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“I’ve never asked you to guarantee my safety.”
“Maybe not, but we’re in this together now.” He rubbed a hand over his face, and she saw suddenly how tired he was, wondered if he’d slept at all the night before. “And god help me, I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
She reached up, touched his face. “What are we doing, Damian?”
He shook his head, took her face in his hands. “I don’t know, but tell me you don’t feel it too.”
She met his eyes, tried to summon the words.
I don’t feel it. It was just sex. Nothing more.
She couldn’t. It was a lie.
She was still trying to figure out how it was possible to have feelings for a man she’d only met days earlier, a man who was the sworn enemy of her brother, who should therefore be her enemy as well. But with all the things she didn’t know, there was something she did.
There was something between them.
She didn’t know what it was or where it would lead, but it was there.
“I feel it too,” she finally said. “I can’t explain it, but I do.” She wondered if she was imagining the relief in his eyes.
“If you go back, there will be hell to pay. That’s if you can find Primo at all. My men haven’t even been able to find him yet, and there are hits out on every location you might try — the club, the apartment, all of it. It’s not safe for you anywhere near the city.”
She thought she should feel some sense of loss at the thought of the apartment, the club she’d decorated so lovingly, being torn apart by Damian’s men. Instead she felt absolutely nothing. It belonged to another person.
Another life.
She held out her hand. “Give me the phone.”
He handed it to her. “Keep it short. No details.”
She looked at the display for a few seconds before dialing. She was beginning to wonder if Primo would pick up on his private line — the burner phone would be an unknown number — when she heard his voice.
“Yes?”
“It’s me.”
“Ari?” There was a lift of hope in his voice that broke her heart. It wouldn’t last long. “Is that you?”
“It’s me,” she said. “I’m calling to tell you that I’m okay, but I’m leaving town… leaving the country for awhile.”
“What are you talking about?” A cold edge had crept into his voice. “You’re being ridiculous. We had a fight, that’s all. Tell me where you are and I’ll send someone for you.”
“I can’t do that, Primo. Not this time.” She drew in a breath, turned away from Damian like not looking at him would somehow make it less of a betrayal to Primo. “Do what you have to do, but leave me out of it.”
“Are you with him right now?” His voice was dangerously low. It was the way he talked when he was on the verge of losing control. When he was barely holding it together. “Is that why you’re doing this? Because you let him fuck you like a whore?”
“This is between you and me, Primo. It’s always been between you and me. Just let me go.”
“We’refamily,” he yelled into the phone. “We don’t let each other go. Not now or ever.”
It was the one thing he could have said that made her second-guess her decision. Because he was right: they were family. They’d lost everything together. Had rebuilt it together too. They’d saved each other a hundred times.
And now she was leaving him when he was under siege.
She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to find Damian looking at her. The concern in his eyes was completely unfamiliar to her. How long had it been since she’d seen anything but anger or fear in Primo’s eyes? Since he’d cared about something besides impressing Malcolm or making more money or improving his standing among the men?
“That’s not your decision to make,” she said into the phone. “I’ll be in touch.”
