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She looked over him, finding a cut on his upper arm that seemed too deep for a mere bandage. Aside from that and his fists, gashed at the knuckles, he had no other visible wounds. Kiera knew that the injuries were likely internal, and she’d have preferred for him to seek medical attention. The blow he took to the head alone was cause enough for worry, not to mention the various other impacts he’d taken when shielding her body from the bat.
But she approached with soft steps, unsure of where to start.
When Vincent reached for the hem of his shirt and tugged it over his head, revealing a solid hair-covered chest, she couldn’t peel her eyes away from the exposed skin there. She lifted a hand, trailing a single finger down the center of his chest. Vincent sucked in a sharp breath and grabbed her wrist, pulling it away from him and shaking his head.
“I need you to help me disinfect and wrap these first. And when you touch me…” Vincent said, shaking his head as if it would banish his overwhelming feelings toward her. He left the rest of his words unsaid, but she knew what he meant. She had the same reaction when he touched her.
“Tell me what to do,” she insisted, still craving the feeling of his chest beneath her fingertips. “And I’ll do it.”
The smile that rose to his face—a smile that he gave only to her. Only when they were alone together. It told herexactlywhat he had in mind, but she pursed her lips and placed both hands on her hips, cocking her head.
“Oh really?” he asked.
“Vincent, I’m not used to… blood,” she admitted, glancing at the gash across his arm that appeared to have bled a lot in the time it took for them to arrive at his house. She imagined that even to paint the wound on his arm would make her queasy. Now that her adrenaline had worn off and she faced the possibility of touching that blood, her vision swam before her.
She must have swayed on her feet, as in the next second, he had her by the hips, moving her to sit on the closed lid of the toilet.
He knelt before her.
He’d taken wound after wound to keep her safe. He’d bled profusely from a wound that he needed her to help to mend. Yet he still knelt before her.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Kiera glanced at him, then at the open wound on his arm, as she nodded slowly. She’d witnessed brutal fights at the Grotto and cleaned the blood from the floor afterward. She’d been around blood more times than she could count, and while it always made her sick to her stomach, she wouldn’t allow it to control her.
“I’m good,” she said.
He didn’t move. “Are you sure?”
She nodded. “Just sit down and tell me about what’s happening,” she said, gesturing to the floor at her feet.
Vincent grabbed all the ointments and tools from the sink and sat them in her lap, allowing himself to drop to the floor before her with a groan, grabbing his thigh as he took a deep breath. He’d been hurt there, too, she realized.
Before she could comment on the pain he showed in every crevice on his face, he spoke. “Krill Laker is a threat to the mafia. One hell of a threat. I know that you don’t think highly of my occupation,” he said with a cutting glance in her direction, “but it’s not all bad.”
“The mafia isn’t good,” she added as he lifted a bottle of alcohol and pressed it into her hand.
“That depends on your definition of good. We handle problems differently and more… brutally. We have these policies in place because of people like Krill.” He hissed as she poured the rubbing alcohol down his cut. “A warning would have been great,” he snipped.
“Oops.” Her lack of consideration would have told him enough about what she thought about his job.
His eyes blazed as he looked at the wall in front of him. “Our methods are effective and keep innocent people from being killed. I’m in a specific splinter cell that handles the mafia-run businesses and threats to the organization. Krill Laker is our largest threat.”
“Why? Because he left the mafia to better himself?”
She’d heard him talking about leaving a dozen times. It couldn’t have been a coincidence that Vincent showed up at the Grotto so soon after he spoke his wishes aloud. She couldn’t help but be drawn to Vincent, but she didn’t have to like his career or the organization he represented.
“Because he killed six of our best men and tried to bomb our last charity event to kill all the higher-ups and wealthy patrons in attendance.” She fell silent at that, her mouth opening in shock. She barely managed to keep her grip on the alcohol as she stared at Vincent’s hard expression. “The mafia is a business, and we do a lot of things that you wouldn’t agree with, but we only kill our own when they’ve done something unforgivable. It’s called organized crime for a reason. We don’t just go around killing innocent people.”
“Why is he after us specifically, though?” she whispered, setting down the alcohol and grabbing an ointment, rubbing it across the wound generously.
“He became persona non grata, and the mafia stopped using him for assignments. He got mad, and he decided to enact revenge. I was supposed to execute him before the next charity event that was coming up, but I lost him, and he saw me. He’s trying to scare me away from finishing my mission, which means using you. You’re in this danger because I didn’t kill him when I had the chance. It’s a lot more dangerous than you realize, Kiera.”
She nodded slowly, finally wrapping his arm with an intentional slowness.
“That’s why you have someone following me.”
He nodded.
