Page 56 of Crush (Deadly Hearts 1)

ChapterTwenty-Nine

Declan

Iknew this was coming, but I still freeze as the silence goes chilly. Only Ruby can give me the chills like that. It’s strange. No one fazes me. Not a single living person, not even Rex. But his daughter? Yeah, she is something else altogether.

“Like hell you are!” she spits out a few seconds later.

“Ruby,” Rex says exasperated. “You are my daughter, and you need to be kept safe. What if that had been you and not your man?”

She blinks.

Her only reaction to Ramsey being called her man. I wish Rex knew that I was also her man. Well, actually, I suppose he does now. My slip up in calling her Princess before, definitely did not go unnoticed by him. Nothing gets past him. He probably already deduced that everyone here is involved with her in some capacity. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that something happened with her and David when they disappeared.

“Jake wouldn’t dare,” she hisses. “He is a coward. He has sent someone else after me and then went after the person he thinks I care about most here because of one eavesdropped conversation.”

“He plays by a different set of rules than you,” Rex hisses back.

“I know that!” she snaps. “He works in my town. He is a low-life mob wannabe, running drugs and prostitution rings. He has no real power, only muscle. I have the power here and he is making a play for it. There is no way in hell, I’m giving that up to the likes of him. Or Scott,” she adds with a growl.

I want to go to her and calm her down. She is getting way too worked up and it’s not good for her stress level. As hard as she is, as strong as she is, her mental state is delicate. If she doesn’t have an outlet for all that rage, it will crush her. The ‘Daddy’ in me is aching to help her, but right now is not that time.

“It makes no difference. He is a threat to you,” I say, and then wish I hadn’t backed up her father. What was I thinking? Even though I mean it, I should’ve kept my mouth shut.

She turns on me with a furious face. “I am a threat to him, and it’s about time he remembered that,” she says, jabbing herself in the chest.

“And we come full circle to me taking him out. End of story,” Rex says, folding his arms over his chest.

“No!” she spits out. “If anyone takes him out, it’s going to be me.”

“I agree,” I say quietly, risking the wrath of Rex but it’s a fact.

She opens her mouth to blast me, until she realizes I have her back this time. She shuts it again, her eyes conveying her pleasure at my support. Not that it will make much difference with Rex. He is fuming, with both me and her.

“Not a chance. You are not a killer,” Rex snarls.

“No?” she asks coldly. “Tell that to you know who.”

Rex flinches visibly at that.

It’s all I can do not to go to her. I clench my fists so I don’t. It’s the last thing she needs right now.

“That was different,” he grits out.

“Whatever,” she mutters. “But let me explain to you how this works.”

I snort at her patronizing tone. Rex’s face is one of utter dumbfoundedness. It’s pretty hilarious.

She glares at me, and I press my lips together.

Turning back to her dad, she says, “Look, Dad. I get that you want to protect me. I do. But that’s not how this works. For starters, if Jake was taken out, it just leaves a hole for someone to fill. That means street gang wars flooding my city and I won’t allow that. For all the power I have in the underworld, I don’t have the power to shut his operation down. It’s too big, there is too much demand. I have no desire to get involved in that unless I absolutely have to. Secondly, how would it look if Jake was killed, and anyone found out it was my dad who did it and not me? I would never recover from that. The power of the underworld is so fragile, so delicate, all it takes is one domino to fall and the whole castle comes crashing down. This may not be the life you all wanted for me, but it’s mine. I have worked way too hard and for way too long to lose it and I’m definitely not letting it go for the sake of some vendetta. I will deal with Jake in my own time, in my own way. He is an arrogant son of a bitch who thinks he has power. He doesn’t. Not compared to me. You will not lift a finger to help me out of this situation, do I make myself clear?”

My heart pounds in my chest. I am so turned on by her right now, I want to break all of our rules and whisk her to her bedroom to fuck her senseless. I have never loved a woman before. Sure, I’ve come close. Maybe even thought once or twice that I was, but when I look at her, facing off with her father, defending her power, her city, I know that all of those previous relationships meant nothing. She touches the darkness inside me that needs feeding, but she brings a shred of light with it that I sorely need, or risk being lost in the job. I don’t want that. Not again. Once was enough, and the day that Rex rang me up to ask me to watch over her was the day that I was pulled out of that pit. I don’t ever want to go back because that means losing her. She is a dark angel, and she revels in the murk, but she still has her humanity. She still has light in her that she enjoys and needs to survive. I need that for her because I love her so completely, it will destroy me if she falls too far into the pit.

“And while we are having an honest conversation for once,” she continues. “How dare you set your lapdog on me.” She gestures wildly to me.

The insult hits me hard. “Hey,” I croak out.

“I don’t need watching,” she says, ignoring me.

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