“They will find whoever is responsible, and they will serve them the kind of painful punishment they deserve.”

  I nod, more grateful than I can put into words that they’re working so hard on this.

  I mean, I’ve done it for all of them repeatedly in the past, but knowing they’ve got my back—Evie’s back—means fucking everything.

  “Is she okay?” Emmie asks softly.

  I let out a heavy sigh as I slump lower in my chair and look up at the huge master bedroom windows.

  “Yeah, I think she is. She’s stronger than she looks.”

  “I know,” Emmie says confidently. “She wouldn’t have survived Lovell if she weren’t.”

  “She… uh…” I rub the back of my neck, not really wanting to confess what’s about to fall from my lips.

  “Here you go,” Theo says, passing Emmie a can of Coke before throwing one at me.

  “Thanks.”

  “Could you give us a minute?” Theo asks Emmie.

  For a second, I think she’s going to refuse. She doesn’t usually take too kindly to being left out of important conversations, but she doesn’t even try. Instead, she pushes from her seat, gives him a peck on the lips and moves toward the cabin.

  “We’ll finish this another day,” she warns, looking at me.

  “Great,” I mutter, rolling my eyes at her.

  “What was that about?” Theo asks, taking the chair closest to me.

  “I think… Evie thinks I’ve bought her.”

  He’s silent for a beat before he shocks me. “Probably for the best.”

  “That I’m lying to her?”

  “Well, no, obviously not. But she’s been through enough in the last few days. Not having to worry about who really owns her arse is probably a good thing. She can relax here with you, which we see you’ve already started doing.”

  “It was all going swimmingly until you interrupted,” I mutter, cracking my can open and swallowing a couple of mouthfuls.

  “You taken her yet?” he asks casually.

  “You just walked in on me jizzing on her stomach, what do you think?”

  He shrugs. “I dunno, maybe you were pulling out so she didn’t end up in the same state as Calli.”

  “Oh yeah, because that will make this whole situation less complicated. There will be no more Deimos babies in the near future.”

  “You say that now… You do know she’s not on birth control, right?”

  “How the fuck did you— You pulled her medical records,” I sigh. I hate that he has the power to invade her privacy like that, but also… “Anything I need to know about?”

  “So quick to judge until you realise it can benefit you,” he mutters teasingly.

  “Fuck off. I’m just curious. I don’t want you knowing more about my girl than I do.”

  He shakes his head at me.

  “Oh don’t give me that. You knew every single thing about your wife long before you were tied to her. I bet you were pulling her records less than ten minutes after you met.”

  “Give me some credit. We were in school. It was at least a couple of hours later,” he deadpans.

  “So?” I ask.

  “Nothing to tell. She was on the pill for a few months, came off it because of the side effects. That’s it.”

  “Good. That’s good,” I say, nodding.

  “We haven’t got any closer to finding anything else, though.”

  “How is that possible? You have guys on the inside.”

  “We had one guy for a brief moment. Then he misdelivered your girl, and now they’re all on high alert. They’ve gone to ground, and we can’t get in touch with anyone.”

  “Fantastic.”

  “We’ll get them, A. We always do. We’re not going to let anything happen to Evie. Even if we have to play a little dirty.”

  I wince. I’m not sure I like the dark look in his eyes right now.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “That they might need tempting out of their hiding places.”

  “Tell me what to do, and I’ll make it happen. Anything to ensure that whoever bought her pays for it.”

  “Of course,” he confirms. “Which is why you’re both not at the centre of this. Just stay here, keep your heads down, and let us do our thing. And while you’re hiding, make her yours. Take her off the market.”

  “I’ve got exams, T. I can’t just—”

  “There will always be someone outside keeping watch. Just keep it to exams only and be smart.”

  “Great. Sound advice,” I mutter.

  “What do you want me to say? Go back home and flaunt her around town? You’re safe here, the internet is secure, you’ve got burner phones. Just… keep her off that fucking camming app.”

  The sip of Coke I’d just taken sprays from my mouth.

  “Tell me you haven’t watched.”

  “What the fuck, man?” he asks, sounding totally offended.

  Really, I’m not surprised he knows. He knows fucking everything.

  “As far as the world knows, she’s MIA. We don’t need her online, letting her sugar daddies know she’s still about.”

  “She doesn’t know I know,” I admit.

  “Probably time you confessed if you want to keep her safe.”

  “She wouldn’t get on it with all this going on,” I say confidently.

  “You willing to risk her life on that?”

  Silence falls between us as the weight of that question presses heavily on my shoulders.

  No, I’m not willing to risk her life for anything.

  Theo watches me closely as I lose myself in my thoughts.

  “Did it scare you?”

  “What?”

  “Falling for Emmie.”

  “Pfft. I didn’t fall for her. I can’t stand her, really,” he jokes.

  “Funny.”

  “Honestly,” he says, sitting forward and resting his elbows on his knees. “Most fucking terrifying thing I’ve ever done. But,” he counters, “also the easiest. Falling for her. It was… inevitable, unstoppable. Easy. It was everything else that was hard work. Accepting it. Understanding it.”

