Tiny alarm bells go off in my mind.
Nobody…except this guy who occupied most of my dreams last night…is around?
He’s here…but he didn’t show up back at the restaurant after my shift…
Something feels weird.
I bite down on my lower lip, his arms still grasping me. “You stood me up,” I say, narrowing my eyes at him.
How sick is it that I don’t want him to let me go even though he could be a total stalker? I mean, what are the odds we’d be here in the same place at the same time?
“I know. I’m sorry.”
I wait for more of an explanation but nothing comes. “That’s all you have to say?”
“I can tell you I fell asleep, and when I woke up it was three a.m.”
“Would that be true?”
“No,” he murmurs, his lips lifting slightly. “But it’s easier to swallow than the real reason.”
“And you just happen to be wandering around here in the most secluded part of this park, perfectly positioned to save me from face-planting in the rocks?”
“Fucking fate, huh?” he says.
I furrow my brow. “This isn’t exactly a place that the Village crowd frequents.”
“Who said I was part of the Village crowd?”
A tingling between my thighs makes me slam my knees together. This guy could be a total psychopath and here I am, craving his fingers, his mouth…everything. “So you’re saying this run-in is just a coincidence?” I say with a nervous laugh.
“I don’t believe in coincidences, Marchella.” His gaze darkens as he stares down at me. “I came here for you.”
Chapter Seven
Roman
Holy Christ.
What in the ever-loving fuck am I doing here in this shithole park, holding the woman whose world I’m about to shatter? She’s already had enough shit to deal with over the years, and here I am ready to dish out some more?
My gut twists. I wanted to see her again last night…so fucking badly.
But I would have done things…bad things…things that would have come from a dark place inside of me. The place where my need for vengeance festers.
I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from taking what I’d wanted for so long and then justifying it because of what her asshole brother did to me.
The rage would have ignited and incinerated everyone in its path.
I was smart enough to stay away last night.
Not so much today.
After finding out Frankie led the charge on the robbery, and then when the plans to snatch Marchella came together, I knew I had to see her one more time before all hell broke loose and swallowed her whole.
So I drove all the way up here and waited for her.
I knew it was only a matter of time before she’d step outside of that dingy apartment building where they live. It was too nice of a day to stay inside, and as far as Frankie knew, nobody was coming after him, so he’d never have warned her to lay low.
Fucking idiot.
I followed her into the park, managed to keep up with her frantic jog, even though running isn’t my chosen form of cardio, and saved her from cracking her head on a boulder while she chased a stray.
Now she’s in my arms.
And pretty soon she’ll be sprawled in my trunk.
I told my guys to hang back, that I needed to check out the scene first to make sure it was safe for us to move forward with our plans. But it was all bullshit. I had to see her again. The spark between us sizzled from the second I left her at the restaurant, and the aftershocks kicked up whenever I’d picture her face in my mind afterward.
It’s almost as if she was a sliver of sanity and I needed to grasp onto her to ground myself.
All of the teenaged lust came rushing back with an unparalleled force, and the things I dreamed of doing to her and with her consumed my conscience when I wasn’t thinking about jamming an ice pick into Frankie’s eye.
The events of the past couple of days fester under my skin like an infection that can’t be killed with even the strongest antibiotic. Shit is slipping away from me — my credibility, my ferocity, my power — and even though I’ve tried to yank it back, it keeps eluding me.
I guess I felt like I had one last lifeline to grasp onto — her.
I know I’ll never have her the way I want her. It’s not like I could ever act on it, not after what Frankie pulled, and not with our family history.
And after I ‘handle’ Frankie, I’m pretty sure she’d never come near my with a ten-foot pole…unless she had one to swing at me.
“You came here for me,” she repeats, a look of disbelief flitting across her features.
“Is that so hard to believe?”
“You blew off our date,” she says sharply. “But then again, you did leave me a pretty generous tip, even after I dumped a highball full of scotch into your lap,” she says, her full pink lips lifting.
“I did.” I look around. We’re still alone for the immediate future.
Safe. Guarded. Protected by all the damn trees.
I don’t have long to get this out.
“I came here to apologize for missing our date,” I say.
Her eyebrows shoot upward. “Seriously? It wasn’t that big a deal.”
I lift an eyebrow. “Really.”
She twists her ponytail around her finger and takes a step backward, a smirk on her face. “It’s not like I don’t have guys hitting on me all the time.”
“Ouch. I came here to apologize. Now you’re just kicking me while I’m down.”
“You didn’t have to make the trip. You could have found me at the restaurant.”
“You’re right, but then I’d have had to wait to see you again. And you aren’t working tonight.”
Her eyes pop open even wider. “Wait, who told you that?”
“The girl who answered the phone when I called the bar.”
“You called, asking for me? So, what are you, some kind of stalker? You figured you gave me that tip and now you’re entitled to…” she stumbles over a branch as she takes another step away from me. “Hey, wait a minute. Did they tell you where I live? How would you even know—?”
