Page 108 of Prohibited

“Y-You killed their brother,” she whispered. Though she tried to keep them still, her lips trembled. Tears stung the back of her eyes. “And you made me help you.”

Walter huffed a humorless laugh. “So that’s how it is,” he said. “They’ve gotten into your mind, sweet baby, and twisted it all around, have they?”

“Nothing is twisted,” she said, trying to jerk her face away, but he held her fast. “You made me help you kill him.”

“That’s the price of freedom, darling,” he said, putting his face so close to hers that their noses were almost touching. The scent of him was intoxicating, made her skin prickle, but she ignored the sensations that were trying to betray her. “For you and for me. We don’t get the things we want in this world without making some sacrifices.”

“Bullshit,” she spat. Her own audacity reverberated within her. She had never spoken that way to him, but her anger was making her bold. “Don’t talk to me about sacrifices. Your greed is what drove you to do it. Enough is never enough for men like you, Walter.”

“Protecting what’s mine, keeping what’s mine, is what is enough for men like me, Evelyn,” he said, watching herclosely with eyes that put a chill over her flesh. “It is the fate of men like me to give up everything to do it. And it is the fate of women like you to be ungrateful fucking wretches who wallow in the diamonds and the splendor of our labors without a care for what we’ve sacrificed to give them to you.”

Evie glared at him. “I don’t want any of it,” she said in a shaking voice. “It was a mistake, Walter. You were a mistake.”

To the unfamiliar eye, Walter might have exhibited no reaction. But to Evie, the way he went perfectly still sent a thunderclap of terror through her.

He took a breath and was on the verge of speaking when a commotion sounded outside of the room, causing him to turn his head. Evie looked over her shoulder, relieved for the moment of reprieve that it brought her, whatever it was.

Someone knocked at the door.

“What?” Walter said, sharply.

The door opened and Andrews stepped into the room.

“We’ve got a problem,” Andrews said in his deep bass voice.

“Are you incapable of handling it?” Walter said, straightening and turning to look at him.

Even Andrews, the biggest man Evie had ever laid eyes on, shrank under the look Walter gave him.

“It’s–” Andrews said, scrambling for an answer that might preserve his dignity. “It’s a problem.”

Walter took a sharp breath in through his nose and then let it back out. Then he looked down at Evie and ran his fingers down the side of her face.

“Wait here, baby,” he murmured but not before pinching her cheek hard enough to make her hiss. “We’ll talk about mistakes when I come back.”

He turned away from her and pulled his revolver out of the leather holster he wore around his shoulders. She’d always thought it made him look sexy. Dangerous. But now it filled her with dread.

What could possibly be going on? What sort of problem could there be?

The idea that Ryan had come for her seized her for an instant, and then she let it go with a settling despair.

Ryan was still sitting in a jail cell because she’d failed to free him. Both him and Alex.

“Goddammit,” she said under her breath and began to work her wrists furiously against the ropes that held them to the chair. No one was coming to save her, so she was going to have to save herself. She gritted her teeth and tried to ignore the horrible burns that were starting to overtake her wrists as she worked at the bindings.

She should have just kept her mouth shut. She shouldn’t have said anything to rile him. She should have just played nice and gone along with anything he said. Then, when she had him convinced that she was back in his pocket, she could have slipped away. Run to San Francisco or back to New York, somewhere where he couldn’t find her.

But she couldn’t leave Ryan or Alex or Lindsay. Not now.

Maybe Walter was right. Maybe her mind was all twisted now, but the fact was that none of this would have happened if she hadn’t trusted Walter. And for better or worse, she had involved herself in something that led to a man’s death. His family and friends had responded accordingly. Could she hold that against them?

Could she hold that against Ryan, with his golden beauty, his firm but gentle touch, his tenacious loyalty?

Could she hold it against Lindsay, with his moral nature, his radiant freckled beauty, his good hearted stubbornness?

Could she hold it against Alex, even, with his frigid beauty, his cruel determination to avenge his brother, and his tender affection for Lindsay?

No.