“I can find him,” Roark says. “For a price.”
“You want me to pay you?” I stare.
He snorts. “Your prima ballerina’s made you stupid. Stop thinking with your dick, Dec. Mario is Milo Marcello’s problem—as long as you didn’t kill him.”
Cal stands, fixes me with that big-brother stare. “This is fucking messy. You keep Marlowe safe. You take the fee from her mother, and it’s done. No more playing outside the family business lines.”
“Cal—”
He doesn’t break stride. He crosses back to the house. One of our men opens the door, and he disappears inside.
“Shit,” I mutter.
“He’s a good leader,” Roark says. “He’s pissed now, but if you want that bodyguard business down the line, I can help. He’ll see it’s useful. Just don’t poke Milo. And for the love of God, don’t have killed his brother.”
He tosses the rest of his cigarette, then leaves.
I’m left under the broken streetlight with my thoughts and the echo of warnings reverberating between my ears.
I stand to go back just as the front door opens again.
I’ve had guns pointed at me by people who didn’t want topull the trigger but had no choice. I’ve pointed mine at people I’d rather not have killed. Sometimes survival makes saints into sinners for a minute.
So no, I don’t care if he aimed a weapon our way in Queens. Not if he was just trying to get clear. Not if he wasn’t going to hurt her.
He dragged her there. That’s his sin.
But what’s been under my skin about Leon is something else entirely.
A look.
I saw it tonight. The same flicker I saw that night—quick, savage, gone in a blink. The way his eyes cut to me like I was a problem to eliminate. The way he looked atherfor a fraction of a second, like he could burn the world down around her and not blink.
He didn’t shoot us.
Maybe it was an act.
Maybe he was scared.
“Or maybe you’re projecting your own issues, there, Dec,” I mutter, pushing off the bench.
Leon lifts a hand. A cab slides to the curb. He gets in.
Marlowe slips around the side of the building into the shadows.
I cross the road, quiet, and she still feels me coming. She stops and turns.
“Are you following me?” she asks.
“Hardly following when I was already out here, Molly,” I say.
I haul her in by the waist, fisting the material of her dress, thumbs brushing the curve of her perfect ass.
I kiss her because I’ve been wanting to all night. I kiss her to drown the taste of Leon, of Roark’s warnings, of my own fucking doubts. I kiss her because she’s addictive, hot and softand sharp-tongued, and I can’t remember what my life felt like before she walked into it.
Her mouth opens, sweet and hot. Her tongue tangles with mine, and she moans into my throat. I pull her flush against my chest, let her feel how hard she makes me.
Ishouldbe asking questions. About what Leon gave her. What he said about it. Why she looked so shaken and stubborn at the same time.
