No, I want that. Don’t I?
“I don’t know what I want,” I admit.
“I know what you want, mi alma, and I’m going to remind you every day,” he says.
“You will tire of me soon, E,” I tell him, because he will. Either that or he will notice just how broken and ugly I really am. As soon as that happens, he won’t want a single thing to do with me.
“I’m going to have the jet ready to take you home tomorrow night, Evie. I think it’ll be good for you to get out of Vegas, get back to your store,” Emmanuel says.
I do need to work. “Thank you. Wait… Will you be on that jet?” I ask him.
“Why? Are you missing me?”
“About as much as I’d miss a hole in the head.” I laugh.
“You having a hole in the head is not a joke,” he grunts before sighing into the phone. “Unfortunately, I won’t be on the jet. I have to finish some things here before I can leave.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m tired and I miss being able to look at you.” He sounds so brutally honest.
“Hold on.” I press the button to switch the call to video. Emmanuel accepts it, his face filling my screen. “Hey.”
“Hey,” he says with a huge smile on his lips. “Mi alma, fuck me.” He shakes his head. “I thought I was dreaming it.”
“You thought you were dreaming what?”
“How your beauty takes the breath right out of my lungs,” he says.
“It’s just skin.” I’m uncomfortable with the same praise I’ve heard my entire life.
“Your beauty goes farther than skin-deep. Your soul is what takes my breath away, mi alma, not your skin,” he tells me.
“Where are you?” I take in the moving background behind him.
“In the middle of a meeting.”
“Then why are you talking to me?” I quirk a brow.
“Because you’re more important than the assholeI’m meeting with. Now, tell me what I have to do to get you to go back up to the suite. That casino floor is not the place to be at this time of night.”
“Don’t you have your people watching me? I’m sure I’m completely safe right where I am.”
“I do. But that’s not the point,” he grumbles. “I would just prefer you weren’t alone.”
“I like being alone,” I say. “It’s easier.”
“Easier than what?”
“Pretending,” I admit.
Emmanuel doesn’t say anything. He just stares at me through the screen. I see something move behind him, a flash of something silver.
“E, who is behind you?” I try to get a closer look at the screen.
The next thing I hear are gunshots. The phone is dropped, the camera now facing the ceiling. There’re two more shots before the phone is picked up and Emmanuel’s face fills my screen again.
“Evie, I have to go. Get on the jet tomorrow. Talk soon,” he says.