“I make it a point to find out what I need to know when I’m interested in a woman, Marchella,” I murmur. I don’t move toward her because right now, she’s like a petrified little animal. One false move, and she’ll dart.
And I don’t feel like running any longer.
I need her to stay right here.
With me.
I’ve never felt this conflicting tug of emotions before, and I don’t know if I ever will again. What I do know is that Marchella is my bargaining piece. And as much as I want her to be anything but, I can’t change the circumstances.
Hers or mine.
I have to save face.
I have to prove my worth to the organization.
And I cannot fucking crack!
I stare at her, watching her expression soften the tiniest bit. “I have a can of pepper spray in my pocket. I will use it if you come too close.”
“I don’t want to hurt you,” I say.
This is one-hundred percent true.
If this was another life and we didn’t have a history, I’d have wanted to hunt her down and violate her in as many ways as I could imagine, all while her asshole brother watched, tied up and gagged. I would have wanted to punish her, all because she’s an extension of Frankie, the man who completely fucking emasculated me in the eyes of the underworld.
And my own family.
I would have wanted to make an example of her, of both of them.
But it isn’t a different life, and all of the feelings that percolated last night…all of the X-rated fantasies…came bubbling to the surface once again.
I have to hurt her. There’s no way around it.
Once I move forward with my plan, she’ll hate me forever.
And for us, forever was never an option for anything more.
“Good,” she says, twisting her head left and right and then narrowing her eyes at me. “So why don’t you tell me why you were so desperate to see me that you had to follow me into the park? You weren’t just hanging out here. You had to have tracked me.”
“What if I did?”
“Well, that would be hella freaking creepy! Especially since you could have seen me last night but chose not to come back.”
“You’re right. But you have to believe it was for a good reason. Besides, you’re not running away from me now,” I say. “If I’m so creepy, why are you still standing here?”
She shrugs, her long ponytail cascading down one shoulder. “Probably because I’m stupid and naïve. But maybe because…” Her voice trails off.
I take a tentative step forward. “Maybe because…?” I ask.
Her hand slides into her pocket, which is totally flat, by the way. She has no pepper spray. It was a bluff. But I did see her run, and she’s got some pretty powerful legs, legs I don’t plan to have near me unless they’re wrapped around me. “Maybe because I’m kind of glad you came looking for me in some weird, twisted way.”
“Why does that make you weird and twisted?”
She rolls her eyes. “Not me, dude. You.”
“I’ve been called worse,” I say with a smirk. “And if that’s the worst you can say, then I’ll stick around to hear some more.”
A smile plays at her lips. “What makes you think there is any more?”
I take another step. “Because, like I said before, you’re still standing here. I take that as a good sign.”
The electricity cracking between us…she can feel it, I know she can. But how the fuck doesn’t she know it’s me? How can she not see me the way I see her? How can she not remember?
Unless the hate runs so deep, she won’t acknowledge what’s long been buried.
Pretty soon, she won’t have much of a choice but to unpack it all.
She clears her throat and tucks a stray hair behind her ear. “Yeah. So, um…Joe,” A nervous giggle slips through her lips. “What happens next?”
A loud ringtone pierces the air and I grab it out of my pocket.
“Yeah?” I say, dragging my eyes away from Marchella.
“Boss, Frankie’s on his way. We have to do this now.”
“Okay,” I grunt. “I’ll meet you at our spot.” I gave them the address of her apartment building under the guise that we’d tail her from there.
Dammit, I didn’t get enough time!
Why’d she have to run for so fucking long?
I click off the phone and stuff it back in my pocket.
“So, I, uh, guess you have to—” she starts to say, but I don’t let her finish. I close the space between us and snake my arms around her waist, crushing my lips against hers to silence the rest of her thought.
I drink her in, the taste of spearmint so sweet on her lips. I plunder her mouth with my tongue as I press my fingertips into the small of her back. A tiny moan slips from her mouth, her arms tightening around me, her fingers tugging at the hem of my shirt. Fuck, I want to sprawl her out on the ground and tear off her clothes so I can feast on her, tasting every inch of her frenzied body. Our tongues twist and tussle, coiling heat igniting the flames of passion deep in my gut…flames that I’ve never felt singe me, much less incinerate my insides.
This is what I needed to experience.
This is why I came.
This is what I had to know…at least for a few fleeting moments before her life completely implodes, courtesy of me and her dear dipshit brother.
I pull away, breathless, dragging my thumb and forefinger down the sides of her flushed face. Her eyes sparkle with lust and excitement, all signs of fear completely erased from her expression.
That’ll change soon enough.
She cocks her head to the side, a shocked expression settling into her features. “Wow,” she whispers.
I graze her lips with mine one more time. “Ditto,” I say, a smile tugging at my lips as I back away.
“Wait, that’s it?”
I run a hand through my hair. “Yeah.”
“You seriously are going to just walk away after that?” she exclaims, throwing her hands in the air.
