She doesn’t even bother getting her bags from the backseat, choosing to storm past the row of supercars and disappearing through the door that leads to the kitchen.

I sit in silence for a moment, letting my body calm down. It was already on edge after fucking Lila in the breakroom, and now this…

“Fuck.” I lean back, closing my eyes for a moment.

Every muscle in my body is tense, and I instantly think of Lila. How in this moment I want nothing more than to have her straddling my lap, bouncing up and down on my cock. The feeling of spilling inside her would definitely take the edge off.

I curse myself.

How can I give Rosa a hard time for breaking the rules when I did the same today? I knew Lila was trying to taunt me, to get me to break. And it fucking worked.

That dress. My cock had been rock solid all day, and I snapped.

My fingers itch to touch her again, to drive straight to her apartment in the city and storm through the door and pin her against the wall, the door, the bed.

“I’m losing my goddamn mind.”

I force myself to get out of the car before I make another stupid decision.

The kitchen is empty, with no sign of Marco either. He’s likely in his own study on the other side of the house.

I have no interest in talking to him either, so I head up the stairs toward my office.

It grates on my nerves when Marco doesn’t side with me when it comes to matters regarding our sister. I hate always being the bad guy, but he’s young and still has a lot to learn.

I never signed up to play the guardian role, it’s not something I was interested in. Even with Valentina, I was hesitant to bring children into our world, knowing that they’d likely have a target on their head from the moment they took their first breath.

How could I do that to an innocent child? It would make me just as much a monster.

The moment I close the door to my office, I pour myself a scotch and take a seat behind my desk, switching on my computer and opening up my security app.

I quickly check all the cameras in the house, noting Rosa pacing around her room on the phone.

She looks pissed, but I’d rather have her mad at me and alive, than dead.

Marco’s in the main living room, also with a scotch in hand as he works from his laptop.

I move on to the penthouse apartment in the city, and to the cameras at Mason’s International. Everything is as it should be.

I’m about to switch over to my emails when I notice a new folder named Lila in the app.

23

ANDRE

I hold my breath as I click on the folder named Lila and find four new camera feeds.

“Quick work,” I mutter, impressed by my security guy’s swiftness.

I asked him last night if he would be able to install a few cameras in Lila’s apartment so I could keep an eye on her at all times. I was expecting the job to take at least forty-eight hours, but there she is, lying in her bed, eating a bowl of ramen.

I click through all four cameras, getting the full layout of her small apartment. If you can even call it that. It’s more of a large room with a bathroom.

I maximize the feed that shows her bed and lean back in my chair, taking a sip of my scotch.

Fuck, she’s beautiful. She’s wearing an oversized T-shirt, her toned legs stretched out in front of her, and her hair loose around her shoulders. She’s watching something on her laptop, a smile tugging at her lips as she eats.

Part of me aches to be beside her, enjoying her company. Laughing at a show together as we eat in bed.