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Pepper didn’t say anything, and instead went back to looking outside.
“Did you hear me?”
“I heard you. I’m choosing not to listen. It’s what a woman does best, so I’ve been told.”
She heard him sigh, and refused to help him with this. He had been a total asshole.
“I was worried, okay? It has been a long time since I had a bounty on my head. I was unprepared, and I fucked up yesterday. I shouldn’t have gotten pizza, and then I saw you running toward me, and I flipped out.”
“Yeah, well, normal boyfriends don’t have to deal with a band of killers chasing after their girlfriend, do they?” She ran her fingers through her hair, hating every single second of this. “Are we there yet?”
“Still got another thirty minutes. I want to stay in public. It’s the only way I’m keeping you safe. How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine!” She snapped the words out, and then regretted it. “I’m sorry. It’s been a really shitty day. Actually, you know what, scrap that. It has been a fantastic day that has turned into a crappy one. I’m going from one safe house to another because of some asshole, and now I’m arguing with you. I don’t even know why you’re angry with me. I asked you a simple question, and you behave like this? You know what? Forget it. Forget I ever said anything. I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t ask to be killed, or to have my mother murdered. I just wanted to live a normal life, or as close to a normal life as one can get.” She was nowhere near done. “You know what? I’m sick and tired of all of this. I was a good person. That asshole who came along destroyed everything. He killed my mom. You know what is even stupider, as I’m sitting here right now all I can think about is how good last night was. I gave my virginity to you, and then you treat me like this. I want to hate you so much.”
There, she was done.
Once she realized what she had said, she groaned.
“I don’t think stupider is a word,” Viper said. He sounded so calm that it had her looking toward him, and yes, he was staring straight ahead at the road. “You can’t take my word for it of course. I don’t know if there’s a word like that in the dictionary.” She froze. “You’re right, and I hated to admit my weakness to you.” He glanced over at her. “I can’t read. I’ve never been able to read.”
“No one taught you?”
“The bottom line was money, Pepper. I don’t need to know anything but numbers, and that’s all I know.” She didn’t need to know that there had been someone there who had his back. His entire childhood had been one fucked up mess after another, but even when he’d been at his worst, there had been one person who helped him through—Bain. Bain was the only person from his past that he’d any kind of feelings for. They were sworn together as brothers to fight those who had taken them and hurt them. After they had completed their mission by taking out those sick fucks, he’d only seen Bain once or twice throughout the years. Viper rarely thought about him, but there were times he wondered if the bastard was dead.
“How can you take orders?”
“Boss tells me. I have a great memory, and the thing about GPS nowadays, they tell you what to do.” He shrugged. “No one knows. You’re the first person to figure it out.”
“Were you born to that way of life?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
“You talk about being in some kind of prison. Were you
born there?”
She watched as he stared straight ahead. “I don’t have any memory of the time before. I know I wasn’t born into that way of life. I did some digging. I was stolen from my mom’s side when I was three years old.”
She covered her mouth, shocked. “You must have been afraid.”
“I can’t remember. Growing up there was fear. It didn’t change, and when I was old enough, I settled the score with those bastards.”
Pepper didn’t know what to say. “You had no idea that there was a hit out on you?”
“Nope.” He said the word with a pop to it.
“You’re not afraid?”
“Nope. This won’t be the first time I’ve had a bounty on my head.”
“How did you stop the bounty?”
“By killing the person who placed it on my head. It’s not easy to do with a target on your back.”
“We need to kill my stepfather.”
“Yes, we do.”
