But somewhere deep inside, I know this isn’t freedom. It’s running. And you can’t run forever.
His mouth crashes against mine in a wet, clumsy kiss that only gets worse when he adds his tongue. It tastes like alcohol and bad decisions, but I let him. Because that’s what people my age do at parties like this. They kiss strangers, they laugh too loud, they forget the world outside these walls.
I tell myself that’s what I’m doing too. Forgetting.
I reach up, fingers brushing his jaw, ready to pretend a little longer when suddenly he’s gone.
I blink, breath catching, confusion flooding in as my vision struggles to focus. The music is still pounding, the crowd still moving, but everything around me slows.
And then I see Lorenzo.
Standing exactly where Rick was a heartbeat ago, framed by flashing lights and cigarette haze like some vengeful apparition. His expression is pure fury—cold, controlled, and infinitely more terrifying than if he’d shouted.
My stomach drops.
For a second, no one else even seems to notice him. But I do. Every inch of me does.
The air between us crackles, sharp and electric, as his dark gaze sweeps over me. And I know, with a sick twist in my gut, that something we can’t take back is about to happen.
15
Lorenzo
Elizabeth looks up at me, her lips parted, pupils blown wide.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, voice thick with alcohol.
“I’d like to ask you the same thing.”
When I got word she was gone, I almost lost it. Every second she was unaccounted for scraped at my nerves like glass. And then to find out she’d slipped past my men withone ofmy menand ended up here, in some filthy apartment full of drunk strangers?
Unprotected. Unwatched. Unsafe.
I don’t remember crossing the room. I just know that when I see her with no shirt on, eyes glassy, lips slick from another man’s mouth that there’s a roaring in my ears that drowns out the music.
The crowd fades. All I can see is her.
Elizabeth giggles, the sound light and wrong in this place. “Where did Rick go?”
“Come on,cara,” I say, keeping my tone even only by sheer will. “It’s time to go home.”
I take her arm, firm but careful, and she leans back, resisting me with a surprising strength.
“I don’t want to go back there.”
Her words are slurred, but they hit harder than they should.
“Oh? And where do you want to go?”
“Back to Kansas City,” she murmurs, gaze unfocused. Then she blinks up at me and frowns adorably. “Hey… you ruined my plan.”
“Plan?” I echo, my pulse slowing in that dangerous way it does before everything burns.
She nods, almost proudly. “I was kissing Rick so he’d take me to bed.”
For a moment, the world stills. The music, the lights, the laughter—it all disappears under a single, furious thought.
She was going to let him touch her.
