Page 76 of Under His Protection

More shots were fired, and as Eva moved to stand, to run, reaching out for my hand to guide me to safety with her, I flinched as a bullet sank into the cushion of the couch. Inches from my head. It was the luckiest miss, but I wasn’t sure Eva would survive a hit if she got up from the shelter of this lounge area.

“Get down!” I yelled it as I pushed Eva down, sparing her from a direct hit to the head, given the location of where the bullet pierced through the chair she’d sat in.

As we stumbled lower from my act of shoving her and covering for her, I lost my balance.

I fell. It was such a hard impact that my breath was punched out of me. I’d been holding it, tense and bracing for pain with this sudden attack.

My head smacked on the edge of the low table, and darkness quickly eased into my vision, sending me to oblivion as I was knocked unconscious.

29

DANTE

Dante

Istayed at the Hound and Tea long enough to see that Reaper and his gnarly friend were tossed out. The security staff consisted of professionals, and it wasn’t anything as dramatic as dragging the bikers out by the collars of their ugly shirts.

They kept their hands on them as they ushered them to the door, and from the third floor windows, I watched the pair of MC members get in a car and speed off.

“I would’ve thought they’d come on their bikes,” Romeo said. He stood next to me, watching the pair leave.

“I bet they have all manner of vehicles for disguises.” Just like how they snuck in here, dressing up more like the usual clientele that gambled here. I turned away, satisfied that they’d left. I had no doubt they’d try to come back. The Devil’s Brothers would be a problem until they were all six feet under.

“I want more men on it. Follow all their vehicles. Track them.”

Romeo nodded, leaving with me.

“I want to know how many of these fuckers are in that club.” Because if I’ve got to be the one to rid the world of them, I’ll need to prepare accordingly.

“Everything. I want to know every single fucking thing about them. You and Franco have already started to gather intel about them. Now is the time to step it up.”

“On it.”

Romeo drove off in a different direction, likely one of the other properties he preferred when he didn’t want to stay at the mansion. That was where I headed, impatient to see Nina. She was the reward I could look forward to after dealing with scum like Reaper.

On the drive, I thought back to how I’d referred to her—potentially knocked up. That was another way of belittling her. She wasn’t here just to bear my child. She wasn’t important in my life just because thrusting into her pussy was a lot like coming home.

She was a friend. A support system. A listening and level-headed woman who would make a good partner, even outside the bedroom.

Is that why she’s still so guarded? Over the last couple of weeks, we’d fucked almost nonstop. It was, like Franco had teased, a honeymoon period where we couldn’t get enough of each other. While connecting in a physical way was easy and enjoyable, I realized that she still maintained a slight edge of distance, as though she was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It wouldn’t. But how would she know? I told her I wanted to keep her with me forever. I was clear that we weren’t pretending anything anymore.

I had yet to express how I felt, though, the more emotionally charged kind of relationship.

Love. I hadn’t given her an indication that all I did for her and wanted to give her was an act of love.

“Time to fix that mistake,” I muttered as I pulled into the drive. I didn’t want Nina to go another moment of thinking she was just someone to fuck consistently.

Inside, I didn’t see any sign of her. But the person who was waiting for me in my bedroom pissed me off.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” I narrowed my eyes at Vanessa sitting on a chair near my and Nina’s closets. That piece of furniture would be removed and destroyed, now tainted from her being in this place and touching the cushion.

She had no right to be in here, no allowance to be present on the property at all, much less inside the home I now shared with Nina.

“Welcome home, Dante.” She smiled slowly. It was a practiced expression meant to make men drool and drop to their knees. Seductive and cunning, that was how I could sum it up. She’d given me this very same smile countless other times, and it always resulted in the same reaction—anger and annoyance.

“Cut the sex-kitten bullshit. What the fuck are you doing in here?”

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