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Her lower lip trembles.
"How did you find this?" She asks softly, and I glance up at her apartment building. I give her a look and she huffs out a sigh, her shoulders rounding. "I don’t want to go in, I just want to see it." She chews on her bottom lip, then glances nervously around us. "You shouldn’t have brought me here without telling me."
"I’m not an idiot," I reply, and the tone in my voice is sharp enough to make her wince. "You’d have fought me the whole way if you knew I was taking you home." I look up at the building. It’s not much to miss. The old cement facade is cracked and crazed, in need of a good repair. I can see why it’s on the demo list to be flattened, making way for a bevvy of townhomes, or microscopic condos.
"Can we go? I don’t want someone seeing me here—" she turns away from the building, reaching for the car door, but I put a hand on her arm. She’s jumpy. Something’s scared her, or someone.
"Is someone bothering you?" I ask. Her eyes go wide.
"N-no," she stammers. She’s a bad liar. I don’t know why she ever thought she’d be good at infiltrating my business, but maybe she was hoping on not dealing with anyone at my level. First mistake. I have good layers of intelligent people throughout my operation, but that doesn’t mean I don’t personally check in on things. Even if my lower-level staff don’t know it’s the big boss they’re dealing with, they’ve met almost all met me at some point or another.
But she’d have no way of knowing that. Just like I don’t know what’s going on with her, and why she’s so rattled being in the one place she has to be missing.
I take her by the shoulders and turn so that she’s looking at me, and I’m facing her building.
"Who would be looking for you, Ash?" I ask, and her mouth opens. Her tongue darts out, and the pink tip runs over her lower lip, making me think about how it would feel wrapped around my cock, how much I want her again. Now’s not the time for that. Stay fuckin’ focused, Greco. "Who set you on my trail?"
She looks up at me, those eyes of her reminding me of a mysterious forest, the kind of place I’d get lost in, and for a moment, I am lost. My hands grip her shoulders tight, until she lets out a shaky breath.
"If you care about me, you won’t ask," she says quietly, "and you’ll figure it out on your own because you’re a big crime lord, and can probably do that. Don’t you have like, people for that?" I pop an eyebrow, and she hazards a brief, cautious smile.
"Then answer me something else, little spy, if you won’t be honest with me on who hired you." She hesitates but I give her a slight shake, just a small one, to let her know I’m serious. I could pry any information out of her that I wanted to, if I wanted to. She has no idea what resources are at my disposal. "Why did you accept the job to break into my business, to spy on me?"
She shrugs and shakes her head.
"I didn’t have a choice."
My eyes narrow.
"Bullshit, everyone has a choice?—"
She scoffs and squirms out of my grip.
"Men like you would think that," she says, walking away from me and up the few steps to the first landing of her apartment building’s entry-way. She’s framed by the doors, the peeling paint, the faded sign in one fo the windows displaying contact information for the property management company itself. It’s a sad place, although there’s a kid’s trike on the steps, and with some windows open I can hear the sounds of people talking, cooking happening, signs of life. More so than in my sterile pent-house.
More so than in my life since the patriarchs were all murdered...
"You think you can just have anything, buy anything, and get anything you want," she snaps at me, and her anger is so pure, so real, and so honest, that it gives me pause. But even though her glare is leveled at me, she’s not mad at me, not me directly. It’s just the idea of who I am. Powerful? Is it my power she’s angry with? The way I can ordain who lives and dies, arrange the world around me to my liking at anytime? Or is it the way I have money, and use it freely, buying things like ice-cream on a rainy day, a dress for a woman I’ve just met?
"So?" I ask, spreading my arms out, palms open, the epitome of all the things she hates. If we’re going to have it out, then let it be here, and now. I don’t give a fuck.
I know my future has Ashley Morrow firmly imprinted in it. Fate, or God, or the universe. All of it seems to have spoken to me, and it’s in my gut. I can hear her name in my sleep.
There is no reality where I let her go free, because that will be the end of me.
If she wants a show-down, I’ll give her one, and then I will take her home and show her exactly how she was made for me, to be pleased by me, to please me. We are meant for each other.
"So?" She repeats, her brows furrowing, and then her mouth twists. "You think you’re such a big man. What did you tell yourself? That you’d just sweep me off my feet and buy me some clothes, and that would fix everything?" Her voice is rising, but her eyes are empty, like she knows she’s full of crap, but she’s hurt, and has nobody to take it out on but me. If I need and stand to be the bulwark of her rage, I’ll do it.
I’d do fucking anything for Ashley Morrow.
"It doesn’t have to be hard, Ash," I say, my voice gentle. She scoffs, and her shoulders sag. Above us, there’s movements in the windows, faces pressing against the glass, and then vanishing.
"You don’t even know why I’m angry," she points out. I try not to smile, because that’d just be insulting.
"Money has never come easy to you. You’ve struggled all along, and I’ve waved my hands and made the problems go away, but not the real ones." I take a step toward her, wondering if she’ll bolt, but she holds her ground. "Your life’s not going the way you hoped. And now, here you are, and what does that say about you, and your life? Who the hell is Luca Greco, and why does he deserve a woman like you?"
Now I’ve hit it, or at least, something that breaks the anger inside of her. Those beautiful green eyes of hers well up with tears and she shuts them tight, to hide herself away from me. She shakes her head.
