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“We thought the ranch was safe.” I swallow hard and back out of his arms. “I think I should look at going out on my own.”
His eyes flash, and he starts to shake his head, but I hold up a hand.
“Hear me out. They’re finding me because they know I’m with you. With the Martinellis and the Tarenkovs. They’ll keep tracking down you and your family, Annika, to find me. That’s not fair to anyone, Shane. It’s not right.”
“Ivie.”
“I’ve disappeared before,” I remind him. “And I was a lot younger with little education. Now, I can hack into anything, change my name again, and start over. I can go anywhere. I’m smarter, and I have a little money saved up to get started.”
“No.”
I pace away from him, my mind forming around the idea.
“I mean, I’ll miss you all. Never seeing Annika and Nadia again might kill me, but if it keeps you all safe, it’s the right thing to do.”
“No.”
“Shane, be reasonable.”
“You going out on your own with some idiotic idea of keeping us safe is not being reasonable, Ivie. It’s fucking stupid.”
“I am not stupid.”
“I didn’t think so either until about thirty seconds ago. I don’t need you to keep me safe.”
“Yeah, I saw that on the monitors.”
That makes his jaw clench, and his eyes narrow.
“Who are you? I keep asking and asking, and you always blow me off. If you don’t want anything to do with me, fine. You don’t need to tell me. But we’re sleeping together, Shane, and you can’t convince me that it’s just sex. It’s not. So, don’t even try to say it is.”
“It’s not just sex,” he mutters and rubs his hand over the back of his neck.
“Then I need you to talk to me. Because I feel that you care about me, and I sure as hell care about you. Jesus, I need you all to stay safe. I don’t know everything that’s happening, and that means that I’m scared and frustrated, and you’re asking me to just blindly trust that you have everything under control.”
“I do have everything under control. Why can’t you just trust me on this and let me do my damn job?”
“Because I don’t know what your job is!” I round on him, aggravation coming out of every pore on my body. “I don’t know what Cameron said. I don’t know anything except that I watched you and Curt systematically assassinate at least a dozen men today, men who were after me. And now you’re trying to just tuck me away in this beautiful ivory tower while the menfolk take on the bad guys.”
He sighs. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything!” I push my hair off my face. “I want to know everything. I think I have the right to that, Shane.”
“Okay.” He blows out a breath. “Curt and I are trained assassins. We kill people for a living for the US government. Well, he used to. He’s retired.”
“But you’re not.”
His eyes are cold and level with mine. “No. I’m not. And I can’t tell you more because it’s classified.”
“Who do you kill?”
“Whomever they tell me to.”
I swallow hard. “What did Cameron say?”
“The Sergis are behind this. The last guy we killed at the ranch confirmed he was working for them. Carmine and Nadia are planning to go to New York, where the Sergi family is based, to do some digging.”
“That’s it?”
He nods. “Yes.”
“And now I’m just supposed to sit here and wait again?”
“I don’t know what else you’d like to do. You’re definitely not going to New York.”
“I don’t want to go to that godforsaken city ever again.” I sink onto the side of the bed, suddenly bone-tired. “At least if I left, went out on my own, I’d have something to do and it would keep you safe.”
“I’m not the one in danger,” he reminds me, and the scene from just a few hours ago clearly comes to mind.
“I beg to differ.”
“If you left, I would find you. And not in a creepy serial killer way.”
That makes me smile, but I bite my lip, trying to stay serious.
“I didn’t intend for you to come to mean so much to me, Ivie, but you do. You matter. You matter more than anything else in my life, and you going anywhere that I can’t find you isn’t an option for me. I know it’s fast and that we have a lot to talk through when we get this all figured out. But I’m not letting you leave me.”
He gently drags a fingertip down my cheek.
“I need this to be over.” My voice is a hoarse whisper. “It’s too much. I don’t deserve this, Shane.”
“I know.” He pulls me into his strong arms and holds on tight. “I know. We’re going to figure it out. Together.”
I nod and take a deep breath. “Do you think the pizza is here yet?”
