Page 8 of Captive of the Crime Queen

She shivers suddenly, goosebumps rising on her arms. Itischilly in here, especially if one is only wearing a slip, I assume.

I shrug off my leather jacket and hold it out toward her. "Here," I tell her. "Put this on."

She looks at me warily but takes the jacket nonetheless, slipping it on gratefully as she wraps herself in its warmth. As she pulls it tight around her body, I notice once again how small she is, fragile even, beneath its bulkiness.

I imagine what Nero would have done to her on their wedding night. A strange, icy rage fills me as I picture his violence, his cruelty, his delight in causing pain.

Aurora shrinks back, mistaking my anger as directed at her, and a desire I've never felt before rears up in me: the desire to reassure. I take a breath, try to find unfamiliar words, when I'm thankfully interrupted by a banging on the door that makes Aurora jump.

I cross the room, gun in hand, and slide up next to the door, waiting.

"Lupo," comes a voice from the other side.

I unlock and open the door. Lyssa saunters in, followed by several of my men. They're still hyped up from theaction, congratulating each other and recounting their favorite moments. Lyssa's eyes light up when she spots Aurora cowering in my jacket, and she gives that predatory smile of hers.

"You…" Aurora says, recognition dawning. "You were in the foyer. One of the wedding attendants."

"Perceptive," Lyssa drawls. She looks at me. "All clear so far, Boss. Rest of our people are down there, watching the streets."

"Well, well, what do we have here?" drawls Vinny, one of Lyssa's newest recruits. He strides toward Aurora. "Nice view, sweetheart," he leers.

A single glance at Lyssa and she's between them in an instant, her knife against his throat, her eyes on me for the order. I even consider it for a moment. But I reach for my customary cool instead. "You look at her again and you'll lose your eyes," I tell him calmly.

I think it's my calmness that really undoes men like Vinny so easily. They expect fire from their superiors. They don't know how to deal with frost.

Vinny stammers apologies as Lyssa lets him go. "Go and check the perimeter and streets," I tell him. "Now." He scrambles to obey. Lyssa sends me an amused, questioning look. I ignore it and grab Aurora's arm. "We're leaving. Let's go."

I want to get us away from here quickly, before my fool brother gets lucky and stumbles across a witness who saw which way I went.

It's time to return home.

Lyssa takes the stairs to make sure they're clear, while I pull Aurora into the elevator again. I stand with my hand firmly around her bicep, such as it is, and stare straight ahead.

I can't bring myself to look at her again right now.

I'm not sure why.

I only know that I might come undone, and that won't do. I need all my focus if we're to get out of the city unharmed.

She's changed since I saw her four years ago—and yet she hasn't changed at all. Physically, she is even more beautiful than I remembered. And yet those wide blue eyes are just as guileless as that day I saw a scared, skinny teenager staring at me with her mouth open as I walked past her. I thought by now she might have grown up a little. But as soon as she asked why I'dsavedher, I knew she was just as naive now as she was then.

And now she speaks again, her soft voice barely enough to fill the small elevator carriage, but enough to make the thing that's twisting inside me loosen up a little.

"Thank you," she says quietly.

After a moment, I snap, "For what?"

"That man. The way he looked at me…"

She's right. The way Vinny looked at her was unacceptable. I won't have a man like that among my people. I'll speak to Lyssa later; have her deal with the matter. "He won't trouble you again," I tell Aurora.

The elevator doors open and I let go of her arm for a moment so I can push her back gently as I peek out to check the surrounds.

Clear.

"Let's go," I tell her, and I reach back to take her arm again.

But somehow, instead of seizing her arm, my hand finds hers instead, and her fingers slide trustingly into mine, holding tight.

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