“Yeah, you’re talking about Fang, aren’t you?” he asked while he circled me. “He is a peculiar one, I’ll give him that… as are you. You made not only a reclusive shut-in fall for you,but also one of the most respected men from the local mafia group… and, somehow, Kieran.” He stopped circling when he stood directly before me. “What, one wasn’t enough for you?”
Of course this guy knew me. If he was the one who’d been watching me, he’d had plenty of time to do recon, to get to know me and my guys. Shit. That meant Tessa knew everything he did.
“You know kids my age. We’re greedy, think we’re owed the world.” That came out less deadpanned and more bitter, but whatever. The joke still stood on its own.
He was smiling when he slowly knelt in front of me. “How did you lure Kieran away? I’m curious.”
Lure Kieran away? From what? From his psycho sister? As if it was hard. As if I did it on purpose and Kieran wasn’t the one who latched onto me, first. Still, if this was Tessa’s way of trying to find out the truth, there was only one thing I could say.
“Why don’t you untie me, and then I’ll tell you everything you want to know?”
His gaze fell, but I wasn’t stupid enough to think he was actually mulling it over. Seconds passed, and then his stare snapped up. “I’ve watched you for so long, longer than I’ve everwatched anyone. I think you lured Kieran without meaning to. I think it just happened and Tessa is giving you way too much credit.”
Shit. This guy… he was good. Too good.
“And you know what else?” He reached for me, for my hair, specifically, which he then ran between two fingers, curling the pink and blue strands around it. “This hair… these eyes.” He stopped fiddling with my hair to grab me by the chin and force me to look at him—as if I would look anywhere else.
“It’s not real,” he whispered, his voice so low I had to fight the shiver that threatened to creep up my spine the moment it hit my ears. “What is real is this.” The man released my chin and dropped his hand to my left, where he gingerly touched the side of my hand. “What’s real,” he paused as he pulled away and stood, pointing to the coffee table, “are those. That’s the real you, not this pastel goth bullshit.”
Pastel goth? Was that an actual thing?
He went to sit down on the couch, and this time he spread his knees like he owned the damn place, which I supposed he just might’ve.
“Who are you?” I asked, finding my voice after that whole thing. Not going to lie, I still felt his touch on my hand, on my face. It was a weird sensation, ghostly, and with those knees of his spread, well… a girl with a thing for sexy older men could only be so strong before her willpower caved and she glanced somewhere she probably shouldn’t have.
The man wore all black. He didn’t give off rich-person energy. No, he was more gangster than mafia. And those pants? They weren’t exactly loose.
Oh, no, they were tight in all the right places.
“You obviously work for Tessa,” I went on once I forced my gaze to avert back to his face, “but you’re not some low-ranking grunt. You’re someone who knows how to take care of business.”
“That I am,” he said. “You can call me Jason.”
“Jason,” I repeated his name, liking the sound of it, for whatever reason. “Well, Jason, let me ask you this: if you work for Tessa, why am I not dead? Why didn’t you just kill me so she could be rid of me forever and finally get what she wants?”
The smirk lingered on his face as he asked, “What is it you think she wants?”
“My dad. To climb the political ladder. Hell, maybe her end goal is to be the first lady someday.” I frowned to myself. “She wants more. She’s never happy with whatever she has. She’s always gotta be looking up, onto the next big thing.”
“You act like you’ve known her for years, but you didn’t really know her well before you tried to kick her out of the city.”
I met the man’s pitch-black stare and held it, unflinching. “Do you know why I wanted her gone? Did she tell you everything, or just her side of things? Not that I expect a worker bee like you to give a shit, but Tessa isn’t innocent in all of this. I might not have spent much time with her after my kidnapping, but before? When she and my dad were dating?”
Jason only stared right back at me, prompting me to go on, “I saw more than I wanted to when I was chained to a bed in a basement for two years. I saw their wedding, how happy she was—at the time, I hated her only a little less than I hated my dad, but that was before I found out the truth about the woman you’re working for.”
“And what is the truth?”
“She was the reason I was kidnapped. She wanted me dead. Even now, she still has it out for me. All I wanted was a new start—I didn’t give a shit about politics or any of that crap. All I wanted when I got out was to find out who was responsible and make them pay, and then wash my hands of it. I gave her a choice. I let her walk away once. She won’t be so lucky again. Even if you kill me here and now, there’s a whole group of peoplewho’ll take up my mantle and hunt that woman down, pregnant or not.”
Damn, by the end of that speech, I sounded downright vicious. Lola might’ve been rubbing off on me.
Jason stunned me by whispering, “I believe you.”
All I could do was stare. “You… do?” Out of all the things I expected to hear, that I could honestly say didn’t even make it on the list.
“I’ve known Tessa much longer than you. I know she tends to twist things, hide the truth—it’s what helped get her where she is today.” He stood, and once again he walked around the coffee table and approached me. Instead of circling me like last time, he stood directly in front of me, where he slowly lowered to his knees.
My breathing hitched when he set his hands on my legs. I couldn’t help it. I wanted to both squirm away from him and remain right where I was, feeling his warmth through my pants.
