I almost smirk. Almost. "Deal."
I hear his breath. Something unspoken lingers between us. The tension from earlier. The history. The brotherhood.
Then Alessio exhales. "Get some sleep," he mutters. "You sound like you're about to do something stupid."
A low huff leaves me. "Too late for that."
A quiet snort on the other end. There he is.
"Yeah," he says. "I figured."
The line goes dead. I stare at the phone for a second before setting it back down. Razor. Looking for her. Obsessed. My gaze shifts toward the door. Toward the hallway. Toward her.
A slow, dangerous calm settles over me. He can look all he wants. He can try. He can dig, ask, and push. Doesn't matter. He won't find her.
But if does, even if he only gets the smallest hint of her—my fingers flex in and out of a fist—then it won't be a hunt anymore. It'll be a fucking execution. I lean back against the headboard, staring into the dark. Sleep isn't coming. Not now. Not with this. Not with her down the hall. Not with him out there. Tomorrow.
Yeah.
Tomorrow just got a whole lot more interesting.
The next day…
I'm standing by the large balcony doors, staring out at Vegas as it sprawls behind the glass, muted and dipped in shadow from the tinted windows. The city pulses down there like a living thing, all neon and sin and secrets, but I barely see it. My mind is one huge jumble, a storm I can't outrun.
The night at the poker table keeps looping through my head on repeat. The way Gabe looked at me when I took my place behind the felt, like I was the only thing worth watching in a room full of dangerous men. He made my stupid, half-forgotten dream come true. Gave me the cards, the table, the power. For those few hours, I wasn't the exhausted widow, daughter, vet tech—wasn't the woman whose life had been shattered and taped back together wrong. I wasalive. Confident. Desired.
I never would have dealt in a game like that if it weren't for him. Everything now is because of him. The thought sits heavy in my chest, twisting tighter with every breath. What does he want from me? Really? Because men like Gabriel D'Amato don't do anything for free. Not the private penthouse, not the top specialists for Mom, not the way he looks at me like I already belong to him. He's been making it impossible not to want him back; every dark glance, every possessive touch, every growled word makes my body ache in ways I didn't know it could.
I press my forehead to the cool glass and close my eyes. I'm not calling it love. No way. That would be insane. I loved Pete. Loving him took months to form, slow and steady and safe. This thing with Gabe is nothing like that. It's fire and violence, and a hunger that scares the hell out of me. I'm more than attracted to him. I'mconsumedby him. And that terrifies me most of all. Because he's a mob boss. A criminal. A killer.
I've seen him end lives without blinking. I watched him drag that bleeding doctor across the carpet like he was nothing. And the worst part? I haven't even thought about that doctor since. Not really. I try to dig deep, to find some scrap of horror or guilt or basic human decency… but it's just not there. The man was a jerk, sure, but still, he didn't deserve to die for it, if that's what happened to him. The truth is, I don't know his fate, nor do I want to. What does it say about me that I can't find it in myself to care?
Probably the same thing it says about the rest of my life right now: completely, irreversibly messed up. Right. That has to be it. I exhale shakily, watching my breath fog the glass. Behind me, the door opens, and the reflection of the room shifts.
I feel him before I see him. My body is too aware of his now, too in tune. A low hum under my skin, a pull low in my belly that has nothing to do with reason. In a way I never was with Pete.And that truth only adds fuel to the fire already burning inside me.
Why him? Why now?
His reflection fills the glass, tall, dark, and lethal in that black shirt with the sleeves rolled up, exposing his corded forearms. He stops a few feet behind me, eyes locked on mine in the window like he can read every chaotic thought racing through my head.
"Audra."
Just my name. Low. Rough. Possessive.
I don't turn around. Not yet. Because the second I do, I'm not sure I'll be able to keep pretending I don't already know the answer to every question currently tearing me apart.
Earlier this morning, I opened our bank apps. I didn't want to, but I had to see exactly how bad a shape our finances were in. My heart nearly stopped when I saw a balance of over seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars in Mom's account and over ten million in mine. Dollars!
Mom's account showed a deposit of one million, followed by a series of recent transactions that brought the balance down by two hundred and fifty thousand. Right around the amount that she owed in back taxes, doctor's bills, property taxes, and so on. I knew that number by heart, because it had been a staggering weight hanging over me for years. Sooner or later, we would have had to sell Mom's rental house to pay the bills. Which would have taken the only source of income she has.
I have a pretty good idea where the money came from, but I don't know what to think about it. About any of this.
"Audra?" he says again, stepping behind me.
"Don't." My voice cracks as I whirl around.
"You've been paying for everything," I whisper, my voice trembling with fury, insecurity, and confusion. "The hospital bills. Back taxes. Even our house is paid off."
