Page 62 of The Burnt Heart

“Ray.” Adelaide licked her cinnamon sugar covered fingers. Her stature regal, as though balancing a crown, no glimmer of the anxiety that she had shown earlier.

“If I was a lesser man, I’d feel a bit hurt. Is my date being usurped?” Ray joked, frowning when she didn’t match his playful energy. That’s right, fucker. No more Adelaide smiles for you.

“Is this about Lara?” Ray bit out, low, and gruff. “You of all people should know what it’s like to have your parents disapprove of who you spend time with.”

Jesse barked an empty laugh, slapping his fist in his palm. Like a bull, pawing the ground and begging to gore the man. But Adelaide held his leash, and she only shrugged.

“It’s not going to work out between us, Ray, fun as it was. I’m still in love with my guys. There is too much history between us. They’re my soul mates. No matter what my family might think.”

The words hit Ray, flinching softly, like he’d come expecting the lashing. In an unspoken cue, Briar, Jesse and I displayed our left hands prominently. Ray was no fool. His gaze flickered to my ring finger, noting the fresh tattoo that was inked on all three of us. A black band that met in the middle of our fingers with an elegant calligraphy of the letter A. When the needle had bitten my skin, it had felt like penance.

“You got married?” Ray’s eyebrows shot up like a rocket as he leaned over to examine Briar’s tattoo ring. Adelaide choked, bending over her desk and coughing. Her eyes watered as she thumped her fist on her chest. Mouth gaping with frozen denial. But a strangled noise escaped instead. I leaned over and rubbed her back as Jesse handed her a glass of water. Her scent curled around me like an opulent greenhouse bloom. Sultry and rare. Her eyes bugged as she got a closer look at our tattoos.

We’d been without our girl for months. Enough time to flagellate ourselves for our decisions. Circumstances had stopped us from claiming her in the way we always wanted. We’d felt tied to them. Not anymore. My heart hammered in time with the woman in front of me, and if I had to endure everything horrible her father had promised? I would. Because nothing was worse than losing Adelaide. This wasn’t a time for spoken apologies. Words were wind, changeable and transient. The mark on my skin was permanent, and like a photograph, something solid Adelaide could hold on to.

“Yes, like Adelaide said, we’re soul mates.” My fingers curled around her chin, directing her gaze to mine. Her pulse thumpedunder my fingers, wild with disbelief. I spoke out loud, but my words were for her only. I had never been effusive, and her eyes flickered with that shared knowledge. Touch had always been my way of showing love. It was hers alone. My fingers pressing bruises into her skin. The drive of my hardness inside her perfect heat. She was underneath my skin, painted into my soul. But she didn’t welcome my touch, rightly, so I had to declare myself. The words might whistle right past her, but I would speak and speak again. Until they became a gale.

“Even if Adelaide never forgave us, we would love her until our end. Permanent, enduring. This isn’t a ring that we can discard when things get too hard. It’s our promise to you. We are yours, always have been, always will be. Ever since Calder Place. Your name is already etched on my heart. That’s not to dismiss the hurt we caused; we have a lifetime of making up to do. But we’ll do it together.”

Adelaide managed a thin smile, her fists shaking in her lap. Tucked out of Ray’s sight. Her eyes flamed with an anger some might interpret as passion. I knew better. She was trying to tame her tongue. I felt the echo of its sting like a whip on my back, knowing she would tear strips off me as soon as we were alone.

“We love you so much,” Briar choked. His hand trembled in the air, ignored. Ray whistled slowly in shock as Briar let his hand fall to his lap. Adelaide lashed her hands together on the desk. As if to prove she was unaffected. But the rigid line of her body gave her away. Adelaide wasn’t trembling, but only from mammoth effort.

“You’re smart to elope. I don’t think your father will take this well.” Ray’s eyes flicked to Adelaide’s finger, and he cocked his head. “Where’s your ring?”

My fingers drank in the line of her stiff spine, carved the furious steel path of it. The warmth of other people’s skin made me recoil, but I had missed the soft, lush feel of Adelaide. She feltlike violet painted dawn, light spilling over drowsy life, stirring it awake.

“Adelaide deserves the biggest, shiniest rock alive.” Jesse showed his teeth, a challenge. “It’ll arrive soon, won’t it, Adelaide?”

