Pacing.
I’d never paced in my life.
Raced.
Yeah.
But pace?
Fuck me sideways.
My hands tightened, flexed, tightened, flexed, my muscles so strained, it almost felt like they were stiff. If I didn’t roll my shoulders, maybe my muscles would become petrified, like wood.
She lifted her eyebrows at me. “Problem, Signor Fausti?”
“Not the fucking time, Sistine.” She had a flip mouth, and I wasn’t sure if I was capable of not taking control of it with mine. Our tongues thrashing for power. Our bodies at war while weripped each other’s clothes off. That felt like the only remedy—the water to this fucking burning inside of me.
“You should be thanking me right now,” she snapped. “Not looking at me as if you are angry atme.I am not the one who shot atyou!Although, there have been plenty of times I considered this!”
I started for her. She started for me. We both stopped before we crashed. Our eyes were daring. Our chests heaving. Our breaths clashing. No sign of surrender on the horizon.
“If he shot at me, he shot at—” I cut the word off. I couldn’t even fucking speak it aloud with the word that came last—youand the rest that followed.
She seemed to understand by what she said next. “He did not!”
“He could have.”
“Could have.Those are the two most important words in that sentence, Signor Fausti.”
“Cut the fuckingSignorFausti bullshit.”
“Casanova Prince!” She flung the nickname in my face like she was cursing at me.
I took her by the shoulders, my hands trembling. At my touch, probably at the searing heat coming from my palms, her mouth parted, and she breathed out. A moment passed between us. A moment when we both seemed to get lost in each other. And I knew then, like I knew the first time I saw her, that there was no way out. Even if she refused to admit it, she’d ensnared me, and the thrashing of my heart was making my walls explode around me. The only reason my heart was thrashing so wildly, though, was because it was trying to get to hers.
Maybe the intensity between us was overwhelming her. Maybe it was my eyes. The way I was looking at her, like she was my fucking future, and I was trying to figure out how to bring it closer. How to start it now.
Either reason, she yanked out of my hold.
My hands instantly felt empty.
Cold.
I didn’t fucking like it.
“If you did not know, Casanova,” she snapped, but there was no mistaking the tremble in her voice. She was trying to tamp down the emotion. “My family is sworn to protect all that is valuable to yours. This is what we do. If a trained solider of ours is not around, we take matters into our own hands. This is what I did. I am going to assume you are of some value to…someone. I did my job, Casanova!”
“Fuck the job.” I turned in a circle, running another hand through my hair. “Fuck. The. Job. Nothing, not even me, is valuable enough to trade for your life.” My eyes felt as wild as my hair. I knew it was all over the fucking place. So unlike me. “Iprotectyou!” I roared, hitting my chest.
She opened her mouth to respond at the same time her eyes widened. She realized in that moment what I’d said, and how truthful the admission was. It shocked the fuck out of me too. I knew all of this, but the situation had unnerved me to a place I’d never been before. A place where my control had slipped.
So fucking unlike me.
She opened her mouth again, but no sound came out. She stared at me, swallowed hard, then went toward her desk. I followed. She snatched the bag with what I assumed had the necklace inside of it. She shoved it toward my chest.
“Go,” she said, and this time I felt the tremble. Felt it in her hands.
I set my hand over hers. “Swear to me you’ll never do that again—for anyone.”
