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The phone rings once before the call is answered. “You with Oakley?” I ask Cross.
“Describe with?” he questions.
I shake my head, knowing exactly what the asshole is doing. She’s sleeping and he’s creeping on her again, but I suppose it’s not the worst thing he could do. I mean, fuck. He could be responsible for tearing her heart out of her goddamn chest. “You’re fucked in the head, bro,” I tell him. “Bring her down to Empire. I need to meet with Nikolai and it’s the perfect time to test her loyalty to her father.”
“Alright,” he says. “Give me fifteen.”
The phone goes dead, and I toss it over to the passenger seat as I fly right into the city and out the other end, following the old train lines until I pull up at an abandoned parking lot. It’s barely been ten minutes, and Cross hasn’t arrived yet, but he won’t be long. There are multiple entrances to Empire throughout the city, many of them even well outside of the city limits and into neighboring towns, but Cross knows this is where I need him to meet me.
My mind is a fucking mess as I pace outside my Bugatti. I can barely think straight.
This bullshit with my mother has fucked with me in a way I wasn’t prepared for. It makes me feel weak, pathetic. It makes me feel as though I’m not fucking ready to take the reins of this society, but it’s all in my head. I’ve been ready for this for years, and the fact that I’m questioning myself only pisses me off.
Cross pulls up just a moment later, his matte black Lamborghini shooting through the parking lot and making my jaw clench. That Lamborghini is fucking beautiful, and once upon a time, it used to be mine, until I lost it in a fucking bet and had to hand him the keys. Who fucking knew that Cross had such big balls? I’ll never play Russian Roulette with the bastard again.
Cross pulls up right beside me, his window down as he stares out at me with apprehension. “You good?” he questions, reading me like a fucking book.
I shake my head. “We’ll talk when I get back.”
Cross nods and with that, Oakley bails out of the Lamborghini before Cross takes off like fucking lightning, leaving me staring at the girl who’s been sending my world into chaos. Only now, meeting her pissed-off stare, the cloudiness begins to fade from my mind and suddenly everything comes back into perspective, making it easier to breathe again.
Oakley stares back at me, her brow arched as her hands fly out wide, clearly not too pleased to be here. “What the fuck, Zade? I was sleeping.”
My lips press into a hard line. As hard as her attitude usually gets me, I’m not in the mood for it tonight. “Let’s go.”
I start walking toward the entrance of the train tunnel, and with her only other choice to remain out here in the dark by herself, Oakley scurries after me, huffing and puffing with every fucking step. “What the hell is going on?” she questions as we approach the external door, and I pull the big brass key from my pocket.
“I need to speak with Nikolai, and I figured what better opportunity to spend some quality time with you, too.”
She gives me a blank stare, clearly not appreciating my bullshit quite as much as I do. “The only thing you like to spend quality time with is your hand,” she throws back at me, and I can’t lie, she’s not wrong. The number of mornings I’ve woken up with wood after having her ass grinding back against me through the night is messed up. But I’m not about to admit that.
Opening the big, metal door, I go to walk through, only to notice Oakley hesitating out in the cold tunnel. “What?”
“The last time I walked in there willingly, I got knocked out and tied up by the very man you’re here to see,” she explains, a real fear hidden behind her eyes. “The next time I was in there, I was locked in a prison cell and thought I was going to die down there.”
“And both times I’ve been there to save your ass, Lamb,” I remind her, heavily focusing on those blazing blue eyes, only to scold myself for paying so much attention. “Do you really think I’d get this far just to let something happen to you now?”
She lets out a heavy breath before finally stepping in after me, though I can tell she’s not comfortable here. She sticks right to me, her hand snaking out in the dark and latching onto my belt loops as if being close will save her. “Do you get just how fucked up it is to say things like I’ll never let anything happen to you while knowing you’ll be the one responsible for killing me?”