  “Were you worried about how fast it happened?”

  He dips his head and rubs the back of his neck, clearly not comfortable with these deep kinds of conversations.

  “It was too late for that. We were already married.”

  “Yeah, I guess the situation is a little different.”

  “I’m just lucky we discovered we actually liked each other and one of us didn’t end up dead.”

  “You know it would have been you, right? She’d have shanked your arse in your sleep.”

  He laughs, but there’s no bitterness there. It’s pure love. The sound of it makes something deep in my chest ache.

  “Too fucking right.” He sits back. A wide smile pulls at his lips as he thinks about his wife.

  “So what did I miss in Vegas? Anyone else get married?”

  He chuckles. “Not that I’m aware of. But I wouldn’t put it past Seb and Stella to sneak off.”

  “I’m with you there.” They were the exact couple I had in mind.

  “Everything calmed down once we discovered all this shit. Emmie went to visit the artists in Rebel Ink Vegas with the girls. Brianna got a permanent reminder of her time in Sin City.”

  “She got inked?”

  “Yep, another little surprise Nico organised. Apparently, Emmie drew her something while she was in hospital and she’s had it put over her scars.”

  “Wow, that’s incredible.”

  “It looks amazing.”

  “You weren’t tempted? You could have got matching Mr. and Mrs. ones.”

  “Emmie will get me under the machine, I’ve no doubt.”

  “So whipped,” I quip.

  “Takes one to know one.”

  “Yeah,” I breathe, thinking of my girl upstairs. “I think she’s it, you know.”

  “What about all that shit from before Vegas?” he asks curiously.

  I shrug. “I dunno. Right now, this is more important. Keeping her safe and putting an end to it all. I guess… I dunno. I’m going to have to tell her. Talk to Dad about changing my job. Fuck knows. All I know right now is that I’m not letting her go again.”

  “Thank fuck for that. You were a right miserable fucker without her.”

  “Sorry if I put a downer on Vegas. I shouldn’t have come.”

  “Too late for regrets, man. She’s safe. She’s here with you. That’s all that matters. And hey, now you know how much life sucks without her. I think it might have been the reality check you needed.”

  “I still think we’re crazy. I barely know her.”

  “You know enough. Trust that.”

  “Who are you and what have you done with our cold-hearted future mob boss?”

  “Fuck you, man. I’m right here. But there’s more to me than just that future. I want it all.”

  “Aw, you’re quite the romantic at heart, aren’t you?”

  “Just don’t tell the others.” He winks before yawning.

  “You should get back, get some rest. You got an exam tomorrow?”

  “No, Tuesday. Then only one more to go.”

  “I can’t fucking wait. We need to do something epic this summer once this is all over. Just the twelve of us, no stress and plenty of sun and sex.”

  “Sounds like a plan, man.”

  “We could take Stella back to Florida. I’ve always wanted to meet Mickey.”

  “Of course you have.”

  “And her friends seemed cool.”

  “Oh, you noticed. Thought you were too busy sulking.”

  I shake my head. “We could teach them how to play real football.”

  “Yeah, maybe. Reid came back with us,” Theo says, surprising me.

  “Oh, shit must be hitting the fan,” I chuckle, trying to make light of the situation.

  “He’s on a mission. And I think he wants to spend more time with Bri. He’s been fighting this ring for a long time. He wants to finally see it crumble.”

  “It will,” I say confidently.

  He nods. “It will. This is our city,” he says, sitting back and spreading his thighs wide. “And any fucker who tries to take it from us will live to regret it.”

  14

  EVIE

  I squeak in surprise when I pull the bathroom door open and find someone sitting on the bed I shared with Alex last night with my sketchpad in her lap, pencil moving furiously against the page.

  She stills and looks up, her dark eyes locking on mine. “Sorry, I got bored waiting. I hope you don’t mind.” She flashes me a quick look at what she was working on, but it’s gone before I get a chance to see it. “How are you doing?”

  “Um…”

  “The guys wanted to chat business, so I thought I’d come and check on you. All of this, it can’t be easy.”

  A laugh tumbles from my lips.

  “Sorry, that—”

  “It’s okay,” I mutter, walking toward the bed with one towel wrapped around my body and another on my head. “It’s… I don’t even know. I’m having a hard time telling myself that it’s real and not just some bizarre nightmare.”

  She scrambles across the bed to sit next to me. “I get that. Trust me, I do. I’ve been in some fucked-up situations. We all have. But if I’ve learned anything from this life, it’s that Lovell was the perfect place to get us ready for it.”

  “Easy for you to say. You embraced Lovell and its darkness. I just hid from it all.”

  She shakes her head. “Nah. You’re more resilient than you realise. Plus, you’re not alone.” Her hand twitches on her lap as if she’s going to reach for mine, but she thinks better of it. I’m not sure if I’m relieved or disappointed. I could do with some extra strength right now.

  “I meant what I said when we walked in on you. Sorry about that, by the way.”

  I shake my head. She rode her husband right next to me in the back of a car last weekend; I think we might be beyond that kind of thing now.

