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I’d lost it in front of Leonid, showed him a weakness in his own fucking house. He wouldn’t forget it. He’d use it against me. He’d twist it and use it to his advantage. It’s what men like him did. It’s what I did.
I’d seen it in the way he looked at me when I took Lina out of there. When he stared at her.
I turned away and stalked back to the bar, pouring myself more vodka. Too much. I tossed it back and went for glass number four. The burn wasn’t there any longer, and alcohol was the last thing I needed. My head was already fucked up without the temptation of Lina in my apartment and the cloudiness of booze in my veins.
I shouldn’t have told her I killed that fucker in the alley. But I’d taunted her, needed her to ask me so I could show her how far a man like me was willing to go for her.
“Who are you? Who are those men? What is actually going on?”
I didn’t turn around to face her. I stared at the wall straight ahead, my glass in hand, my fingers tight enough around the glass I hoped it cracked and tore my hand to shreds. It would give me something else to feel.
“I’m a ba—”
“I know. You’re a bad man. I didn't ask what people see when they look at you, not what you see in the mirror. I want to know what’s going on, because if what you say is true—”
“It is,” I said, cutting her off.
“Then with my life in danger, you owe me the truth.”
How could this woman utter a few words and have something tight and uncomfortable inside my chest and squeezing my vital organs? I was now regretting not looking into her past, not getting any and all information on Lina that I could. I didn’t have a moral compass, yet when it came to her and finding out who exactly Lina Michaels was—who she really was—I found myself holding back, wanting her to be the one to confide in me.
It was fucking stupid. A mistake. I ran a hand over my face.
I turned around and looked at her. She was still against the window, but her gaze was steady as she watched me. It would be so easy to go up to her and press our bodies flush together, to curl my fingers around her throat and make her look into my eyes as I tell her she’s mine.
Fuck, I envisioned myself burying my face in her hair and inhaling deeply before running my nose down the length of her throat, dragging my tongue up and down her soft skin. I could practically taste her in my mouth. Sweet. So sweet. I wanted to feel how fast her pulse would beat against my tongue, proving that she was just as affected by me as I was by her.
“Don’t ask questions you don’t really want to know the answers to.” Did she want me to admit I was involved in the crime syndicate? Did she want to know everything that touched me, everything I owned, was because of blood money?
She pushed away from the window and took a step toward me, but I didn’t miss the tremor that moved through her body. She was trying to be stronger than she felt. It was an admirable quality, but it was also a weak one. A human one that would do her no good.
Lina kept moving closer, watching me cautiously. How close would she come? Would she get so close I could reach out and curl my fingers around her waist? Close enough to where I could press her body to mine and let her feel the physical reaction she brought out of me?
“Are you part of that…?” She didn’t finish that question, but she didn’t need to. She knew what I’d say if I could have. She just wanted me to verify it. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. It wasn’t even about some moral compass, wasn’t because of the Bratva or the Cosa Nostra. At this point I didn’t care about any of that. I’d never tell her, because it would put her in even more danger.
I said nothing. There were no words I could say. She looked away when it was very clear she understood, when she knew she wouldn’t get the answers she sought from me. I finished off my vodka and set the glass down. I tried to shut off my emotions, what I felt. They were messy and didn’t do anything but cause issues. They made a conscience rise up in somebody like me.
“So what?” She looked back at me. “You can’t take me home because I’m in some kind of danger now?” She scoffed and looked away. So brave. Trying to be so strong. It was a turn-on. “You know nothing about me.” She looked back at me then, trying to hide the fear in her eyes.
