“I told you not to go there without me. You know you have a target on your back here since you’re Miguel’s daughter,” I told her, wanting to give her another guilty party. Not me. “I don’t want you going anywhere without me.”
Giselle didn’t look too thrilled with me or with what I’d said. “Oh, I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware that you were calling the shots—” For someone who was shot and looked like shit—beautiful shit, but still shit—she still had quite the attitude.
God, I really did love her, and that’s what made this so fucking hard.
“You know your father would say the same thing,” I said, hating that I brought him up. What I wanted to do was tell her the truth, how Miguel had been the one to want her killed, but I couldn’t. What good would that do her right now, when she was helpless as ever?
But if I told her, he’d know it was me, and then I’d be a dead man walking. Fuck.
She glared. “You should go. I don’t want to see him right now, and if he comes back and finds you in here, he’ll know I’m awake.” She was right there; I couldn’t argue with her about that, nor could I blame her for not wanting to speak to Miguel.
Heaving a sigh, I told her what a good Santos subordinate would: “You’ve got to talk to Miguel eventually, you know. He wants to know what happened, and then you’ll have to talk to the police. I don’t know that they’ll do anything, but they need to make a report on it. If anyone will find out who shot you, it’s your father.” I paused. All of that, pulled miraculously out of my ass, but if I had to guess, it was all true. “And me.”
She didn’t say anything to me, not for a few moments. Something passed behind her beautiful brown eyes, and it was as if I watched her build up her walls. “Please, Zander.”
I couldn’t say how long I stared at her after that. I really did love hearing her speak my name, even if she wasn’t quite herself right now. The last thing I wanted to do was give her space, but I knew she was right. So, in the end, I heaved a sigh and got up, leaving the room. I think, as I did so, I left a piece of my heart with her.
I stood just outside the room in the hall for a few moments, forcing myself to turn to walk away. But the moment I turned, I saw Miguel further down the hall, heading in this direction, a phone in his hand. His black eyes spotted me immediately, and I knew it was too late to turn back and pretend I hadn’t seen him.
Squaring up my shoulders, I walked to him, meeting him in front of the window that looked into Giselle’s room. I couldn’t look inside, couldn’t glance in her direction, too busy watching Miguel stop when he stood beside me.
His other hand lifted to grip my shoulder, squeezing hard enough to make me wince—but I swallowed the wince down, not wanting him to see it. I bit back a frown, holding in everything I wanted to say.
He leaned in toward me, his voice the lowest and perhaps deadliest I’d ever heard it, “The next time I tell you to shoot, you better not miss.” A warning, a threat, one Miguel did not need to elaborate on, for I knew precisely what he meant.
If he told me to kill her again, and I failed, he’d kill me instead.
I didn’t say anything, didn’t nod, didn’t tell him I was sorry. I simply stood there and waited for him to stop his posturing so I could get away from all of this—at least temporarily. There was no permanent vacation from this, unfortunately.
He dropped his hand off my shoulder, straightening himself out. With a hard look in my direction, he was gone, walking into the hospital room, acting as if nothing at all was wrong, as if Giselle wasn’t here because of him and his stupid orders.
I still couldn’t believe it, and I still had no idea why. It wasn’t my place to question, not my place to wonder what Miguel was planning, and yet I found myself doing just that, especially in the days that passed after that.
One thing was for certain, though: life wasn’t going to get any easier from here on out. No, it would only get harder. Harder for me, harder for Giselle, and definitely harder for us.
Us. That was the problem. There was no us.
I stormed into the Santos house, bringing a small bag with me. My eyebrows were furrowed, a frown on my face. I didn’t pass any guards, meaning Miguel himself wasn’t home—the old me would’ve found it odd that Miguel would leave Giselle home alone, but the old me was nothing more than a fucking fool.
How long had it been since that day in the hospital? How long since the night I’d come to the realization that I could never kill her? I didn’t know. The days had passed by in a whirlwind; life had done the opposite of slow down. Everything had changed—and yet, at the same time, nothing at all had changed.
Giselle had neglected to tell me that she and Luca were officially engaged. Miguel had let me know late last night, through a text, no less. It was like he wanted to hurt me. Like he knew I loved his daughter, and to further rub it in my face that I could never have her, he arranged an engagement between her and fucking Luca Moretti.
Luca was fine, sometimes, but most of the time he was one annoying motherfucker. How he stared at Giselle when she wasn’t looking. How he grinned like an idiot any time he was near her. Oh, yeah, if Miguel had told me to kill him, I would’ve done it, no questions asked.
But now he was Giselle’s fiancé, and I could do nothing about it.
I went right upstairs to Giselle’s room, knocking once. It took every ounce of restraint in me to not bust in. Holding myself back was perhaps the most difficult thing I’d had to do in my life, other than shoot the girl I loved. I wanted to barge in there and demand answers from her, ask her why she didn’t tell me herself, why I had to learn the truth from Miguel.
She would be a married woman soon enough. She’d be as off-limits as ever. If I couldn’t touch her now, I sure as shit couldn’t touch her once she said I do to Luca.
When I heard no sounds coming from inside the room, I said, “It’s Zander.”
It was a moment before I heard the shuffling of feet inside, and a few more seconds before the door opened and Giselle stood in front of me, wearing white capris and an ivory blouse that hugged the curves on her body. A thick, black necklace hung on her neck, and I wondered if it was a subtle way of rebellion.
And, fuck it all to hell, she looked just as gorgeous as ever, her blonde hair framing her heart-shaped face, her full lips puckered and waiting. Ten inches shorter than me, the perfect height difference. Immediately, I wanted to pull her in to my chest and hold her there, tell her that everything was going to be all right, even though it wasn’t.
Once she got married, I might hardly see her. What the fuck was I supposed to do with myself? Moving on had never been an option, not something I’d ever let myself think about. I didn’t want to move on.