I claw for his eyes. He traps my wrist against the plywood and leans his weight. Breath becomes a bargaining chip I’m quickly losing. My lungs scramble for air. Instinct sends my hand to my chest, my fingers finding the blossom’s edge through cloth.
You will not give up. Oddly, this time the voice in my head sounds like Matteo’s.
I twist, drop my weight and his grip slips a hair. I roll, raking my boot heel down his shin until he swears in a word I don’teven know. Air slices back into my throat, the pain tasting like electricity.
He comes harder. His fists to my ribs, then his elbow to my jaw. The second hit blurs the world and the third folds me. I catch the fourth in the crook of my arm and manage to snake my legs, scissor, and take him to one knee. He’s strong as hell. He’s also patient, and patient men are dangerous. He finds my hair under the hood and yanks my head back, trying to bounce my skull off the plywood.
The sky narrows to a tiny slit, the scaffolding net swaying in and out like my desperate lungs. My gun is under the car. My knife is stuck in my boot. I reach for it, but he reads my move, pinning my arm with his knee.
“Tiernan will be pleased.” He draws a box cutter from his sleeve like a gift. “He said to bring you in breathing, but he didn’t say how tidy.”
He leans in, blade scraping across my throat.
A sound cuts the street, a sharp, ear-splitting crack.
The goon jerks forward and red blossoms below his shoulder. He blinks down at the wound like he hasn’t decided if it belongs to him. A second shot folds him sideways. His weight crashes across my legs, and I barely suppress a cry. Bone and meat are heavy in a way that nothing else is. He tries to say a word that starts with my name and ends in nothing.
I shove him off, then half roll and half crawl away. The world comes back in pieces: the smell of hot metal, a horn, someone shouting that they’re calling 911, and then my own wheeze. Boots pound toward me, and a familiar shadow cuts the light.
“Cat.” Matteo. I recognize the voice without looking up and the part of me that knows better still answers to the way he says it.
He’s a dark figure under the scaffolding, coat open, gun down now but not away, and wild eyes like a storm coming. Matteojust stands there for a long moment, scrutinizing every inch of me, a torrent of emotion surging beneath the glossy surface.
I shove up. The alley tilts, and I force it level. He doesn’t touch me, thank God. If he touches me, I will forget that everyone who knows my last name wants me either punished or dead.
“You all right?” he finally whispers, eyes still scanning me for blood. His gaze snags on my throat where the box cutter sliced skin. It’s just a shallow line, more sting than danger, but still, his jaw works. “Who did that to you?” His glare turns absolutely lethal as he kicks at the man’s corpse. “This asshole?”
“Doesn’t matter. I’m fine anyway.” My voice is a lie that barely passes for truth. I swallow the rest, hitch the duffel onto my shoulder, and toe the box cutter into a storm drain.
He flicks his eyes to the dead man again, then the street. Sirens are nearer now, too near. He steps in to block me from the sidewalk’s view, not touching, just making me small behind his frame.
“Any sign of Tiernan?” I ask, voice low and I hate the slight tremble in it.
“Not yet but he’s probably close.” A muscle jumps in his cheek. “You shouldn’t have gone back for the phone.”
“I don’t take orders from Rossis,” I hiss, because it’s easier than thethank youthreatening to erupt. If he hadn’t come… I squeeze my eyes closed and shove back the grisly thoughts.
Something like a laugh cuts through his teeth and dies quickly. He glances at my hands, the tremor I can’t quite contain, and then looks away. Mercy is dangerous, and he hides it like a weapon.
I drag breath through my throat and press the heel of my palm against the blossom under my jacket, just once. A private promise to myself, to my baby girl. He doesn’t notice the gesture because he’s watching the shadows, the mouths of nearby alleys,and the movements of strangers inching closer. Good. Let him keep seeing the threats, not the memory carved into my skin.
“We have to move,” he grits out. “Cameras saw this. Cops will be here first, then someone worse.”
“Someone worse is already here.” I tilt my chin toward the dead man. “Tiernan has friends in the city.”
“I’ll never let Tiernan have you,” he growls. And for a beat, I want to believe him. We just stand there staring at each other for an endless moment, frozen in time.
“Let’s go,” he finally murmurs. He lifts the hem of my hood a fraction and winces as his fingers carefully brush my hairline. They come away red and sticky. Heat snaps through me at the touch, memory and adrenaline igniting a flicker of something I can’t afford.
“Don’t,” I whisper.
He drops the fabric immediately. “We move northwest. We can cut through the campus, but first I’ll peel off and draw them away.”
“We?” I hiss. “I don’t need an escort.”
“No, but you need a distraction.” His eyes flick back to mine, something unreadable in that bejeweled gaze. “Let me be what I’m good at.”
A siren howls around the corner. The woman with the poodle is already on her phone and three kids hover, hungry for the drama. The city is waking to this little war.
