Page 18 of Fight

Which meant that even if I wanted to leave, I’d be stupid to. If Markov got his hands on me again, he’d never let me go. I looked at the house and then turned back to Ioan and gave him my best smile.

“Why are we still sitting out here? Let’s go, roomie,” I said, putting levity into my voice that I didn’t really feel. Then I got out of the car.

Ioan

I watchedP as she bounded toward my front door while I lingered in my car.

What the hell had I gotten myself into?

I still didn’t know, and worse, I had no idea how I would get myself out of it. But at least for these minutes that didn’t so much matter. I’d work it out. I knew I would, but what I cared about in those few moments was how relieved P seemed to be.

I’d sensed the change in her when I’d pulled up to the house, felt that curiosity become suspicion. I wouldn’t even allow myself to consider why she’d changed so swiftly, though I could guess at it.

A deep, unexpected anger had coursed through me at the thought of P’s mistreatment, but it had been pushed down when she’d smiled at me, her face telling me that at least for now she was going to trust me.

I wasn’t sure why that mattered. I’d simply lost my head and now had to clean up for it. But seeing her smile, knowing that she might feel safe in my home made me happy.

And that confused the fuck out of me.

She was nothing to me, so why did her smile, one that I’d only earned after getting myself into yet unknown depths of trouble, touch me?

I looked at where she stood by the door, and laughed when she waved at me impatiently.

I didn’t know, but what I knew without a doubt was that I would save her.

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