  “Don’t mention it,” I whisper, my cheeks burning bright as I think back. “And, what did you say?”

  She laughs. “Fair enough. Not sure I’d have heard anything either if the situation was reversed. I said something along the lines of, ‘Hey look, Alex has cheered up’.” When I narrow my eyes at her, she goes on to explain. “I’ve never seen him as down as he was on our trip. Seriously, it was pathetic.”

  My lips part to respond, but I quickly find that I don’t have any words.

  “He really likes you, Evie. Like, really likes you,” she repeats to nail her point home.

  “Then maybe he shouldn’t have left me.” If you’d have asked me if I was over it before I said those words, I’d have thought I was. But the whole statement came out sounding bitter and angry.

  “He was freaking out, Evie. He went and fell for you, and he didn’t know how to handle it,” Emmie explains.

  “He said that?”

  “Hell no, he’s a guy. They don’t very often say shit like that. But I know him. We all do. He’s the last single one of his childhood friends, and he’s been lonely for a while. We’ve tried to keep him a part of the group, but I think he’s felt pushed aside more than he’s allowed us to see.”

  I sigh, hating that he’s been hurting while his friends have been moving on with their lives.

  “He’d have got over himself and come back. I know that for nothing.”

  “Or he could have bought me on the dark web and given me little choice.”

  Emmie stills, and I lift my eyes from my lap to study her.

  “Y-yeah, or that.”

  Her voice and the expression on her face gives nothing away.

  “Pretty sure that’s the least of what he’d do to protect you.”

  “Maybe,” I mumble. “All of this”—I gesture to the room around us—“is so much to take without all of the talk about trafficking rings and the mafia and…” I blow out a long breath, letting my words trail off. “I’m just the girl who hides in the background, dreaming of the day she and her family get to embark on a better life,” I confess quietly.

  “You are embarking on that better life, Evie. This could be it, everything you’ve ever wanted.”

  “It’s all been taken out of my hands,” I argue.

  “Would you have chosen Alex if it weren’t for all this? Would you have given him a second chance if he came back from Vegas and turned up at your front door?”

  I don’t answer straight away, my head and my heart battling each other.

  Emmie chuckles to herself, obviously reading something in my silence.

  “You know, I never in a million years would have thought that at seventeen I’d be a wife. A wife to the future leader of the Cirillo Family. I knew I was connected to some dangerous men. What my pops and my uncle Cruz were involved in wasn’t anything Mum ever kept from me, despite my dad’s intentions. And while her intentions might have been questionable, I can’t regret anything that I’ve been through.

  “Like this, like what you’re dealing with right now, it was messy, and painful, and at times deadly. Nothing about this life is easy or straightforward, but that is part of its beauty. We can wake up each morning and have no idea how the day is going to end. It’s exciting and exhilarating. But it’s also full of love and a family that will literally do anything for each other. The bond we all share runs so much deeper than blood. It’s something that I hope I never, ever take for granted.

  “You’re a part of that now, Evie. It might not have been by choice, but I like to think that there’s something out there that decided we all needed each other and found a way to bring us together.

  “And in case you need to hear it… something tells me that no matter what, Alex would have always chosen you. He’s gone for you, Evie.”

  I lift my hand up, swiping away a tear that escaped as she finishes her little speech.

  Everything she just said about her family… I might not have met them all yet, but I know it’s true. I feel it, see it, in the way Alex talks about them.

  It’s the same kind of unconditional love I feel for Blake and Zay. And they have that, all of them.

  I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to experience what that was like after living almost in solitude all my life.

  Blake has been my best friend for as long as I can remember, and I know just how sad that sounds. What would it be like to have other girls on my team?

  “All of this… I think it’s just a way to show you where you were always meant to be. With Alex. With us. Lovell kids don’t always have to be Lovell kids, thank fuck.”

  I can’t help but laugh.

  “You deserve better. Let Alex give it to you.”

  Silence falls between us until she finally reaches for my hand and squeezes supportively.

  “I’ll leave you to get dressed. Theo and I really need to go home to sleep. Jet lag on top of a wild five days in Las Vegas is no joke.”

  “Did you have an amazing time?”

  She nods. “Yeah, it was… well, it was Vegas. I’ve never experienced anything like it. You can come next time,” she says, pushing to her feet and walking to the door. “They’ll fix all this, Evie. Trust everyone around you to do their jobs, and it’ll be over before you know it.”

  “Promise?” I ask, thinking of Blake and Zay.

  I might have been reassured that they’re okay earlier, but seeing them through a screen and being able to hold them is entirely different.

  “Yeah, I do. What I can’t promise is that it’ll be simple and easy. It’s likely to get messy and bloody. But you’re just going to have to roll with the punches with that and trust us.”

  I suck in a breath. I want to believe she’s joking, but something tells me that she’s not.

  “Take your time. He’ll wait.” She winks before slipping out of the room and closing the door behind her.

  I fall back on the bed with a sigh.

  Closing my eyes, I think over everything she said.

  Am I exactly where I’m meant to be right now?

  Is all of this fate?

 

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