Page 28 of Witness Protection

This chick confused the shit out of him.

“I’m the bad guy, remember?” He ran his hand through her black hair, noticing his shitty dye-job, her roots still a mix of black and blonde. One moment ready to kill, the next completely broken.

He didn’t know what to make of Sophia Morenov.

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Her father was gone. All his men, the ones normally in charge of protecting her, were gone.

Hawk was gone.

Sophia never felt so alone and vulnerable. Even when she was being whisked away after her father’s murder scene, at least she’d had Hawk.

This was worse.

She was scared, tired, confused, and needed comfort … anywhere she could find it. Cayden was cruel and vicious, but men didn’t turn cold if they’d had an easy life. Her father had stolen people Cayden loved, and it wasn’t the first time her father had arranged hits on innocents. Part of her knew Vasily Morenov’s lifestyle would come back to bite him in the ass. As invincible as her father appeared, no man could escape death.

What Cayden didn’t realize was she wasn’t like women from other crime families. Sophia wasn’t an evil person, and she wasn’t ready to order hits or sell her soul for money. All she ever wanted was love and freedom. She was born into a lifestyle that never suited her. She always felt alone, never belonging, always searching for something more.

It hurt her when Cayden assumed she was a spoiled bitch. Sophia would have traded every last thing she owned for something as intangible as a real conversation, true love, or friendship with a person not paid to be nice to her.

“What happened to you, Cayden? What changes an innocent little boy into a criminal?”

She hated herself for feeling it, but she was falling for her captor. He was gorgeous, those narrowed blue eyes sharp and intelligent. She’d seen all his tattoos before, and just like with Hawk, they turned her on.

What happened if the bad guy could fall in love?

Could she change him, make him love her?

Sophia bit the inside of her lip. She was fucked up, getting wet for the man who’d murdered her own father. This was Stockholm syndrome at its finest, and she should know better. But she still didn’t care.

“You’re assuming I was ever innocent.”

“People aren’t born evil,” she said.

She reached up to touch his face, craving to feel the dark stubble coming in, but he snatched her wrist before she could make contact. “My father was a big player in the criminal underworld. When my mother was murdered by one of his rivals, he went crazy, killed everyone he could before being taken down. No one remembered the baby.”

His father was passionate, just like Cayden. Only he’d come out with a scar rather than a death certificate.

“That’s why people in our world aren’t supposed to have a happily ever after. When you love something, you become an easy target. I’m not even sure I know what love is.”

“I never had a choice in life,” he said. “I was only a few months old when the government stepped in. I ended up in the system, the ninth circle of hell, and you don’t know what that shit can do to a kid. If I could cut the memories from my head, I wouldn’t think twice.”

God, she wanted to fix him, to heal him with her love. She’d always been a hopeless romantic. Sophia had tried to get through to Hawk, to show him how much she loved him, but he only ever pushed her away. Her fantasies never evolved much beyond her imagination.

Maybe she was destined to fall for all the wrong kinds of men, thanks to her father and the daddy issues he’d piled onto her.

“You’re a man now,” she whispered. “You can’t live in the past forever.”

“It shaped me into the bastard I am today. I can’t change that.”

She leaned closer to him. They were both still lying on the bed, her wrist still in his firm grip. She wished he’d kiss her. Was that insane? Sophia could already taste his lips, and she craved his domination. “Like when you kissed me in the elevator? Was that just an act?”

“It’s all part of the job.” He rolled off the bed, putting an end to the brief intimacy she felt growing between them.

He sat back in his office chair, the leather creaking as he spun round to face his screens. She watched him, angry that she craved his affection. Angry that he showed no interest.

Just like Hawk.

Sophia hated Cayden more than any person in the world—at least she should. She’d witnessed him kill her father, take everything from her with one bullet. The man didn’t give two shits about her, either.

As soon as it was more convenient, she’d be dead.

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