My smile fades. “You’ll see me again, Marchella. I have a nasty habit of turning up when people least expect me.”
And with that, I turn away from her shocked expression and jog toward the nearest exit.
I have a job to do.
Chapter Eight
Marchella
My head is spinning so fast right now, the only way I can make sure I don’t land face-first in the dirt is to climb down the trunk of a tree so I can sit down to rehash the crazy, fucked-up events that just took place.
I went from chasing a stray to being stalked to thinking I was going to be murdered to being kissed senseless.
And now I’m alone again.
It all happened so quickly, I could convince myself that it was all part of my daydream fantasy loop.
But the heat pooling in my belly and between my legs is enough to convince me that he was not, in fact, a mirage. That gorgeous yet nameless man’s hands grazed my lust-filled body, his demanding fingers pressed into my flesh, his lips crushed against mine, and his devious tongue launched a delicious invasion on my mouth.
It really happened.
Then, without warning, things ended just as fast as they started.
But damn, it was intense and oddly, so…familiar.
Powerful.
Blissful.
And way too fleeting.
I press my fingertips to my temples, my skin prickling from the memory of his touch. I lean back against the rock, flinging a hand over my forehead, every cell in my body on high alert.
How am I supposed to just pick myself up and walk away like it never happened?
Because that’s exactly what he did.
He took off faster than a shot, phone call or not.
I should probably be second-guessing my actions, wondering why he mysteriously flitted into and out of my life twice in the past twenty-four hours, but the endorphins coursing through me just keep that stupid smile plastered across my face.
Like I don’t have a care in the world.
An alternate reality.
Maybe that’s why I don’t want to break the spell.
Maybe that’s why I subconsciously know that if I leave, it will shatter and I’ll be plunged back into my actual reality.
I take in a deep breath, knowing I can’t escape forever but a few more minutes to bask in the feeling of euphoria that has commanded my body and mind can’t be bad, right?
Let’s call it therapeutic.
When I finally drag myself up from the rock, I tighten my ponytail and head toward the park exit and back to the craziness of the city and my life. This little slice of bliss will be here when I get back. And I will go back, just to relive those stolen moments and hope that I may get a chance to claim a few more like them.
He came to find me.
A shiver rushes down my spine.
He likes me.
And I like him, too.
I rub my hands down the sides of my arm and cross back over Seaman Avenue, the gravity of Frankie’s predicament washing over me as I put distance between myself and the delicious little tryst I just shared with my sexy stalker, Joe.
A deep sigh expels from my mouth as I trudge back to my apartment. I know this isn’t hell. I mean, it’s definitely worse than purgatory. But I have Frankie, and we have food and a roof, albeit questionable since the plaster chips incessantly over our heads.
We have hope.
I may get jaded, but I haven’t completely lost that hope.
And dammit, I have a degree from one of the best universities in the country!
I can fix this!
Running always empowers me. Makes me feel like an in-control badass, and even if it’s total bullshit, it makes me smile. I furrow my brow as I
pass a quiet side street. A tiny whimper makes me do a double-take, and I duck down the street in search of the source of that sound.
Oh my gosh, it sounds like…
I walk gingerly down the sidewalk, searching for any movement. I strain my ears to try and hear the sound again. A car zooms past and I jump, startled by the noise and annoyed that the coughing muffler might have scared the animal away.
When it’s quiet again, I keep walking, twisting my head left and right when I gasp, clapping a hand over my mouth. A furry paw peeks out from one of the run-down buildings. It disappears as quickly as it steps out, and I jog over, falling to my knees when I see the tiny puppy cowered against the cement wall. It looks up at me with big, sad brown eyes and lets out another cry. This time, it doesn’t look like it has the energy to run away, which makes sense since it must have run all the way here from the park.
My brow furrows.
How insane is this?
The puppy, the Stalker otherwise known as Joe.
What are the freaking odds that I’d see them both…twice…in the most unlikely of places?
I reach out tentatively, smoothing down its matted fur. A little peek at its back confirms it’s a girl. She’s almost all black, except for a small white patch around her neck.
She doesn’t look like a typical stray, especially around here. I wonder if her owner brought her to the park for a visit and she got away somehow. I bite down on my lower lip. I think it’s a Boston Terrier. I cup her chin in my hand and tilt her face upward to see if she’s wearing a collar. Not that I needed to move her head. She’s so little, it would be hanging down like a necklace.
My gut twists.
Of course.
Her collar probably slipped off. “It’s okay, baby,” I whisper. “You’re okay.”
But she’s not.
So I decide that second to add her to my list of blessings.
I said I loved the silent camaraderie, but I’ll take it in barking form, too.
But the dog doesn’t bark. She just ventures toward me, one slow step at a time. I hold out my hand so she can sniff me, and it isn’t long before she’s licking my entire arm. She’s not completely comfortable yet. I guess she’s still sizing me up.
Savage Beast: A Dark Mafia Enemies to Lovers Romance (Sinfully Savage) Page 8