He rolled his eyes. “I look away one second and see them walking out. I’m staring at twins. I thought it was Izzy leaving too. You were all there. I got other shit to watch.” He sounded pissed.
Losing the one person in my life who kept me sane, though, had me more pissed. It would cause me to unravel and unleash everything I kept bottled. “If Delilah Hardy has one fucking hair out of place on her head, I’ll kill them all.”
Cade had called in his brother, Bastian, and he was on the car speakerphone as Leonardo navigated the side streets to get us there as soon as possible. We’d also called the authorities, but they had protocol to get through. They needed to get approval. Goddamn red tape. This was a big bust. They had to do things right. But they also had other intelligence that said it was the next ship over.
Fuck them.
We’d seen Delilah’s phone location.
“I shouldn't have left her,” Izzy whispered, looking out her window.
Damn right she shouldn’t have. And I shouldn’t have let her leave the room without telling her I loved her. Without telling her we’d get through the shit and get to the other side.
“I’m getting the authorities' clearance right now, Dante,” Bastian said over the car’s speakers.
Cade chuckled as he looked at me. “Not going to help, Bastian. Dante’s killing them before anyone gets there.”
“We need to keep it clean.”
“You keep it clean and legal when your wife was in danger?” My question was met with about two seconds of silence.
Then, his wife’s voice came over the phone. “He still hasn’t forgiven Cade for not protecting me diligently even though the guy only held me at gunpoint for less than a minute.”
“That’s beside the point. You and I were married. The disrespect—”
“Lilah’s as much a fucking Untouchable as your wife, Bastian. She’s mine. My Untouchable. My Lamb. My whole goddamn future. I will tear this island apart, I promise you.” I clenched my fists. I put them over my stomach, but the energy that flowed into them burned hot and monstrous.
“Hey.” Izzy turned to me and grabbed one of my hands, quickly threading her fingers through mine. “I know my sister. She’ll be fine. She’ll stall, okay? She was smart enough to get that text off. We’ll get there in time.”
Her hand shook, and it reminded me Lilah wasn’t just mine. She was my best friend’s family’s kid. Little Lilah who at twelve had come home with fucking pigtails and a huge smile on her face because she’d won the spelling bee.
Lilah who’d tried not to smirk when her parents praised yet another straight A report card on the refrigerator or the girl who’d taken her five siblings to feed a lamb because the mother hadn’t made it. She’d refilled the milk over and over again and let each of them give it to the lamb first.
A fucking giver.
And then she’d given me her virginity, and I’d never been the same.
I’d neverbethe same.
I wouldn’t lose her again. Not this time.
We pulled up to her phone’s location, and I was out of the car before it stopped moving, rushing past everyone, rain falling on my collared shirt and tailored slacks. I splashed through the puddles, raced across the sidewalk, dodging pedestrians, and then flew like a crazy motherfucker through the security entrance. Cade was behind me making amends wherever necessary.
And it only took me two seconds to scan the lobby of that ship to find the perpetrators. They saw me, and their eyes widened. Maybe things clicked into place for them.
Their friend who’d gone missing after looking into Lilah and me on that staircase, how they’d tracked my whereabouts, the man who’d listened in on our hotel room romp and been gunned down by me later that night.
As the police raided that boat, I turned to the officer and said, “Iago’s room is mine. Don’t come in until we give the signal. Cade”—I met his eyes, and he rubbed those knuckles tattooed withchaosacross his cheek as he smiled wide at me—“let’s go.”
We let the police take the men who’d tried to rush away quietly with eyes as big as saucers. Except for the one at the front desk. I approached and asked quietly, “Iago’s room or you die.” I laid my gun on the counter.
The man didn’t hesitate. He knew he’d lost it all already. The Albanians didn’t scare their associates well enough if their men folded this easily.
Cade and I ran to the stairs because I knew I could beat the elevator at the speed I was going.
Cade laughed behind me the whole time, throwing out, “Man, we haven’t fucked someone up this bad in a long time. They’re going to wish they’d never taken the wrong sister.”
He needed therapy.