Page 40 of Between Dusk and Dawn

"And I am telling you no."

He took one step toward me. "I need you to."

He was begging, and part of me loved the fact I had the upper hand here, yet again. "Why do you need me to do this?"

"Because my father is forcing me to get married to someone else."

"What?" I balked, backing into the footboard of my bed and falling back. I scurried up so I was sitting.

"Do you know what the Mafia is, love?"

I’d heard rumors about what the Den and the Alpha house really were. There were always big blacked-out SUVs driving around, and people seemed to deal in handshakes as much as they used money around these parts. There was also the spring bonfire where people would go missing. I assumed it was something else. Rumors said the Mafia and Cartel beefed that night and their treaty to keep the peace somehow disappeared for one night of the year.

"Yeah."

"My family is the Luchesse family," he said as if he was reading the ingredients off a can.

"You’re in the mob?" My voice lifted a few octaves. Again, I shouldn’t have been surprised, but hearing it come out of his mouth was shocking.

"We use my father’s last name, but the family comes from my mother’s side, so yes." He paused, raking his hands through beautiful, long black hair that fell in front of his face. It was much longer these days, and he even had a little stubble on his jawline that somehow accentuated his features. It was hard to deny his beauty. "And my father wants me to marry someone this week. When I go back to Dansport tomorrow, my engagement will be announced."

My heart sank to my feet. The room spun around me.

Why was I having such a visceral reaction to this news? Why did I care so much? I hadn't seen him in three years, and before that, we only spoke once, where he’d yelled at me. Yet my body was unmistakably shutting down over the fact that Walsh Solis was going to get married.

"T-to who?" I got it out as he turned his back on me. Then I noticed a paper at the end of the bed, sitting atop Walsh’s luggage, and scrambled to pick it up and read it.

There were pictures of a beautiful woman who looked oddly familiar, but I couldn't quite place where I had seen her before.

"To her."

"Who is she?" I asked, throwing the paper back in his direction.You don’t care.That's what I needed to keep repeating to myself in order to make it true in my mind.

"She’s part of the Irish mob. I need to get married to her for political reasons, but once I marry her, Madison, that little string of hope that I know you kept all these years will go away. I can no longer?—"

I raised a hand to stop him. "Please don’t."

I stood from the bed, mustering up every bit of courage I could find in my bones. "You mean nothing to me. You arenobody. I don’t know why you are here telling me all of this. I don't know what your ulterior motive is, but I am not marrying you. Go back to Dansport and get married to the person you’re supposed to."

"But—"

"No buts. We were never anything but a fucking mistake, Walsh. We both made a lapse in judgement, then I took it too far fucking up your family. You gave me my year-long silent treatment, then ruined me with your words. We are even. It is done."

I took a deep breath before continuing with what I needed to say before he could say anything. "I do not want to marry you to help you. Where were you when I needed help? You didn’t want me four years ago, why would I suddenly bow to your demands today?"

"Because—"

"Agh," I shouted. "That was a rhetorical fucking question."

The smallest twist of the corners of his lips leading to a sheepish grin was the only indication he was slightly amused. "Okay, Muse."

"Get out." I closed the distance between us, pushing him backward toward the door. "Do not come back. Get out."

Although I was pretty strong from the years of yoga, my strength was met with an iron wall. He didn’t move an inch even as I pushed with my entire body to get him to leave.

"One question," he said, and I stopped pushing him.

"Okay." I didn’t owe him anything but could grant him this one request.

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