Page 14 of The Saint

All these years later?

I wasn’t sure what to think.

He’d hurt me, and in turn, I had wanted to hurt him. But what started out as a way to put distance between us, ended in five years away from my once-upon-a-time best friend.

He’d been there at D’Angelo’s house, the night I got my stars, of course. I’d also seen him at Mariana Medina’s house, arm still in a sling.

The reason for the sling—the gunshot wound he’d sustained to his shoulder—made me wish I’d been the one to put it there.

But that’d been three months ago. Three months where I’d learned the story behind the events that Rolly had been involved in, the details of what had gone down, not only then, but over the past decade.

Injustices.

Lives ruled by terror.

Things that made me wonder if the grudges I held were based on lies in my heart.

I blamed Mateo Medina for my change of heart. For pulling me aside and opening my eyes to the truth that had eluded me my entire life.

“I get it. You fucking hate my sister, and by extension, me,” Mateo had hissed at me. “But would you put that aside for one goddamn minute and open your fucking eyes? Something’s not right here.”

It was his admonition, as well as his knowledge of my closely held secret, that stopped me in my tracks. Up until that point, I hadn’t thought he cared. I hadn’t thought him anything other than the playboy brother of my own personal nemesis, Natalia Medina. Those words were a confession—that he cared about more than getting under Queenie’s skirt.

His caring shook me, because it meant that I was wrong. He’d pointed out my secret, my hatred for his sister, not to lord it over me, but to ask me to set it aside and care as much as he did.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” I muttered under my breath.

I was stupid for holding a grudge. Stupid for running away. Stupid for ever thinking badly about the Medina family the way I did.

It was just… Natalia.

She always seemed to get in my way.

Pulling to a stop, I glanced up the side of the building, checking the address against the text on my phone. I’d had to suck up my pride to get it. I probably owed someone a favor I wasn’t sure I’d want to repay.

But I was already here. No sense in turning back now.

Sneaking into the apartment building as someone walked out, I climbed the stairs to the fifth floor, pausing at the head of the hallway to glance once again at my phone.

As if I hadn’t memorized his address.

As if I didn’t know exactly what place was his.

I moved down the hallway but jumped against the wall as a door to my left swung open and a man and woman tumbled out. Arms wrapped around each other. Mouths and bodies touching as if they should be going in, not coming out. The woman giggled as the man sucked along her neck, and heat crept up my throat as my hands began to sweat. The man looked up, pausing only slightly to throw me a wink. Then he grabbed her by her hand and ran off toward the elevator next to the stairs.

With a deep breath, I smoothed my hands down the legs of my cargo pants. With another, I finished my walk to the end of the hall.

That notebook was tucked carefully in my bag, and I swung it off my shoulder and dug the book out. Slid my hand across the hard plastic cover, saying goodbye to the beautiful, lifelike pictures inside. I knocked on the door, and I had to convince myself not to bolt. Fear, the kind I only felt during a storm, raced through me, that knock like thunder and lightning all rolled up into one.

But when the door swung open, and those slate-blue eyes looked out, that fear receded so fast, it was if it was never there.

Blue, blue eyes. Those high cheekbones, that jaw so sharp it could cut like a knife. A dusting of the blackest hair covered his jawline, and for a moment, I wondered what it felt like.

Just a moment, before the glare in his eyes ate through me, smothering the flames dancing on my skin as well as water thrown on a grease fire.

That gaze dripped, down, down, down, painting me in discomfort as it ate across my skin. I wanted to hide, to suck in my stomach, cross my arms over my mediocre chest. I wanted to cover myself with the most shapeless blanket that had ever been made until I blended in with the dirty carpet under my feet.

No matter how much I might want to be, I was no Queenie.