Page 74 of Reckless Woman

“You want tofeel?” I challenge, palming her jaw. “Give me five minutes and your naked body, and I’ll make you fucking feel me, Anna.”

“You can’t fuck me,” she hurls back. “You don’t fuck broken, remember?”

“You’re not broken. You’re hurting and you’re stubborn!”

“I want to go back to Miami.”

“No goddamn way!” I roar.

“I’m not like Eve, Joseph,” she argues. “You don’t get to throw me in another cage and expect me to sing happy songs about it.”

I open my mouth to respond when the sound of shouting reaches us from downstairs.

“Shit.” Letting go of her jaw, I stride over to the window. Two floors below, Dante has Rick up against the balustrade by his neck. “Shit!”

I reach the balcony terrace just in time to catch the fall-out. Rick’s holding his bleeding mouth, glaring hate and fury. Dante’s pacing with a near-empty bottle of bourbon in his hand and blood on his knuckles.

“Roman Peters just called to add a little extra spice to the entrées,” he informs me with a snarl. “We were right. The bartender is a Morozov whore. She’s his fuckingdaughter.”

Rick picks up the nearest wine glass and hurls it against the side of the house. “This is my final warning, Dante. The only man allowed to call her that is me!”

Tipping my head back, I hiss out a low, slow, “fuck” at the starless sky. As predicted, the storm clouds have gathered overhead. Even the moon is in hiding.

“You have exactly thirty minutes to taste the color of her fear, Sanders,” I hear Dante say, “or I’m doing the honors myself. I want her intel, and then I want her dead.”

Rick’s gone from the room by the time I drop my head.

“We can’t kill her with your kids asleep in the same house, Dante.”

I’m not sure how much sway I’ll have over the decision, though. Right now, he’s a poster child for barely restrained violence. I’m half-tempted to go and wake Eve up to help me calm him down.

“See what Rick extracts from her first. She’s hurt his ego, so he won’t go easy on her. Now, give me some of that bourbon…” I hold out my hand—needing another drink so badly I can feel demons on both shoulders.

I head back inside to wait for the second fall-out, grinding to a halt when I see Anna sitting on the bottom stair. Pale face, knees drawn up to her chest—her sundress is spilling all around her like a purple halo.

She rises to her feet when she sees me. “What’s going on? I heard the shouting.”

“Riddles and lies, and bartender spies.” I stop a meter out, thinking how fragile and tired she looks.She’s so empty of moonshine, it’s killing me.“Dante just found out and he’s breathing bourbon fumes.”

“Nina’s aspy?” She sits back down in a rush. “What the hell is going on around here? It’s like Vi fired a poisoned arrow at this island.”

Not Vi…Vindicta.

We gaze at each other, trying to cling to something—anything—that will make us work again, before it hits me like burning acid.

I need to let her go.

I need to give her the space to come to terms with my decision.

Despite the danger.

Despite it weaponizing every instinct I have.

“Go to Miami,” I say roughly, thrusting my hands into the front pockets of my jeans before I change my mind. The urge to drag her upstairs and lock her up forever is cramping my fingers. “You have one week, and then we’re moving on from this.”

“Joseph—”

“You’ll have a full security detail. I don’t give a shit if Vi’s dead or dying in a ditch somewhere. Vindicta isn’t.”