Page 47 of Devious Kingpin
“Saving you,” he growled in my ear. My eyes locked on his handsome face filled with fury. Stormy and dark. “I had a tracker installed on the car when I bought it in case someone was stupid enough to steal it,” he said derisively, but underneath his tone there was something else. Something resembling concern. “How could you even think about jumping?” The accusation felt like a whip. Then his gaze softened. “Fuck, Juliette. Do you hate me so much that you’ll choose death over me?”
The venom rolled off his tongue, but there was also a hint of pain. Disappointment. His gaze fell to my lips, soft and hungry. He squeezed the back of my neck as his nose brushed against mine.
“I can’t have sex with you,” I rasped, my body trembling at the images in my mind.
“Can’t or won’t?” he asked.
The mind was such a peculiar thing. I couldn’t remember a few nights ago, but that night from long ago slithered through it so easily. Something so dark and ugly, I just couldn’t forget. I wished I could, yet it remained entrenched in my memories.
“Both,” I admitted, my voice betraying me with a slight tremor.
His expression changed, became pensive, his dark eyes penetrating my soul and digging out all my secrets. All my fears. All my nightmares. Then, as if he’d seen all those horrible scenes from my past, he turned rigid.
“Who hurt you?” Three little words and they changed everything.
I swallowed, scared to hear myself admit it. I had yet to say it out loud to anyone. There were four of us, with me included, that knew what happened that night. Today, there was only one of those other three left, because I’d killed the other two. It took me years to realize that I could only move on with their deaths.
When they hurt me, I heard all their snickering comments. Felt all their slaps, the pain, the humiliation. I felt it all. My voice wasn’t the only thing I lost that night. I lost me. But I madethemscream. I didn’t drug them like they had me to make them compliant. I made them feel it. All of it. Every damn slice.
My only regret was that I couldn’t kill the senator’s son. I couldn’t get through his family’s intricate protection detail. And the weaselly fucker was hiding in his family’s home. Never left it.
Dante cupped my face. His touch was warm, but I couldn’t stifle the slight wince. I hated being touched. I knew he wanted me, and I didn’t trust him not to take me whether I wanted him to or not. Of course, if he did, he’d better learn to sleep with one eye open because I’d make it my mission to end him.
Fuck war. Fuck everything.
Nobody would ever make me feel that way again. I wouldn’t be a helpless girl ever again.
“I promise, no sex,” he vowed quietly but with conviction. “Not until you’re ready.” I’d never be ready. It had been eight years, and I was still stuck in that dark room with those boys suffocating me. My breathing sped up thinking about it. I couldn’t go there. “But I will need the name. Who. Hurt. You?”
He assumed there was only one. I’d let him believe it. There was only one left alive.
“Travis Xander.” The name left my lips and the pressure in my chest eased just a tiny bit.
Dante’s eyes flickered in recognition. “Senator of California?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“His son?” he demanded, his dark eyes studying my face. I had no doubt he studied my every muscle twitch.
I nodded, swallowing the lump in my throat. I despised even hearing his name. It made my skin crawl. My lip trembled and I hated this feeling of vulnerability. It made me want to take a baseball bat and start smashing everything until I beat this vulnerability and memory away.
Silence followed. Dante raked his teeth over his bottom lip, then his expression hardened. If I didn’t know it before, I knew it now. Dante DiLustro was a formidable enemy. I’d have to keep that in mind.
“He’ll be dead by the end of the week,” he vowed.
“Really?” I breathed, a sadistic pleasure washing over me. Maybe it was always in my blood. The mafia. The thirst for revenge. Or maybe I was evil. Either way, I relished in the knowledge that the last boy who dared to touch me would be dead soon.
Despite Dante’s fury, dark amusement tugged at his lips. He gave a small shake of his head.
“You like that,” he stated matter-of-factly.
I tilted my chin upward. “He deserves whatever’s coming to him.”
He let out a sardonic breath, his gaze clashing with mine. A vicious smile flashed across his face and his smile made a shark’s grin appear like a welcome home sign. I didn’t care. I hoped Travis’s last sight on this earth would be Dante’s cruel smile.
“Damn fucking straight.” He was still grinning in that feral way. “Nobody touches what’s mine.”
“Well, I wasn’t yours back then.” Truthfully, I wasn’t his now either, but that was beside the point.
