DOMINIC
It takesa few seconds to convince Phoenix to stop fighting me. I have to say her name about a dozen times before she stops trying to claw at my face and actually look at it.
“Dom?”
“I’m here. You’re okay.”
Then she wraps her arms and legs around me and clings with every bit of her strength.
Her mouth finds my face in the dark and she kisses every inch she can reach. My forehead. My cheek. The bridge of my nose. The corner of my jaw. Frantic, wet, graceless presses of her lips against skin that’s slick with sweat and smoke residue.
“You came,” she gasps between kisses. “You came for me, you came, you came?—”
Phoenix Riviera is in my arms and kissing me. For a moment, I almost forget that we’re still in danger.
Get it together, Romano.
“Of course I did. We all did.” My voice comes out rougher than I want it to. Her weight is nothing in my arms, bird-light and trembling. “But right now, we have to go.”
Another kiss lands on my chin. Another on the hollow beneath my ear. Her fingers dig into the leather of my jacket, knuckles white, grip so fierce I can feel her nails through the material.
“Thank you.” Kiss. “Thank you.” Kiss. “Thank you thank you thank?—”
“Phoenix.” I shift her weight, trying to get her feet back under her. “We really need to move. Can you walk?”
She doesn’t answer. Her face burrows into the curve of my neck and shoulder, and I feel the hot dampness of tears soaking through my shirt collar. Her whole body shakes against mine in violent, uncontrollable tremors—the kind that come after the adrenaline burns out and leaves nothing but the wreckage behind.
“Never let me go,” she whispers into my skin. The words are barely audible over the distant crackle of the fire and the growing wail of sirens. “Don’t let me go, Dom. Please don’t let me go.”
Something cracks open in my chest. A fault line I didn’t know existed, splitting apart under the pressure of this small, fierce woman clinging to me like I’m the last solid thing in her world.
I tighten my arms around her and stop trying to get her to stand on her own.
“Okay,” I say against her hair, which smells like smoke and burlap and underneath it all, faintly, that vanilla-citrus scent I’ve been pretending not to notice. “Okay. I got you. I’m not letting go.”
I hitch her higher on my hip and start moving through the maze of containers, navigating by the sound of the sirens and the orange glow painting the sky behind us. She weighs nothing. Her legs lock around my waist, her face stays buried against my neck, and every few seconds another kiss presses against my pulse point like she’s checking to make sure I’m real.
Footsteps pound the gravel behind us. I spin, one arm clamping Phoenix tighter while my free hand balls into a fist?—
Mason skids around the corner of a container, chest heaving, face ghost-white in the reflected firelight.
His eyes lock on Phoenix first. Everything else—me, the smoke, the chaos—ceases to exist.
“Is she hurt?” He’s at my side in three strides, his hands reaching for her. “Phoenix, are you…is she okay? Is she bleeding?”
Phoenix presses her face deeper into my shoulder, her grip on my jacket tightening rather than loosening. A fresh wave of shaking rolls through her.
“We’ve got a bit of a spider monkey situation,” I say. “But I think she’s okay.”
Mason’s hand hovers near Phoenix’s back without touching. His gray eyes scan what he can see of her—the bruise darkening on her cheek, the raw red rings around her wrists where rope used to be, the way she curls into me like she’s trying to disappear. His jaw works through something that looks like it might shatter his teeth.
“The fire department is already here. Some of the bikers are trying to keep them from coming through the gate, but I doubt they’ll be held off for long,” he says, dragging his gaze back to mine. His voice has steadied, professional instincts wrestling control back from panic. “Setting a fire and calling 911 was a brilliant idea. Hopefully the police are right behind them.”
“Doesn’t matter. We’re leaving.”
Mason’s mouth opens. “Dom, we can’t just—if the police are coming, we need to give a statement, we need to tell them what happened?—“
“We’re not doing any of that. Let’s go.”
