Page 10 of Velvet & Sins

“I don’t think so,” I argued. “She was fucking ready to flee the city as soon as she got home. Lucas said that she was spooked, but the officer that interrogated her had nothing.”

Chris grunted, pacing from one side of the living room to the other, his brain working a thousand miles per hour, thinking, just like I was. “I thought he would never come back. I mean, we assumed it was him, but still.”

“I didn’t,” I said and sat down on the sofa chair, right next to the couch where Evelyn slept. “I knew he would come back one day. Tristan is many things, but his pride wouldn’t let him stay away. He has it in his head that he deserves this empire, that he should have gotten it and not me, and he’s going to do everything in his power to take me down.”

Christian stood in the middle of the room, hands on his waist, his anger as palpable as the thick, humid air, but he didn’t say a thing. He’s been with me since we were scrawny little teenagers, running around the block, pretending we could take on the world if we stayed together. Apart from Kieran and Ophelia, Christian was the only other person I trusted.

We stayed together, but the world became so much bigger than any of us ever expected, and the things we did for each other were not things we liked to talk about, but we still did it.

“He’s a spineless coward, hiding in the shadows. I would like to see him come out and face us like a real man.”

I exhaled, feeling the tension coiling in my shoulders, and all I wanted to do was lay down and sleep, forgetting about this fucking world for just a couple of hours.

“We both know he will never do such a thing, at least not until he thinks that he has me in the palm of his hand. You know him, Chris,” I trailed off. “Tristan is spineless, but he’s also a weasel who wouldn’t mind killing innocent people to get what he wants.” And as soon as the words spilled over my tongue, my eyes found her, peacefully sleeping next to me, her chest rising and falling with each new inhale and exhale.

I couldn’t keep my eyes away from her, not even when Chris realized what I was doing and why I’ve been behaving like this.

“She asked me not to kill her,” I murmured, the mere thought slicing through my chest, relentlessly cutting, holding me hostage to this unexplainable pain.

“Kill,” Chris murmured. “What are you going to do with her?”

“She saw me when I exited the room.” I winced, knowing that her fate was sealed now. There was no way that she would ever get out of here, that she would ever get away from me, and that little monster pressing on my chest purred at the mere thought of having her in our apartment indefinitely.

“Fuck. Are you going to—”

“Kill her?” I looked at him, all but barking the word, hating the way it tasted on my lips. I couldn’t even bring myself to think about it, yet I had to. “I don’t know.”

“You sure about that?” Christian chuckled. “Because the way you’re loo—”

“I’m sure,” I barked, trying to detach myself from the emotions threatening to take over my body. “She has a life, a career, and I would have to be the person to take it all away from her. She thought I would fucking kill her.”

“Well,” the bastard laughed, “you did break into her apartment. What did you expect, that she’s going to welcome you and offer you tea?”

No, I didn’t expect that. But I also didn’t expect this deep rooted yearning in my gut, this feeling that if I didn’t have her nothing else mattered. My entire empire could crumble, but if I had her, I felt as if everything would be okay.

And that could never happen.

The Outfit came first—they always came first. First, last, in the middle, there was no space in my life for a woman, not even one as beautiful as this sleeping beauty. She shivered in her sleep and the instinct to jump up and take her in my arms gutted me.

Because I couldn’t have her, never. Not just tonight, but from tomorrow I would do everything possible to separate myself from these fucked up thoughts that wanted her to be mine.

“I don’t know.” Chris shrugged. “She’s really pretty. Maybe I could invite her for a drink or—”

“No!” I bellowed, jumping from the sofa chair and standing right in front of her, hiding her from Christian’s eyes. “You won’t touch her.”

“But why?” The bastard smirked. “You obviously don’t want her, and she seems like the kind of a woman that could be fun in the bedroom. Maybe you don’t have to kill her. Maybe I could keep her.”

My temples throbbed, just imagining him with her shattering the carefully concocted façade I was trying to portray. He couldn’t have her—none of them could, I would make sure of it.

“Chris,” I growled. “Step back.” I shook, warning him to get the fuck away from me. I was five seconds from losing it and I wouldn’t mind taking my anger out on him. The rational side of me knew he was just goading me, pushing me into this state. But the irrational, animalistic side that had already taken this woman as mine, that already recognized her as someone that could be ours, that side didn’t care that Chris was our friend.

It didn’t care that we shouldn’t have her, that we couldn’t have her. Every atom in my body screamed at me to claim her, to keep her here, to protect her from the dangers in the outside world, but I couldn’t.

I fucking couldn’t.

My anger was slowly dissipating as Christian walked backwards, creating distance between him and the two of us, and the breath I’d been holding suddenly whooshed out of me, filling my body with fatigue I haven’t felt for ages.

Turning around, I looked down at her, the tiny hands safely tucked under her chin, and the curves on her legs. Maybe I couldn’t have her, but the memory of her in my space will forever be etched in my mind for years to come. I could watch her from the shadows, just where I belonged, where she never would be.

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