Page 75 of Nocturnal Sins
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Santana
After the third day, Sammie finally got the hang of shooting without falling victim to the kickback. She learned to loosen her grip and become more comfortable holding her pistol. I was proud.
Marco and I stood back and watched her try to hit a few targets while we tried not to laugh every time she missed and cursed out the target instead of her aim. Dust clouds swallowed her feet as she stomped the ground, frustrated. “Can I ask you something, Santana?” Marco said, pulling his stare away from Sammie.
“What’s up? I know you’re not about to ask me if you can date Sammie again. We discussed that shit already, Marco. I was just starting to think you were cool. Don’t fuck it up.” Since we’d been practicing on the private range and I had to spend time with Marco, he got on my nerves less and less and I started to be okay with hanging out with him.
“Nah, it’s not that…exactly.”
“What is it then?” I caught the way Sammie’s perfect ass jiggled when she hopped up and down when she hit her target and my dick begged for her. I had to focus on something else so I looked at Marco.
“You said she’s with someone right?”
“Yeah.” I ran a hand over the bottom half of my face and waited for him to get to the point.
“You don’t seem like the type to just let her have a man.”
“Let her? Marco, she’s grown. She can be with who she wants to be with.” I let out a laugh and tried my best not to stare when I noticed Sammie bending over to put more bullets in her gun from the box at her feet. Marco laughed too and shook his head.
“Yeah, I know. I guess what I’m saying is you seem more overprotective than any brother I’ve ever seen. You and Sam have different parents, right?” His line of questioning was making my muscles draw tighter and my brows furl together.
“What the fuck are you getting at, Marco?” My narrowed sights were right on him. To his credit, he didn’t flinch or back down but I could still sense the apprehension wafting off him.
“I’m wondering if you and Sam are more than brother and sister. I see the way you look at her and the way she looks at you. Hey, I’m not judging. I don’t want to step on your toes at all. It makes sense though, why you jumped all over me that day.” He blinked rapidly and it looked like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to take a few steps back from me or stay where he was.
I would have respected him more if he stood his ground. I didn’t like people I could intimidate and I was really fucking good at intimidating people. I stared Marco down and thought about how I wanted to play my hand.
I could deny everything and let him think he was crazy for concocting such a story or I could do what my gut was telling me to do: claim my woman.
“We’re not brother and sister,” I said proudly, pulling my shoulders back a bit. My chest puffed out with pride involuntarily. “We’re engaged.” I gave Sammie a thumbs up for hitting her target even though she was far away from the bull’s eye, she hit the target and that was good for just starting out.
“Oh shit, like…really engaged?” Marco asked with wide eyes.
“Yeah, like really engaged.” It felt good to admit I was with Sammie instead of hiding it away like a fucked up family secret.
“Wow congrats, man. How’s Pop dealing with it?”
“He’s fine,” I grumbled, folding my arms across my chest. Marco backed off a bit and nodded. I swore if he said something stupid like he didn’t blame me for snatching Sammie up, I would shoot him in the foot or somewhere else non-fatal.
“I’m sorry for being disrespectful a while back when it came to Sam. I shouldn’t have said what I said. Even though I didn’t know you two were together. It was crazy disrespectful to Pop.”
“You’re right about that shit. We weren’t together back when you did that stupid shit though so, I’ll let it slide. Oddly enough, Marco as annoying as you can be, I’m not worried about you in the least. It’s this new motherfucker who keeps texting Sammie from an unknown number that I don’t like. That’s why she’s learning to shoot. Me and Pop want her to protect herself.”
“Someone’s texting her? Like…stalking her and shit?” He asked. Concern colored his frown as he fixed his gaze on Sammie. Wind whipped by us carrying with it the smell of horses and hay.
“Yeah. Every fucking day. I’m going to find out who’s doing it and put a bullet in their fucking brain.” The most recent batch of texts Sammie had gotten detailed how the mystery caller wanted to fuck her and make her scream. A little from fear and a little from pleasure. I was blind with rage.
“That shit isn’t gonna fly. We have to find out who’s doing it. I’m helping. Fuck that.” Sammie ran over to me after her last round of shots and I hooked my arm around her waist.
“Good job, Sammie. Let’s take a break for a little while.” My hand slid down the steep arch of her back and landed on her ass. She looked up at me with sparkling green eyes and a smirk.
“Did you forget we weren’t alone?” Her voice was quiet so that only I could hear her.
“I told Marco about us,” I explained as we headed to the house.
“More like I figured it out but let’s give Santana his credit,” Marco joked.
