Page 102 of The Merciless King

I take her chin. “You want to leave this world?”

She nods.

“Do you know what I do?” I growl out my question, my heart pounding.

This is dangerous fucking territory.

I want my answer, yet I’m terrified to hear it.

This beautiful woman has crept inside my heart while I was using and betraying her, and she’s staring at me like I’m the man of her dreams.

When I’m her nightmare.

“Yes,” Gianna answers, and my heart shatters into a million pieces.

She knows.

She’s always known.

Her eyes dip away with shame, and I want to wrap my hands around her throat, tearing the life-giving air from her lungs. How could I feel this way about a woman who is okay with such evil?

Who selfishly brought me into this world so she could use me for her own pleasure.

She is not who I thought she was.

“But I want you anyway,” Gianna adds.

I bet you fucking do, sweetheart.

I remove my arm and sit up, rage blazing within me like a hurricane. It’s me who should be ashamed.

I’m a US Marine, trained to know who the enemy is. Not to fall in fucking love with one of them. I cannot believe I let myself fall into this fucking Stockholm type syndrome.

Just a few more hours of holding up this charade.

I hope Amy is one of the women in the shipment tonight. If she’s not, then it’s time to face that I’m chasing a needle in a haystack.

And that I’m shit at this undercover work.

I’ve done my best—now I need to get the fuck out of this world.

And away from Gianna Baldassare.

“I have some calls to make,” I tell her as I pull on my clothes. “I’ll meet you down by the car in an hour and we’ll go for lunch.”

I don’t glance back as I leave the room.

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GIANNA

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WHAT THE HELL was that?

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