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If I get through this mess.
“Next on the left,” Ringo calls from behind, making Rose slow in her determined strides. She stops outside a room marked OFFICE and takes the handle, pushing the door open.
“It’s empty.” She looks past me to Ringo. “Where are they?”
Silently, Ringo moves past us, gently but firmly moving Rose aside and entering the room. He holds the door, motioning us all inside, and then closes it and locks it behind us. I frown, looking around the office space. A desk. A bookcase behind it. A couch. A filing cabinet. “This way,” Ringo grunts, pushing into one of the sections of the bookcase. I recoil when it pings open, revealing another room. He gets us all inside, closes the door, and puts a long code in on a wall-mounted control panel. The iron door on the other side of the room opens with a click, and Ringo pushes his way inside, revealing a staircase.
We all climb the steps silently, emerging into a huge room. “Wow,” I breathe, standing stock-still on the spot, while Rose ventures inside, looking quite stunned too. There are four desks in this office, two corner couches, a private bar, a poker table, many men, and the back wall, spanning one side to the other, top to bottom, is glass with an unrivaled view of the club below. A smile creeps up on me. Glass.
I then realize the room’s deadly silent and gaze around, finding all attention pointed at me and Rose. All conversation has stopped. James gets up from one of the couches and comes to me. “Hey,” he says quietly, discreetly taking me in from head to toe. His relief is clear. What isn’t, is why I’m here.
“What’s going on?” I ask, uncomfortable under the scrutiny of all the men.
He hunkers, oblivious to the peanut gallery behind him, and caresses my cheek. “Apart from someone trying to blow me up?”
I withdraw. “You’re not joking, are you?” I crane my head to see past his big body, noting the grave expressions of everyone, most of all Otto. He has a Scotch in his hand. A big one. And now I notice the mini arsenal of firearms scattered across the two enormous coffee tables in front of each corner couch. Grenades, pistols, machine guns. “Is that a harpoon?” I blurt as Rose approaches the table, casting an unsurprised gaze across the collection, before wandering to the foot of the glass wall and looking down into the club. I don’t know why I’m shocked. I knew what James’s collaboration with Black meant, but seeing it spread all over the tables, hearing James just escaped death, and observing the many men in this room, it’s suddenly hit home.
War in Miami.
And my boyfriend has the biggest bounty on his head. I look across to Danny Black. He’s running a close second, and his contemplative face, his relaxed but tense seated position at a desk, the Scotch before him, too, tells me he’s mindful of this. Of course he is.
Danny blows out his cheeks and blinks, getting up from his chair and joining Rose by the glass wall. “We’re done,” he says over his shoulder, and the men disperse, leaving only us.
I look at James. “What happened?” I ask, seriously considering joining Otto with a strong, large drink.
“Did you have a nice day?” he asks, completely swerving my question. He’s not real.
“You tell me you nearly got blown up and then switch to chit-chat of the normal couple variety?”
“We’ll give you two some privacy,” Rose says, pulling on Danny’s arm and eyeing him.
“I don’t need privacy. I need answers.”
“You don’t need answers, Beau,” James says quietly. “You need peace.”
I inhale, and it’s long and deep. He is real. He’s going to send me out on girlie days while he gets caught up in explosions. I wince, hearing a door close behind us. The room is empty, except for us.
James reaches for my damaged arm and strokes down the sleeve of my shirt, his eyes harboring too much sympathy. “Don’t do that,” I warn, shrugging him off and walking to the window. “Stop looking at me like I’m broken.” I reach the glass. The club’s dance floor is clear, the bar quiet, and I see Danny leading Rose across the floor.
“You’ve been broken since the moment I found you, Beau,” he retorts, resentment rife in his words. “I’m not looking at you any differently.”
“That’s the fucking point,” I yell, whirling around. “Yes, I was broken, but I didn’t feel it when I was with you. When you obliterated everything, took me to that place you always do when we’re intimate, I wasn’t broken.” I suck back a sob, my voice infuriatingly wobbly. “Now I feel more broken than ever.” There’s so much more shit to add to the pile. So many more answers I need, and the most horrific thing is that in order to get those answers, I need to let James go out there and find them for us. I have to risk losing the one and only thing that’s given me any hope. I feel like I have my back pushed up against a wall.
