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The plan I’d put into place was dicey. If everything didn’t come together, the chances of coming out of this alive were slim to nil.
What the hell? Maybe I did like playing games after all.
Her call also confirmed my belief that someone was providing information to Michael, and I had a damn good suspicion of who that was.
As I headed into her crappy neighborhood, I continuously scanned the surrounding area, searching for any sign I’d been followed or that Azzurri’s soldiers had been assigned to watch her house. While I didn’t see anyone, that meant shit at this point. I rolled into her driveway, almost immediately jumping off the bike, barely yanking the helmet off before storming toward her front door.
She hadn’t described the threat she’d been given, but I could understand why discovering it had taken such a tremendous toll. As I stood on her front porch, all I could see was red. The vase of flowers was a warning that a loved one would soon be dead, the blood merely a theatrical effect, an attempt to terrify her.
And a message sent directly to me.
Fuck Azzurri and his clan of assholes.
I knocked on the door, taking a few seconds to look up one side of the street and down the other. Goddamn it. I had no doubt her house was being watched. The last thing I wanted to do was lead them to the safe location where I’d taken Lily.
“Who’s there?”
“It’s me, sunshine.”
When she opened the door, she immediately threw her arms around me. I pushed her inside, closing and locking the door behind me.
“You came,” she whispered, her voice muffled as she pressed her face against my shoulder.
“Of course, baby. Has anything else happened?”
“No.” As Harlow finally pulled away, she darted her eyes back and forth across mine. “They’re coming for you.”
“Likely.”
“You need to go to the police.”
“I can’t and won’t do that.”
“Why? Why do you continue to act like you can do this on your own?”
“I have my reasons.”
She cupped both sides of my face. “Trust me enough to tell me.”
I took her hands into mine, pulling her further away from the door. “This had nothing to do with trust, sunshine. There’s no time. I need to get you to a safe location.”
“Where’s Lily?”
“You’ll be with her soon enough. Grab a few things.”
She took a step away from me. “I’m not going anywhere, unless it’s to be by your side.”
“Don’t argue with me.” I’d raised my voice, infuriated that she still refused to accept she was in extreme danger.
“I don’t want to leave you.”
I yanked her by the arms, dragging her onto her toes. “Don’t you understand, Harlow. I refuse to lose you. This isn’t your fight. It’s mine. I shouldn’t have allowed you to get in the middle of it. I should send you out of town for an undisclosed period of time. That would be the smart thing to do, but I know you well enough to realize that you wouldn’t stay there. You’d get yourself into a heap of trouble by being nosy, asking too many questions. I can’t and won’t allow that to happen. Do you hear me?”
“Why? Why do you give a damn what happens to me?”
The defiance in her eyes was just as infuriating as every caustic word from her voluptuous lips. “You’re the most annoying, incredible, witty, beautiful woman I’ve ever met, but you have so many walls padlocked around you that you can’t see what’s right in front of you.”
“And what the hell is that?” Her eyes were lit with a fire unlike any I’d seen before.
