Page 122 of Between Passion and Revenge: Part Two
“Goddamn you, Storm Sandoval,” I whisper into the silence, my hand curling around the tiny foot next to my head.
I know my truth, and it’s that under all the shame and outrage, there’s love. Parts of me, stupid parts of me, still love Storm Sandoval to distraction.
But I won’t let him use that love against me. Never again. Not anymore.
Tempest wiggles, turning her head from one side to the other from her position near my knee.
Now isn’t the time to break; it’s time for me to straighten up and move forward.
Moving inch by inch, I climb out of the bed and slide into the spacious en-suite bathroom. Soft automatic lights illuminate the area, slowly coming up to power so my eyes adjust.
Opening my phone again, I frown at the repeated two-word message from an unsaved number.
Call me.
I tap to start the call.
“We have a problem.” King’s sudden answer takes me off guard, as does the tension in his tone. It’s been years since I last spoke with Yennifer’s brother, but after being blocked from leaving the premises, I called him.
Storm may think he’s running shit, but he doesn’t know who I am today.
He doesn’t know that Shae Olivya Rivers isn’t a woman to be fucked with.
“A problem? The last thing I need are more problems,” I say, rubbing my temple.
“Yeah. Just—hold on,” he says, and the line goes dead for a second before King returns with Yennifer on a three-way call.
“Do you know what fuckin’ time it is?” Yennifer growls. She’s never been, and likely never will be, a morning person.
“Listen, brat,” King throws back, “You and your friend got me up in the middle of the night trying to?—”
“Who you callin’ a brat?” Yennifer yells.
“—commit an international crime by smuggling that man’s kids across the planet, and now you gonna get an attitude with me?”
“King!” I whisper-shout, remembering at the last minute that the kids are on the other side of the door. “You said there’s a problem. What’s the problem?”
King and Yenn go quiet, and King scoffs before saying, “You’ve been flagged on an international no-fly list, Shae.”
I stare at myself in the mirror, processing his statement.
“Um…what?How?” I ask. Yennifer and I haven’t thought much past getting me and the kids somewhere far, far away from Chicago for the foreseeable future. Things clearly aren’t safe here, and while I don’t want to rob Storm of more time with his kids if that’s what he wants, their safety comes first.
“The fact is, outside of smuggling you in some cargo boxes, you aren’t going anywhere. At least, not anywhere requiring aerial access,” King says.
I feel like throwing up. What in the hell?—
“Storm,” I grate out, moral fury at his actions making the back of my neck sweat. Of course, this is his doing. He anticipated my plan to leave and put a stop to it.
An international no-fly list? The fuck?
“I’ll call back later,” I say, seething. I look at myself only for a few seconds before I storm out of the bathroom in search of the pain in my ass.
It doesn’t take me long to find him; all I have to do is follow the sound of “Not Like Us”to the gym.
I try,reallytry, not to short-circuit my brain at the sight of his sweat-drenched abs that have somehow gotten more defined in the last eight years, but I don’t really succeed.
Not if the flutter in my nether regions is any indicator.
