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I retraced my steps back to the front, where Austin stood waiting for me. He looked me over once, and I nodded, letting him know I was fine.
“Liam Callahan,” he said.
“In the flesh,” I replied. I needed a fucking smoke. “He even brought his son along.”
“The venue was changed at the last minute. I didn’t have time to check,” Austin said.
“That’s what he wanted.” Everything he was doing was to prove a point. Having the ability to change Amelia’s shooting location, bring me to him, displaying his kid in of us—his message was clear. He wasn’t even the least bit worried about me. I couldn’t touch him, but he could fuck with me in the blink of an eye.
“He wants you to sell out your father,” Austin said, not even trying to pose it as a question. But what else could Liam Callahan want with me?
“Mr. Sloan, we’re ready for you.” The same photography assistant who had called Amelia earlier appeared in front of us again.
“I’m heading back to Chicago after this,” I told Austin as I walked toward the assistant.
“Thank you so much for agreeing to do this shoot, Mr. Sloan. Everyone is obsessed with you, too.”
That was the problem.
“Beautiful, Amelia,” I heard Hanako say. We walked past the large pool, and Amelia leaned against the pool wall dressed in a strapless red swimsuit, glowering into the camera sensually, her pink lips parted slightly.
While whole world was watching me, I was always stuck watching her.
Amelia
When he came out, dressed only in his black boxer briefs since they hadn’t prepared anything for him, I let go of the breath I was holding. I had told Austin to immediately find out who it was we were talking to, but I wasn’t sure if that made any difference whatsoever.
“Jump in with her,” Hanako directed.
Noah nodded, but instead of slipping into the pool slowly, he backed away.
“Noah, don’t you—”
Too late. He ran for it, and I prepared myself for the wave of water that would surely mess up what the stylist had done to my hair. In the background, I heard the cameras click away as the wave hit me.
“Agh!” I screamed when his hands grabbed my legs, pulling me under with him. Bubbles all around us, he kissed me, and instinctively, I wrapped my arms around his neck, his arms wrapping around my waist.
We stayed under there until our lungs forced us back to the surface. As I gasped for air and wiped the water from my eyes to glare at him, I couldn’t talk because of that damn grin of his.
“There are easier ways to tell me you are okay,” I whispered.
“But are there better ways?” He lifted my chin, leaning into me again.
“Hold it,” Hanako yelled at us, and he froze, remembering that we were working and that this wasn’t our pool.
“Okay, Noah. Lift her up out of the water for me, and Amelia, can you look down at him?” Following her directions, I was able to stare into his eyes. Despite his smile and the love I knew he had for me, though, I could still see the pain in his eyes. We were just trying to live—why was it so messy?
This was the only simple moment of my life—when he was holding me.
“I love you.” They were the only three words I could think to say. It was my promise. I would love him no matter what.
Chapter Five
Noah
Chicago.
“They tell me you are wicked, and I believe them. They tell me you are crooked, and I answer: Yes. Gunmen kill and go free to kill again. Flinging magnetic curses, fierce as a dog, cunning as a savage pitted against the wilderness. Stormy, husky, brawling, the City of the Big Shoulders,” I whispered, blowing smoke out the crack of the window and staring up at the buildings above me as they passed by in a blur of blue and gray. No matter what, there was always a gray glow over the city.
