“And I was someone’s target for a while, so I had to disappear until the threat was neutralized. Are we good now, Liv?” he whispered, and it was so deep and controlled I nearly lost it just from his voice.
His fingers vanished, and his teeth dug into my shoulder.
A controlling hand gripped my leg and lifted it over his hip as he slid into me from behind with a hard thrust.
I was good.
He was good.
Everything was so … damn … good.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Wylder
“She break it?” I asked, sitting across from Abe at our usual table. Usual cafe.
Same grease stench.
Same waitress.
Same fan above our heads making a clicking sound.
He ran his finger along the bridge of his nose. “Nah. Not gonna lie, I wasn’t expecting it.”
I grinned. “Clearly. She got me too, a while back. Her aunt … in her fifties … has been training her in self-defense. A fucking actuary.”
“Her aunt, huh?” Abe set his sandwich down and wiped his mouth.
“Yeah.” I took a drink of my ice water, staring out the window for a few seconds. “What were you doing there?”
“Just wanted to see her.”
“Why?”
“Do I have to have a reason?”
His answer grated on my nerves. “I’m watching her. Keeping her safe. You don’t have to worry about it.”
“Oh, I’m not worried. I know you’re all over her.” He smirked.
I kept my reaction neutral. Abe was the man I’d trusted most in my life. He was also the person I feared the most. I felt pretty sure it was exactly how he intended for it to be.
“She knows you don’t have friends. What else does she know about you?”
Shrugging, I glanced at my phone screen and the message from Livy.
Livy: Surfing. Dinner with the girls. Don’t wait up. x
“Nothing. Why are you so concerned?”
“I’m concerned she’s whispering dreams in your ear after sucking your cock, and you’re going to lose focus and slip up … tell her something about you that she shouldn’t know.”
“Again … why are we here? Do you have something for me that doesn’t involve babysitting?”
He took a bite of his sandwich and grinned while chewing slowly. “Don’t worry,” he mumbled. “Your babysitting days will be coming to an end really soon.”
“How soon?”
Abe reached into the pocket of his suit jacket. “As soon as you take out your next target.”
“Why? Is my target a threat to her?”
“Not exactly.” He tossed a photo on the table. “It is her.”
I stared at the photo of Livy on the beach, carrying her surfboard. Abe had used a serious zoom lens to capture it. “What is her?” I asked slowly.
“Your target.”
The muscles in my fingers twitched as I forced them to stay slack instead of balling into a fist. My jaw didn’t manage to do the same.
“And I’ll need a souvenir to send home.”
Acid climbed up my throat.
A souvenir … that was code for a body part. I never knew for sure, but I’d always suspected souvenirs were for revenge killings. An eye for an eye. Sometimes it was a finger or even a whole hand. Once it was an entire severed head. I didn’t deliver the goods to the family; I just delivered the souvenir to Abe. Honestly, I didn’t want to know any more about those situations. Until Livy.
“She’s innocent. We don’t kill innocent people.”
“Aw, son … I was afraid your dick would get in the way.”
“I’m not your son,” I gritted between my clenched teeth.
“Well, I’m the only father you’ve ever really had. Is this going to be an issue? You know how this will play out. She doesn’t live. If you don’t do it, I will.”
My gaze lifted from the picture to meet his purely evil expression. “You don’t do this anymore.”
“I’ll make an exception. This one’s personal.”
“Why?”
“You’ll find out when the time is right.”
“You’ve handed me her photo. I think the time is right. And what was the fucking point of protecting her if she’s a target?”
“I told you, it’s personal. I wanted … I needed her to love you. The payback is so much sweeter knowing that she willingly let you crawl between her pretty little legs. She knows, doesn’t she? She knows you saved her life behind that convenience store.”
I shook my head. “That was you. You had the man do that to her?”
Abe cackled. “I needed your job to feel legit. I gave you the kill you love. You should thank me.”
“I’m not your fucking pawn.”
“You’re whatever I want you to be. Imagine my surprise and pure delight when she enrolled in the same university. Imagine how perfect the timing was that the house you live in now was available right when I wanted you to go back to school. A house just feet from hers. Seriously, fate fucking loves me.”
“She doesn’t love me.” I shrugged.
“She’s living with you. Even if I made the stretch to believe that you don’t have feelings for her pussy, I know there’s no way she’d agree to live with you if she didn’t love you. It’s a girl thing. I realize you have no social skills, especially with women, so I don’t really expect you to realize what you’re doing—”
“Just shut the fuck up.”
His pie hole shut, but his eyes narrowed. I’d seen that look too many times and nothing good ever came from it. “Watch it, boy.”
I bit the hell out of my tongue and swallowed hard.
“Now … you have two weeks. Just in time for the holidays. I’m tempted to say that pretty little head of hers would be my first choice for a souvenir, but I’ve always left that part—no pun intended—up to you.” He stood, tapping his lighter on the table a few times.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Livy
“It’s just sick,” I floated on my board next to Kara and Missy, watching Aiden, my favorite OG (Original Gangster) catch the next wave.
“Um … is that who I think it is?” Missy asked, glancing over her shoulder toward the shore.
I followed her line of sight to my guy and my dog on the beach. He looked completely out of place in his jeans and boots.
“Thought it was a girls’ night,” Kara said.
“It is.” I turned and paddled inward, catching the end of a wave that took me to shore. “I texted you.” I grinned, heading up the beach with my board.
“I know.” He slipped his hands in his front pockets as I parked my board in the sand and wrung out my hair.
“So what’s up? You clearly didn’t come to surf.”
“I’m crashing your girls’ night.”
“Crashing?” I narrowed my eyes. “As in joining us?”
“As in taking you home.”
“Why?” I reached around and unzipped my wet suit.