Page 77 of Hearts Of Darkness

We’re going around in circles.

Dropping my arms, I head for the closet to select a fresh pair of jeans and a clean shirt. She follows me out of the bathroom and stands behind me. I can feel her gaze flickering over my wounds constantly.

“Jesus Christ,” I exclaim, attempting to dress one-handed. Every movement jars my broken shoulder.

“Here, let me help you.” She bends down to guide my feetinto my jeans as I lean against the wall, dizzy as fuck. Damn, this pain is intense. Joseph has already sent for our medical team.

“What happened to you in Colombia?”

“We were ambushed.”

“Did you lose many men?”

I pause. “Some.”

I’m playing fast and loose with the truth again. In reality, ninety-nine percent of my army has been obliterated. Every single man that I sent to New York and Florida was rounded up and pumped full of bullets, and Sanders isstilloff the grid. Fuck knows what Emilio’s done with him. If I wasn’t so goddamn tired, my rage would be irrepressible.

“How bad is the damage to your compound?”

“Outhouses are still burning. Sector six is destroyed.”Millions of dollars’ worth of firepower stolen.

“Is that where you made the co—”

“There’s no production here,” I say sharply. “Our processing plants are elsewhere.”

This is one discussion I’m not prepared to have. I trust her not to reveal my identity, but beyond that it’s a gray area. She hates my business. Her feelings for me have caused a ripple affect with everything she holds dear—her family, her job, her future.

“I’m going to resign from my paper.” She sounds reluctant but accepting. “We’re quite the conflict of interest, aren’t we? The cartel boss and the reporter. I can’t give up writing, though. I’d miss it too much.”

“I wouldn’t want you to.” I lean over and catch her lips in a hard kiss. “Just focus on another criminal for a change. I hearWall Street’s full of them.”

She doesn’t smile. It’s like she hasn’t even heard me. “I need justice for my brother, Dante.”

Those words.

Once again, my past has chucked a bucket of water at the portrait of our future.

“Shall I turn myself in to the DEA, the FBI or the CIA, or is this a citizen’s arrest?” I drawl, shrugging into my shirtsleeves with difficulty. She reaches out to tug the tails across my abs, and I catch her staring. “It’s quite a dilemma, isn’t it?” I add, my voice softening. “We’re all about the lust and the hate, and that fine line you dance in-between.”

“There’s a part of me that will never forgive you for what you did, Dante. I miss him every day.”

I don’t answer.

I can’t.

I hate seeing the hurt reflected in her eyes, and the knowledge that I caused it wounds deeper than any bullet.

I punch a number into the safe in the wall. Picking up the gun there, I slide it into the waistband of my jeans. “If we get through this, I’ll spend the rest of our lives making it up to you.”

“There’s only one thing that will make this better.”

She doesn’t need to elaborate. What did she label my affliction again? An unquenchable bloodlust? Sounds about right… Whatever the fuck it is, it isn’t going away soon.

“Get dressed. Time to go.”

She drops her towel and bends down to pick up her bra and top from the floor. I can feel myself growing hard again.

“What happens after I’m gone, Dante?”

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