“You’re not going back there,” I said, keeping my voice low, steady. “I’ll drop you at a clinic. You need a full panel—STIs, pills, the works—and someone to document those injuries properly if you want to press charges.”
She shook her head. “I can’t pay?—”
“I didn’t ask if you could pay.” I glanced over long enough to make sure she understood. “You go in, give only your first name, and let the nurse take over. They’ll treat you, no questions.”
She swallowed hard. “Thank you.”
In the rearview, the other two clung to each other, mascara streaked, shaking. The hurt woman wiped at her face with the back of her wrist.
“You three don’t go back there,” I said. “Not tonight. Not ever if you can help it.”
No one argued.
I drove fast, watching the shadows, making sure no cars followed. Only when we were ten streets clear did the woman beside me finally exhale. I dropped all of them at the clinic I used, sent a text to the nurse I had working there, transferred ten of what I’d been paid tonight to cover what was needed, and then I was done.
But I couldn’t rest when I reached home, so I headed to my office after a shower, phone right there in case of another call-out. A hit notice shimmered on one of the darker message boards—an anonymous bounty for the missing surgeon had been answered.
Someone had added a thread titledLocated. New identity. Money for full details. I sent them the money, fuck, it was like water slipping through my hands tonight, then read the information sent to me, before I sent the information to Novak, and then shut the laptop hard enough to rattle the desk.
I needed… Fuck. I grabbed my cell, my keys, and headed out. I didn’t text him. Didn’t warn him. I just showed up at Levi’s apartment like every bad decision I’d ever made rolled into one.
He opened the door in a T-shirt, hair roughed up from sleep, eyes widening when he saw me.
“The fuck? What?—”
I kissed him. Hard. Desperate.
He grabbed the front of my jacket, pulling me inside, slamming the door with his foot. Our mouths collided again, teeth scraping, heat surging under my skin. I pushed him back to the wall, swallowed his groan, felt his hands in my hair, on my back, under my shirt.
Not rough this time. Not a game. Not pressure.
Closer.
Then I kissed him again—my turn to slow this down. Lingering. My lips trailed to his throat as I traced his ribs. He let out a sound—wrecked—that nearly undid me.
His palms were warm on my hips. He guided me toward his bedroom, and I followed because I couldn’t not. Clothes dropped in a trail behind us.
On his bed, I touched him as if he were something fragile. And maybe it was because I still had the echo of that woman’s broken voice in my ears, the sight of her torn skin burnedinto my fucking head. Maybe it was because an hour ago I’d watched men treat women like objects, like meat, like nothing, and it reminded me of back then. Maybe it was because I’d had blood on my hands—hers, his—and I needed to touch something without hurting it. Without breaking it. Without being part of the violence for once.
Whatever the reason, my hands shook when I touched Levi, not from fear of him, but terror of what I’d carried with me into his bed.
He stared up at me as if he didn’t understand it but wanted more. His chest rose and fell hard, his lips parted, eyes locked on mine, trying to work out who the hell I was right now. Not the man who’d pinned him to a wall. Not the asshole who pushed every one of his buttons to see what lit him up. This was different—slow, careful, intimate in a way that scared the shit out of me.
I lowered myself over him, bracing a hand beside his head, letting my weight settle against him inch by inch. His fingers slid up my ribs, slow enough to give me every time necessary to pull away. I didn’t. Couldn’t.
I kissed him again—unhurried, steady, a long press and suck of my mouth against his. Our bodies aligned, slow friction, the kind that made my pulse trip over itself. He touched my face as if I wasn’t something sharp and he wasn’t afraid of getting cut.
I dragged my thumb over his lower lip, watching him tremble under it. “Yeah,” he whispered, voice low, breathless. I felt it everywhere.
I cupped his jaw, leaned in, and kissed him deeper—lazy, consuming, nothing like the mess outside or the blood I’d scrubbed off my hands earlier. This was something else entirely. Something dangerous in a different way. Something that made my chest ache.
He arched up into me, heat meeting heat, and I let my body follow the movement, rolling my hips into his slowly, controlled,letting him feel every inch of intention. The soft, wanting, sound he made went straight through me.
“Alejandro…” he whispered, fingers tightening enough to anchor me.
I didn’t break the kiss. Couldn’t. Instead, I kissed his throat, tasting the pulse there, slow and steady and alive. And fuck, I lingered, breathing him in.
His hands were on my back, slow, and every careful press of his fingers made something inside me unravel, thread by thread, until I was afraid of how much I needed the next touch to happen.
