Page 133 of Green Flag
“No, we’re not,” I snapped. “But, yes, he’d beat him up far better than me.”
He looked me over before placing his hands on my shoulders. “Give yourself a second.”
I breathed in deeply. Once. Twice.
There had been a few years since the last time I was truly friends with Nix, but he’d always given me older brother comfort.
For once, his security was nowhere near us. They’d hung back with Livie and Saliha.
No doubt he could look after himself. And me.
“I’m calm,” I sighed. “He just riles me up.”
“Don’t tell Luca that,” he said with a shake of his head. “It will only set him off. As far as Luca needs to know, he doesn’t affect you at all. If you want to continuenot fuckinghim.”
I laughed through my nose, then put my smile on, rushing through the crowd to get to him.
Luca’s grin lit up when he saw me and he lifted me up in a hug before spinning me around. “Did you see it? Dropped a weight class, but I did it!”
I held him so tightly that when he placed me on the ground, he whispered in my ear, “Are you okay?”
I nodded over and over. “I’m so proud of you.”
His dimples showed as he looked overly chuffed before his face fell. “What happened here?” he asked and ran his thumb over my bottom lip, just as his cock had nearly an hour before.
A breath of incredulous laughter escaped me. Of course he was worried about the self-inflicted cut when his face was swollen and a black eye was fast approaching.
He couldn’t hurt me. He would tell me. Eventually.
“Was just worried about you. Only for a second.”
Something flashed in his eyes as his lips parted, but then he looked at our feet and wrapped me back up in his arms as a camera flashed.
Because that was the purpose of our hug.
The purpose of our being.
26
Chapter 26
Luca
Everly and I spent Christmas apart. I flew back to Italy in the early hours after the fight and she stayed with her dad, while I reunited with my family.
Though I wanted to see her.
And hug her.
Seeing her name in the PI’s report made me sick and lit a fire in my chest I couldn’t put out. Pedro had exploited her love and loyalty. He’d set her up for the fall, and I could only imagine it was her father who stopped those very incriminating logs from being used in the investigation.
I had a newfound respect for him.
Not that I could explain that to her.
She still believed Pedro was innocent and… I didn’t want to shatter her heart. She didn’t need to carry that extra wound.
Whenever she texted me, the normal excited feeling was accompanied by guilt.
