He leaves, taking the path between my house and Evie’s to make a quick escape. I shut the door and turn back to Evie, watching her nails dig into her palms as she continues to look out at her son.
“Let me have tonight. Okay? Let me have one last night of this before I have to tear their world apart.”
I pull her to me and kiss her firmly on the temple. “They love you, Evie. Nothing is going to change that.”
Evie’s anxiety seemed to be contagious. It’s two in the morning and I haven’t been able to sleep a wink, tossing and turning in my bed until I’m sure I’ve worn a hole in it.
Evie wanted Atlas to stay with her last night, leaving me to come back to my house and sleep in my bed while Kortez and Roman are split between my own guest room and living room.
We need a bigger house.
I know why she did it though. Roman, despite his family ties to Atlas – and unknowingly to Kortez – is loyal only to Evie. He may be upset when he learns of the truth tomorrow, but he won’t leave.
Kortez wouldn’t leave her either. He’s been obsessed with her since childhood, and he wouldn’t let her slip through his fingers a second time.
She knows I’m on her side, since I’ve known about the plan for years. I’ve trained her countless times in combat and guns; shit I learned in the military mixedwith the dirty street fighting of my club days.
The only one she’s worried about is Atlas, especially because she knows she still plans on killing his father. If not for taking Kortez, then for the torture Aldo put him through every day that followed.
She needed one last night with him.
I get out of bed and throw a pair of gym shorts on before heading downstairs. I need to try and relax – maybe a beer will help.
Except, when I go downstairs, I realize my kitchen isn’t empty. Roman sits on my island, with his own beer in his hand as he looks out the window facing Evie’s house. From here, you can see into her second story window. The light is off, and her bed is on the other side of the room where Roman can’t see, but he doesn’t seem to care.
His voice breaks the silence, somehow knowing I’m standing here without me making a single sound. “She’s going to break his heart when she tells him, you know?”
I don’t bother to ask how he knows. He probably had Kortez follow Markus over to see the Psycho’s, if they didn’t already have a plant in the gang to begin with. I’ve had a feeling they knew for a while, but this confirms it.
“Why haven’t you told him?”
Roman takes a drink of his beer and turns to me. He’s shirtless, dressed in a pair of flannel pajama bottoms a red the same shade as his hair.
“Not my place. Atlas’s view of Eve has been tinted in their time apart and he doesn’t realize just how…vicious my little moth is. He needs to learn that on his own.” He sighs and takes another drink. “Tez and I are doing what we can to fuck Wade up but…he’s here, isn’t he? He’s in Denver.”
I nod and walk over to the fridge, grabbing my own beer before opening it on the edge of the kitchen counter. “He is. Evie believes Atlas will leave her for this, you know?”
“He won’t leave. He may be pissed but he won’t leave.”
I walk over, stopping directly in front of him and waiting until his eyes raise up to meet mine. “And you? Will you leave us?”
His eyes widen in surprise, the blue glinting with the same feeling building inside myself. Desire. “Us?” His lips turn up in a one-sided smirk. “Scared to lose me, Wylder James?”
I set my beer down beside him, my arms trapping him on the counter in front of me. “Scared to love you, Roman Bavone.”
He begins to laugh but the sound is cut short by my hand snapping up and wrapping itself around his throat, squeezing just enough to feel his vein pumping beneath my fingers. “Are you prepared for my violent version of love?”
Chapter 35
Roman
“Love me violently or don’t love me at all.”
My words seem to be all the permission he needed. The hand around my throat tightens even more as he pulls me into him, our lips clashing together with enough force to rattle me down to my bones.
He swallows up my moan with a flick of his tongue, parting my lips to let him through. I knew kissing Wylder would be like the eye of a hurricane, calming in one breath and devastating in the other. From one kiss, he claimed a power over me that I’ve never given another man.
It’s not that I’ve never had male lovers – I have. I’ve just never loved them like I do Wylder. I don’t know when it happened, either. Somewhere between the secrets and the jokes, my soul reached out to his and grabbed it by the balls. He’s mine now.
