton’s feelings had proven true time after time, and if he’d finally managed to break away from the wishes of his family to see me dead, then there was no reason why I couldn’t be honest about how I felt about him too.
“Ashton,” I called out, but a series of loud bangs on the door interrupted my thoughts, bangs we’d all been taught from a very young age to recognize and avoid.
“Open up right now! It’s Chicago PD!”
