Maybe it’ll happen when you stop putting her in danger.
My jaw clenches. This time, it’s me who lets go of her and leans away.
She sounds a bit breathless as she says, “Tell me about this poker game.”
I give her the rundown of my conversation with Maksim.
Blake’s brows are furrowed. “Isn’t Maksim worried about being seen with you in public? If he’s already thinking about trying to turn you, he’d want to keep your meetings private, no?”
“He picked well. The two of us being seen on neutral territory like Red Vines shouldn’t arouse suspicion. In his mind, even if it gets back to Gino that he and I were there together, our attendance could be easily explained as coincidental.” I take another few bites of her abandoned pasta. “What do you think about this dinner with Ekaterina?”
Blake shrugs. “I have to go. It’s the kind of thing Vita told me to expect.”
“You’ll be there on your own. I don’t like it.”
“It’s not like she’s going to do anything to me in public. What are you afraid of?”
“I don’t know.” Something uncomfortable gets lodged inside my throat. Should I tell her how I’m really feeling?
Fuck it. I’ve got nothing to lose.
“I’m worried I’m putting you in danger. I promised you I’d keep you safe, and this doesn’t fucking feel like me fulfilling that promise. This feels like me doing the wrong thing for selfish reasons again.”
Her eyes widen, like that was the last thing she was expecting me to say.
“What are you talking about? I’m the one who convinced you to do this. Iwantto do this. You becoming capo…” She swallows. “It will make everything better, won’t it?”
No more twelve-hour days when I barely see her. No more blood caked under my nails when I get home. No more men doubting that I could disembowel them for giving her lingering looks.
And to top that all off…I just have this gut feeling that once we make it to the other side of this, she’ll be mine again.
“Yeah, it would. But at what cost?”
“I can handle this. I don’t want to see you hurt, Nero.”
“It’s not your job to fix my problems, Sunshine.”
Unease flickers across her expression. “It is when I’m the one who contributed to them.”
I frown. “What are you talking about?”
“Brett was my ex. Uncle Lyle was my godfather.”
Is she seriously blaming herself for what happened? “You’re kidding, right? Don’t tell me you’re doing this out of some misplaced sense of guilt.”
“You know, in the beginning, I was so worried about the people in my life causing problems for you. And then when I found out about how you’d lied to me, I was so full of rage that I became blind to my own part in what happened to us. But if it wasn’t for Brett and Uncle Lyle, you would have stayed Rowan Miller. You’d still be running Handy Heroes with Sam, and you wouldn’t have had to risk your life by coming back here. So yeah, I do feel guilty, and I don’t think my guilt is at all misplaced.”
My heart breaks all over again.
This woman. How can someone be this fucking pure and good?
She’s wrong, of course. She’s blameless. If I’d handled Brett differently, he wouldn’t have gone to the Iron Raptors and demanded they look into me.
But I can see now that this has been weighing on her.
I swipe my hand over my lips, trying to contain the flood of conflicting emotions suddenly rushing through me. “You don’t have to do this.”
“I know. But I want to. You’ve taken many choices from me, Nero. Don’t you dare try to take this one from me as well.”
