Chapter 8
Leda
For a moment I didn’t think I had heard Lucas right. One moment he was calling me brilliant and praising me, and the next he was trying to send me off.
Again.
I was freaking tired of this. “What?”
Lucas sighed and pressed his forehead to mine. “Just hear me out, all right? I know you don’t want to go, but it’s the best place for you. Fuck, I hate to even say this, but I’m in some deep shit right now, Leda. I need to make sure that you are safe.”
I pushed him away, putting some distance between us. “This is crap, Lucas!” I railed. “Was this your plan all along? What about never letting me leave your sight again? Was that just a way to get me to comply with you?” I yanked up my shirt, letting him see the bruises that dotted my skin, and he winced. “This is what happened last time you tried to send me away! Did you already forget how I almost died!”
“No, I haven’t!” he bit out, raking his hands through his hair. “What the fuck do you want me to do, Leda?”
God, he was so stubborn! I dropped my shirt. “Did you even consider why I ran in the first place?” I asked.
He narrowed his gaze. “Because you wanted to find me.”
“That wasn’t the only reason,” I told him, barely containing my anger. “Nico bringing me to his home gives my father one shot to take us both out at the same time. We can’t be in the same place. It’s too risky.”
It wasn’t something I wanted to give my father, nor did I want to put my nephews and all those that I loved in danger. I would much rather my father come after me than ruin the happiness that Nico had found.
Splitting us up was more for Nico than for anyone else. After all, my father needed me. He didn’t need Nico.
“I don’t care,” Lucas said, grasping my arms. “You can’t be here, Leda. I’m being fucking selfish by having you here. This shit is consuming all of my time.”
I turned away so he wouldn’t see the tears forming in my eyes. “I’m so tired of this,” I answered. “All you do is think that I’m incapable of handling my own business because I am a woman! I’m not a shrinking wallflower, Lucas!”
“I never said you were,” he argued, his grip lessening. “But you are the most important fucking thing in my life, and the very thought of you being caught in the crossfire scares the shit out of me.”
“And it doesn’t for me?” I countered, breaking his hold.
I knew the tears were threatening, and he probably could see it written on my face, but Lucas needed to realize that it wasn’t just a one-way street when it came to someone getting hurt. If he got killed, it would devastate me, and considering he had only a handful of men watching his back, it wouldn’t hurt for him to keep me around.
“You need to trust me, Lucas,” I said in a softer tone. “You need to trust someone, and if you can’t trust me, then maybe I shouldn’t be here.”
His jaw clenched and I placed my hand on it, attempting to smooth out the stone hold he had on it.
“I love you,” I said. “I love every dark part of you, but I feel like you don’t believe me.”
Lucas shuddered under my touch, and I knew he had his own internal war raging inside. “And right now, I don’t feel like I’m the most important thing in your life,” I continued, tears spilling out of my eyes now. “Because if I was, you wouldn’t be doing this.”
“Are you asking me to choose?”
Shaking my head, I let my hand fall away. “You know me better than that. You know what I have grown up in. I know that being a Don is the very air you breathe.” Drawing in a breath myself, I wiped the tears away.
“But understanding Dons runs deep in my blood. What I’m asking is for you to let me help.”
I wanted to be a partner with him, to be by his side and have him know that I had his back.
Lucas looked defeated, his shoulders slumping. “I can’t take that risk, Leda. I can’t let anything happen to you.”
I opened my mouth to retort, but a massive wave of nausea hit me, and I found myself running to the bathroom instead, making it just in time to hurl up all the food I had eaten lately. “Leda?” Lucas asked from behind. “Leda, are you all right?”
“Give her air!” Mrs. Wong’s voice cut through the haze of me throwing up. Where did she come from? “Go downstairs. I tend to her. Go!”
I heard Lucas walk away and fell to the floor, wiping my mouth shakily as I did so. “Here,” Mrs. Wong replied, placing a cold washcloth on the back of my neck. “This help.”
“Thanks,” I muttered, pressing my forehead to the cold tile of the wall next to me.
“How far along, Leda?”