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I tried to smile, but feared it came across more as a grimace as I shoved the papers in my hand toward him and rose. “I’m sorry, totally my fault.”
Concern filled his brown eyes. Eyes that seemed to bore into mine before slipping behind me. Shit, he was gorgeous. “Are you okay?” he asked. “You seemed to be running from something.”
“Fine,” I answered a little too fast as he grabbed my phone from the floor and held it out to me.
The pretty brand new phone with its rose gold cover, the phone bought by Finley. A tortured moan tore free with the pang in my chest.
Confusion in Mr. FBI’s gaze turned to concern. “Are you hurt? Can I call someone?”
Am I hurt? Yeah…you could say that.I licked my lips, that ache in my chest pounding. Ripped in two, does that count? Running from a goddamn monster, the same people who murdered an entire family and everyone who worked for them. That kind of evil never goes away.
“No. No, I’m fine, honest.” I grabbed my phone from his hand and took a step backwards before turning. “I’m sorry for slamming into you like that.”
He looked like a nice guy, a really nice guy. Still, I left him behind and ran. I shoved my way out the doors and ran, my shoes slapping on the concrete path until I hit the door to our building.
Murky gloom consumed me as I strode through the automatic doors. I sucked in savage breaths and hit the button for the elevator. The Salvatores were dangerous…I'd known that.
But I hadn’t knownhowdangerous…
Now I knew.
All those deaths…all that terror. The Salvatores wiped out an entire family? We had their goddamn money and there’re just the two of us. Two of us with no one to care if we simply disappeared.
“Jesus.” I wrapped my arms around my middle and I stepped inside the elevator car, stabbing the button before I closed my eyes.
Bad blood like that doesn’t just go away. It turns into someone like Dominic Salvatore. A man who was planning retribution, a man determined to go to war. A man who was born to spill blood. “Stupid,” my voice was thick as I shook my head. “Sofuckingstupid.”
My stomach clenched and acid burned in the back of my throat. I was afraid I was going to be sick.
The elevator doors opened and I stumbled out.
“Anna?” Kat called.
I jerked my gaze up at the sound, panic fluttering in my chest. I licked my lips, scanned the apartment, and found her curled up in the corner of the sofa. “It’s me,” I managed as I forced a smile.
She didn’t move for a moment, turning her head toward the window. Her hands fluttered against her cheeks as I turned to the kitchen. I clenched my fists and released them, trying to still the trembling. “Want something from the kitchen?”
“I’m good.” She lifted a half-filled glass and drained the contents.
She was drinking…a lot.Her haunted gaze and the shine on her cheeks told me she’d been crying. “You okay?”
“Family shit, you know?”
I cracked open a bottle of water and drank, making my way toward her. One minute, Kat was up, likereallyup, then she spiraled. I wasn’t used to seeing someone hit rock bottom that fast. “Are you in some kind of trouble?”
She let out a bark of laughter and reached over, filling her glass once more. “Anna,I’m always in trouble.” She smiled a sad, empty smile, and drank. “But enough of my shit. I don’t even want to think about it. I thought you wanted to go to class?”
“So did I,” I answered, leaning against the arm of the sofa.
But Finley…always Finley.He was everywhere I turned. I couldn’t breathe without thinking about him. Hating him and wanting him at the same time. He frightened me, but not like his father.
No, his father was terrifying.
And Finley was…Finley was…hurting.
“Fuck this shit,” Kat groaned and unfurled from the sofa to pad bare-footed toward me. “Let’s get drunk.”
I laughed and lifted my water. Kat just rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Drinks at Evan’s in an hour?”