Our girl had no choice but to nod, words still escaping her. I might have pitied her, backed into the corner as she was. But I couldn’t find it in me. I’d wanted to bind myself to Adelaide from the moment I saw her. Lung freezing desire, I struggled to hide when I was near her. Soul shaking want spilled from my body. I was shocked over the pleasure her touch brought. I had tried to touch women before her. Ran my fingers down the soft swell of cleavage. Sank my hold into fresh scented hair. But the touch was sour, jangling my nerves until they screamed. My throat tightened until I gasped on choked breaths. Sweet scents turned acrid in my nostrils, the hair curling as if singed. Their touch was noise. Clamoring at every sense, overwhelming it until I had to pull away.

Adelaide’s touch buzzed over my skin. Lulled me like the lap of the ocean or a soft spring breeze. She took me to a million places, and all of them were home. Six years in, I didn’t fight it anymore. Adelaide was my siren. I’d let her drown me before I let her go. She was a daughter to a ruthless crime lord. It was time for us to become the men she needed. Sometimes that meant taking what we wanted. Our girl. Ray stretched out in the chair; lips thinned with suspicion.

“Can I talk with you alone, Adelaide?” Ray asked. He tapped his fingers on the side of the chair. Hard, impatient taps. His languid pose dripped away, the warm welcome he expected was not forthcoming. He didn’t falter under the collective hard glares aimed toward him. His fingers danced as he stared at my girl. I wanted him speaking to her alone over my dead body. But I didn’t have the right. Adelaide cleared her throat.

“Anything you want to say to me, you can tell me in front of my–husbands—”

Ray’s amusement intensified. This was a man who wasn’t often told no. The arrogant tilt of his chin put me on edge. But he was entirely too casual to be the one behind everything that had happened.

“No secrets, huh? Do they know about our fake dating, then?” His smirk was a slash.

“It was obvious,” Jesse scoffed. “I already told you as much before I got shot. Remember?” Jesse pressed, hoping to fluster the Donato heir. But he only rolled his eyes, waving his hands in a placating manner.

“Still got you all twisted up though, didn’t it? Enough to earn her forgiveness. But I wanted to talk about Lara.” He paused, eyes flaring wide as Adelaide leaned forward and slapped the desk.

“What's to explain. She already told me what you said, but I warned you. You had your chance, and you blew it,” Adelaide snapped.

“I panicked.” He looked pained at admitting it in front of us. “Turns out I’m no better than these stooges of yours. Pops threatened her, and not in a charming, lighthearted way. Said I could have all the whores I wanted, but there was only one girl he would accept me settling down with.” He pinned Adelaide with a sharp look. “He’s going to take you eloping hard, by the way. Us ‘dating’ was his dream come true. Then that hand turned up, and he started insisting I fucking propose to you. I thought I could smooth it over afterwards, explain it to Lara when I got him to see reason. But things spiraled and I was worried about her ending up in a ditch. You know this life. It’s not that big of a stretch.”

I looked at Adelaide. Her face was shrewd and calculating. She was hearing everything in between the lines of what Ray wassaying. And his regret-soaked expression looked genuine to me. Her shoulders relaxed a fraction, the tension dropping. Perhaps she could relate. She’d kept the three of us at arms length over the years. Something we had tolerated without questioning. I didn’t want to ask her why, because it might mean hearing she didn’t think we were worth being in her world.

“It’s better if you let her go,” Adelaide informed him and Ray slumped in his chair, scrubbing a hand down his face. A dark flash of pain crumbled his features, hidden beneath his palm. My fingers ran down Adelaide’s back, but I didn’t relax. Ray could be an excellent actor, Adelaide sure was. “Besides, we have bigger issues to talk about. Like if you are the one orchestrating these attacks on me?” Blunt as ever. My girl heaped her accusation like a sack of cement. Ray winced under the weight of it, choking out an incredulous laugh. It withered on his lips when he realized she wasn’t joking.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” His handsome face creased with affront. Briar hissed, and Jesse reached up and clipped the back of Ray’s head. His slick black hair stuck out to the side, and he hurried to rectify the unruly strands.

“Greenich Bay has been dangerous lately, hasn’t it?” Adelaide smiled smoothly. “Almost as soon as I agreed to involve myself with you. Shooting, dismemberment, bombing, drugging. Crimson Claw, supposedly.” She marked her fingers and tilted her head, waiting for him to give her the answers she wanted. His cheeks flushed a frustrated red.

“I know. I was there for most of those,” he attempted to drawl, but his tone was too clipped and tight to feign ease.

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