Rome:Yeah. I could be fucking you in your bed if you’d give me your address. I know just where to touch you to make you scream. Want me to come show you?
Jesus Christ, he could raise the heat level in seconds. We needed a cold bucket of water for the two of us.
Me:Admire someone else.
Rome:That an invitation to substitute cubic zirconium for a diamond? I’ll pass.
Me:You’re ridiculous, you know that?
I sent the text with a small smile on my face. Maybe he was just throwing out a compliment to keep the conversation going, or maybe he knew it was what I needed. He was the one man who never made me doubt myself in any regard. He held me to a sky-high standard.
Would my confidence ever get to where he thought I was? I didn’t know, but I dressed in a black crop top that showed my tattoo. His words on my skin. His confidence in me.
It was a tribute to the monster that loved the woman he thought I was.
I hoped I could prove him right.
I headed out after pulling some ripped jeans on and smoothing my dark hair with a straightener.
“Maksim!” I said. “You brought a friend.”
Maksim stood at the hood of the SUV outside my building with a tall, broody looking man that was about our age. The two of them side by side in front of a dark SUV were what nightmares turned to fantasies were made of. Maksim had the dark, Italian look with a couple small scars on his face that I knew were from his time being a bodyguard. His friend stood just as tall beside him. He had a strong jaw, an athlete’s body, a good hairline. When I took him in, though, I didn’t see any of it, because his eyes were almost translucent because they were so blue.
He held my gaze and smiled, putting out a hand for me to shake. “Luka, heir to the bratva out west.”
I ran through my mental rolodex of people I’d seen at Mario’s funeral. “You didn’t come to town when Mario passed.”
“No need,” said Maksim. “Egor was here.” He nudged his friend in the shoulder like it was an inside joke. “Can you imagine you two sitting through a plane ride together?”
Luka didn’t squeeze my hand too tightly or drop his gaze at all while he measured me up. Instantly, I liked him.
“I’m just here to keep Maksim company,” he said.
“Or spy for Egor?” I suggested.
“My grandfather could ask me to carry him across the street to a hospital after being shot and I wouldn’t do it. You can believe me when I say I’m not here to spy. Maybe to meet you. But only because Maksim says nice things.”
“Maksim does, does he?” I smirked at him and then waved off our meeting of the minds in the middle of a busy Chicago sidewalk. “Shall we all ride to this meeting and get it the fuck out of the way?”
“You think I need to be prepared?” Maksim asked as he opened the door for me. I didn’t share much with Maksim, or anyone in the bratva for that matter. I couldn’t trust them not to trickle down information to others.
Still, he was the only one who could help me if a situation went down. “It’ll be heated.”
“I swear to God…” he grumbled before he slammed the door. When he got into the front seat and Luka was situated in the passenger beside him, he glanced back at me and said, “You got to start giving me more, Katalina. I’m your guy.”
“I don’t have a guy.” I broke eye contact and stared at the city that rolled by. Men in suits, women in heels with briefcases buzzed past. They didn’t even see the men lurking behind them in the shadows, how the gangs wove in and out of society. They’d all become experts at being invisible. I caught one in a hoodie hunched over on a bench. When I met his gaze, he glanced away quickly. He was spying for another gang, surely.
Being aware was my life now, the way I lived another day. If I didn’t stay alert, I’d be grabbed and end up dead and dumped down the river somewhere.
“You’ve got to have someone, huh? You can’t take all this on alone, and the Armanellis—”
“They’re not a part of this.”
Maksim chuckled and nodded. “They’ll always be a part of you, Katalina. Family isn’t just blood, right? You’re not so stupid to think that. I know you know that better than anyone.”
“Maksim, aren’t you only supposed to be my security?” I teased, lifting an eyebrow.
Luka spoke from his side of the car. “He can’t be just that to anyone he cares for. You know we’re supposed to be enemies. My dad wanted me to kill him when we were ten.”