“Nothing you can’t hear,” Tobias responds.
“Because I’m your legal counsel?” I ask.
He shakes his head, takes my hand back in his, and runs his finger across my tattoo. “No. Not because you’re my lawyer.” The way he looks at me makes me shiver, and I know without words, I’m here because I mean something to him. Because he wants me around.
Because he needs me.
This whole time, since Tobias has been back in my life, I couldn’t pinpoint the feeling I have when he’s around. It’s only now, now that I remember, now that I can understand our shared past, that I know why I’ve felt a connection to him from the moment I looked into his eyes. His words from all those years ago are still crisp in my ear. I’m the plane, and you’re the sky.
“What time will the guys be here?” Gideon reaches for the water in the middle of the table and pours himself a glass.
“Soon.” Tobias turns to face him while reaching his hand out to place it on my lap.
I wish I wasn’t wearing leggings. The feeling of his skin on mine is the best feeling in the world.
“Who’s coming?” I place my hand over his, needing the connection. I always want to touch him. It’s the only thing that brings me calm.
“Just a few of my most trusted confidants.”
“Do you need me to—?” His hand moves, and then his fingers are pressing down a little on my tattoo as if he’s telling me to stay.
“You aren’t going anywhere, Skye. Where I go, you go.” When I don’t say anything, he drills me with his stare. “Do you understand?”
“Kind of,” I squeak.
“Room,” he says to Gideon, who is quick to stand and vacate the space.
Then my chair is being dragged closer to him. The scratching sound echoes through the air. We are face-to-face, only a breath away.
“You are the only thing that matters to me. You are everything. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“If you told me to drop this—”
I shake my head. “I won’t.”
“I know, but I would.”
Leaning forward, I place my lips on his and say all the things I’m too scared to say with a kiss. I’m not afraid of much but losing him petrifies me. I already lost him once.
“What’s wrong?”
I ponder whether I should say what is bothering me, but it pours out when I finally open my mouth.
“I can’t lose you again.”
Tobias moves fast, and the next thing I know, he’s pulling me from the chair and placing me in his lap.
Touching might bring peace, but this, being cradled in his arms, feels like home.
“You won’t.”
“You can’t promise me that.” I tuck my head against his chest.
“No, I can’t.”
We have both lost so much. We know reality is not always sunshine and roses.
“We need to speak to your father.” Tobias’s hand tightens around me, preventing me from moving away. Instead, I tip my head up to look at him. “We need to know why he lied to you.”
“Maybe it wasn’t a lie? Maybe he thought it—”
“No, Skye. He knew. He was the policeman on duty that day, and he adopted you. There is more to this story than we know.”
I nod my head in agreement.
“It’s time we find out everything.” He bends his head and places a kiss on my mouth. Silencing any objections.
He’s right.
I spent my life fearing the dark, but it’s time I swing the door open and see everything. It’s time the past is brought out into the light. Only then can we move on. That’s when we will see the truth.
44
Tobias
Everybody is here.
All of us sit around a large table as if we are about to play poker. But we aren’t. We are not at Cyrus’s house.
This is not a Friday night, and the hundred-thousand-dollar buy-in is not on the table. It’s not a friendly game with zero money. No, this is something quite the opposite, and unfortunately, it keeps happening. It’s not easy to leave the underworld, and it’s even more difficult to leave when you have unfinished business.
“What’s the plan?” Lorenzo asks before he lifts his scotch to his mouth, and I look over at where he sits. He’s beside Matteo, who’s his cousin and former boss. So much for retiring. It’s not just him who has come out from his self-proclaimed exile from this life. Alaric Prince is also at the table, as is Cristian, who took over for Alaric when he retired from arms dealing.
On the far side are Cyrus and Trent.
“We need to lure Felix out of hiding.” It’s Trent who speaks, and everyone in the room agrees.
“It’s not that easy.” All eyes turn to Cyrus. “From what I’ve heard, no one has seen him since the attack. Jax, anything to add?” Jaxson Price is not physically here, but his voice rings through the air via the state-of-the-art surveillance system that Jaxson and his security company installed.