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“Does she know about…” His question drifted off when I shook my head. I’d told Andy everything that had happened in that warehouse. I’d dragged him into the sitch, so it was only right that he knew who the bodies belonged to.
“I’m going to tell her now.”
Andy stared at me a little longer before turning around and walking to the door. “She loves you, you know.”
“What?”
“Wren. She loves you. You’ve never dated. You’ve just fucked the women you wanted. And then those women turned into fucking basket cases when you said you didn’t want more. But you want more with her because Wren isn’t anything like those women. Don’t do what I did and fuck up a good thing.”
I tried to tamp down the hope that lit up my chest. There was no place for love in my life, at least that’s what I thought. Wren did more than turn my life upside down when she came storming into my office that day. She fucking lit a match and watched me burn—burn for her.
“Call your brother,” I told him gruffly.
Andy left my office, and I grabbed the tumbler of whisky off my desk. His words were still pinging around in my head. Wren and my relationship was based on an agreement—a sneaky-as-shit way to get into her pants. I’d wanted her the moment she set foot in my office, but the more I got to know her, the more I touched her, the more I got lost in her, the more I wanted.
Was it love?Fuck, I didn’t know.
I wasn’t sure I could love a woman like that. Bianca was different. She was my sister, so the love we shared was familial.
Our father had been incapable of showing real love, and our mother was a shell of the woman she used to be. I’m sure she did love our father at one point, but that love had been beaten down and trodden on until there was nothing left by an emotionally broken woman.
I would never raise a hand to Wren. It would kill me. I needed her safe. I wanted her to be with only me—not because of some fucking agreement—but because she wanted to be with me. To love me. To fucking give me the life I had only ever dreamed about.
Placing the tumbler back on the desk, I grabbed my phone and stalked from the office. Andy was waiting by the car at the curb when I stepped from the club. Wordlessly, like he knew exactly what was going through my head, he opened the rear door, and I slid inside.
* * *
Wren wasawake when I walked into the room, smiling at something the nurse said.
“Mr. Rivera, nice to see you again,” Patty stated, her eyes crinkling in the corner.
“Nice to see you, too,” I replied, my full attention on Wren who was sitting up in bed. Some of the swelling around her eyes had disappeared, but she still couldn’t see. Holding out her hand to me, I laced our fingers together as I sat beside her on the bed.
“How are you, my little bird?” I asked, brushing her knuckles against my mouth.
“Okay. Still drugged up, so can’t feel much.”
Patty said, “I’ll come in and check on you a little later, Wren.”
And with that same efficiency, she left them along with the scent of the breakfast Wren had been served a few hours earlier.
I had to tell Wren what had happened to her brother. It was her right to know, but I had no fucking idea how I was supposed to broach this subject with her. I was so far over my fucking head. I’d crossed so many lines—with her, with my own personal life, and my business—with everything that used to be clear-cut black and white now had shades of gray.
I sucked in a breath and let it out. “I found Hawk.”
She stiffened. “You did?”
“Yeah.” I studied her face, knowing that this could break us. “He’s dead.”
An anguished sob was torn from her throat, her hands covering her mouth as tears streamed down her bruised and swollen face. I reminded myself that Hawk had been the one to put those bruises there, which helped me to say, “Sanderson shot him after he spilled everything to me.”
“Jesus,” she whispered.
I brushed the tears from her face with my thumbs, cursing myself out when she winced from the touch.
“What happened?”
I opened my mouth, then shut it. I couldn’t lie to her about this. If she was going to stay with me, she needed every single dirty detail. She had to have all the information to figure out whether I was worth the heartache.
