This Atlas…he’s different. Older. Stronger.Darker.
There’s no mistaking his muscles for new because it’s clear he’s been building them for years, and the few tattoos he had at twenty are now faded with age and joined by new ones of all shapes, sizes, and colors that turn his skin into a living art piece. His eyes are…dark, completely black and a window to emotions that are so strong I can see that it hurts for him to feel them. It hurts me to even see them. There’s blood soaked into his iris’.
Not only does he have a beard now, but his face has been marked by a long scar going from underneath the beard all the way up to his hairline, a diagonal slash from one side to the other. It hurt, and whoever did that to him wanted it to.
My hand reaches up and my fingers trail over the scar, all the way from his hairline down to where it disappears. Atlas shivers underneath my touch, his eyes boring into mine as I take a small step back. Already, my body and my heart are begging for me to fall into his arms. I want his darkness to embrace my own. Only my mind is stopping me, telling me to remember my plan – telling me to remember I need to figure out what it means for Atlas first.
“Eve…” His voice breaks on that one, simple little word, but he continues. “I am so sorry…I am so sorry we left you. I’m sorry my father took Kortez, and we left you alone and worried for ten years. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to help raise our son and tell you every day how much I love you.” He shakes his head and lets out a soft, shallow laugh before bringing it back up to look at me. “I probably sound ridiculous but I’m not lying and I didn’t earlier. You fucking haunt me, Evangeline. Your ghost lived with me every day for the last ten years and you know what? Iwantedto be haunted. You could have dragged me to the pits of hell and tied me up at the Devil’s altar and I would have thanked you as long as I got to look at your face while he burned me. That’s howfuckingcrazy you make me, Eve.”
My heart is throbbing, beating out of my chest as the weight of his words makes its landing.
Here I was planning his murder, and he was dreaming about me because he still loved me.
“I…I need to get some sleep. We’ll talk more tomorrow.” Before he can say a word to stop me, I’m rushing to my room and slamming the door, my hand resting over my racing heart and begging it to stop torturing me with its whispers.
As Atlas’s footsteps descend the stairs, my heart continues its relentless reminder.
“Liar. Liar. Liar.”
Chapter 21
Atlas
Wylder is standing at the base of the stairs when I come down with his arms crossed over his chest. My eyes catch on the gold in his hair – his eyes – and not for the first time since being here, I wonder if Eve chose him to drown herself in because he’s the exact opposite of me. Did she want to erase me that badly?
I tilt my head back and motion upstairs as my foot hits the last step, “She went to bed. May want to go ease the fire I started.”
His eyes narrow and a rough hand on my shoulder stops me before I can move any closer to the door. “Just like that? No warning me to stay away? No death threats?”
I reach up and grab his hand, twisting his wrist back just enough for him to wince and step away from me. “Just like that,fratello.I came to the understanding that I would have to share Eve ten years ago when I realized just how deeply Kor cared for her. All I care about right now is winning back her love and making sure she knows she never has to bealone again.”
His face shines with something that looks almost like respect as I let go of him. “Then you’d better go so I can go show our woman a good time.”
I let out a chuckle and walk over to the front door, “If I can’t hear her screaming from your house, then you aren’t doing it right.”
Leaving him alone in Eve’s living room, I walk the short distance back over to the house my brothers and I will be staying in for the unforeseen future, the one belonging to the man who is no doubt watching my future wife strip right now.
Lucky bastardo.
I hear the yelling before I even open the door, Kortez’s voice rough as sandpaper as he rages at my cousin now that they’re alone. Kortez and Roman are almost as close as I am with both of them and fight like brothers. Their level of crazy clashes – and I’m the peacekeeper. When they don’t have to work together to settle me, that is.
Their voices get louder as I walk in, shutting the door quietly behind me so I can figure out what part of this conversation I just walked in on – because I have a lot to say to Roman as well.
“You knew, Roman! You…You fucking knew that was her!”
I round the corner to see Kortez pulling at his dark curls and I know he’s close to breaking. We need to find him someone to kill or he’s going to snap, and I can’t have him snapping on Eve.
Roman is sitting in an armchair across the room, looking as if he would rather be anywhere than here with his head propped up on one fist as his eyes follow Kortez pacing a hole through Wylder’s living room floor. “I did.”
The tension in the room grows, heating up so fast I know I need to step in sooner rather than later. “Since when?”
My cousin’s eyes shoot over to me without even an inch of movement from his head or his hand holding it up, “Since the day after I met her.”
Roman’s nonchalant attitude is probably what’s got Kortez so fired up because it’s already doing the same thing to me. How can he not see what a breach of trust this is?
“You’ve known the whole time and didn’t tell us? Why? So, you could wiggle your way in before we got a chance to win her back? Why didn’t you tell me about my son, Roman? A fucking son!”
My muscles tense as my anger gets the better of me, my voice raising to the same octave as Kor’s was just moments ago. Roman finally moves, leaning back into the chair and letting out a deep sigh.
