“You’re not a one-time anything.”
Hearing him say that should have felt better than it did. I wrapped my arms around my waist. This never should’ve happened after the way he treated me tonight, but yet again, I’d lost my sense of self-worth the moment he touched me.
“Just leave, Renzo.”
“We didn’t use a condom. If something comes out of—”
“I’m on the pill.” He didn’t need to know they were more for hormonal reasons than contraception, up until now.
His jaw clenched, and his fists tightened around the bedspread. He shut his eyes with a deep exhale, then fixed me with a stern gaze. “This isn’t over.”
The bedcovers rustled as he rose, but I didn’t watch him dress. I didn’t watch him leave. I couldn’t. There was a part of me foolishly hoping he’d argue and stay, but his determined steps said that was wishful thinking. I held my breath until the door slammed shut behind him. It was only then that I crumpled against the wall, slowly sliding down. He’d done what I asked, yet I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe he’d given in too easily.
Chapter 39
Anight’sdrivewasexactly what I needed. At this hour, there was barely anyone else on the road, but it wasn’t quiet. The engine rumbled and roared as I changed gears, vibrating up my leg with an almost soothing touch. With the convertible top down, the wind whipped through my hair as I ramped up the speed. The music blared.
All of this, I controlled. I pressed down harder on the accelerator. A thrill rushed through my blood as the signs sped past. A slight turn of the wheel, and it changed lanes. A little extra, and it would turn sharply, like a thing of beauty. No lag. No protest from the car. No debates. No arguments. It followed what I wanted. It understood what I meant to achieve. It took my pent-up aggression and put it to good use.
Women, on the other hand…couldn’t control them. Could barely understand them. Tonight’s ambush had been necessary. As much as Ainsley had needed to be in that interrogation room with Micah, I needed my revenge. I’d never have peace until I saw it through, and it was beyond frustrating trying to reason with Ainsley. This wasn’t an act to spurn her.
I was accepting the reality of us because there was no shoving my feelings down anymore. We were so good together. Thesexual tension. The discussions. The banter. Our combined strengths, and yet she could be so unreasonable and so…ridiculously unyielding.
I slammed a palm against the steering wheel with a yelled grunt as I veered off the freeway toward a house I owned in Newport Beach. For seven years in prison, I fought for my place in the social pecking order, only to be thrown over by a woman ten inches shorter than me and weighing a good fifty pounds less in muscle mass. And yet, I felt myself goddamn wanting to give in because I wanted her happy, and wasn’t that just so fucking enraging, so comically emasculating.
I wanted to see her smile more than I wanted my next adrenaline high. I wanted her lips on mine. I wanted to be inside her again. I wanted to share everything with her. I’d hesitated about us when I got out of prison, only because I’d needed a little time to wrap my head around the fact that my feelings for her weren’t wrong or vile. I understood now. She was made for me. That woman was mine, and denying it would never change that fact.
The tires squealed as I swerved hard in front of the guarded gate, kicking up bits of loose gravel. Slowly, the gate opened with a wave from my guards. I peeled into the driveway, ready for a good night’s sleep.
I stopped abruptly in front of the left side garage and gazed up at the stars.
I couldn’t give up on my revenge. I’d lost seven years all because the Greeks paid off a seventeen-year-old kid to lie in court.
“There you are.” Vinny tapped the hood of my car. He circled to the passenger side. “You’re not answering your phone.”
On the seat beside me lay my phone and my wallet. I threw them there after leaving Ainsley’s hotel, irritated by the lump in my back pocket.
Vinny opened the car door, put them into the cup holder, and sat.
“What the hell you doing?”
“Someone ran Ettore’s crew off the road halfway up to Bakersfield. Both vans.”
“Shit. They alive?”
He typed the coordinates into the GPS. “No casualties. A couple of injuries, but nothing Doc can’t handle. That’s not the issue.”
“The bodies?” I swung the car around and peeled out of the driveway.
“Yeah. They got spread out. Get this: the guys recovered all of them but two. They’ve been combing the area for the last hour. Nothing.”
“Which ones?”
“The one with the mutilated face, a knife stab per Ettore.”
“I remember him. There was something off, didn’t seem Greek.”
I pressed harder on the accelerator, swerving around the few cars on the southbound freeway. The engine roared in response. The sooner we got to the scene, the sooner we could figure out our next step, whether or not this was deliberate sabotage, and why.
