This is for everything they’ve done to me and are about to do to me.
My family, the living and the dead, the ones present and those who are absent, all culpable just the same.
This is for all the little wars they’ve started inside me, some burning quietly, some engulfing me with their vicious dragon flames.
For all the taboo things they’ve done to me.
This is all for you.
“Hi,” I murmur, tracing the seam of his mouth. “I thought you’d never come,” I go on in the same hypnotic cadence, reveling in the heat blooming in his eyes.
“I figured you weren’t that far, but I was held up for a minute out there.”
“It was my stepfather,” I say with a laugh.
He likes my joke and chuckles in reply.
“He’s technically not your stepfather.”
“I can call it whatever I want,” I say brutishly. “Besides, socially, he is.”
“He never was,” he says, arguing with me, a flash of amusement in his voice.
I tilt my gaze to his chest, my fingers dancing on the contour of his pecs hard beneath his shirt.
“Would you like me to dance for you?”
I flick my eyes up.
“Only if you’re a good dancer,” he says, winking in a tease.
My smile broadens as I lift an eyebrow.
“I can manage.”
I flick my head in the direction of the pool while taking his hand.
“Let’s go over there. It’s more private.”
“Sure.”
We walk down the few steps and stop next to the lounging area, where I nudge him slowly toward a chair.
“Relax, and enjoy.”
Before they draw their guns out,I continue in my head.
He leans back, his arms folded on top of his chest, as I start swaying my hips to the rhythm of the music floating through the air.
Nothing seems inappropriate.
Not my dancing for him, not the fact that we’re alone.
That is bound to change, though, as the door to the patio opens, and a few male silhouettes slide out.
Men, guests, probably holding their drinks, inching closer to the handrail, and before long, I spot a few men who work for Giorgio.
Perfect.
