He smiled, running a finger from her temple to her jaw. She didn’t say anything. “What’s wrong, mio cuore?”
“Just go away.” Frankie shied from him. “Please.” Anteros caressed her, trying to draw her back to him, but she flinched as if she’d been hit. Anteros blinked, feeling as if he’d just been thrown into a thrash of waves.
“Will you just leave me the fuck alone?” she asked, tone beseeching. Frankie gripped the book she held for dear life but didn’t look at the page, eyes never moving from the spot on the floor. It was like she was frozen.
Anteros reeled at her words, standing up. What had happened between this morning and now to make her so cold? He nearly reached out again, but then shook out his shoulders.
It didn’t matter.
He didn’t care.
“Be ready in an hour,” Anteros snapped, walking out of the library.
Anteros watched as Frankie placed her finger against the car window, just as she had the night he’d taken her from her home. This time though, they were traveling together to the home of the man that had taken him, Lucio Pavoni. Lucio’s annual Christmas party was famous in his world—so famous, it had continued on without him. As in the first instance, she let her finger slide down the glass, separating the moisture, creating a clear line between the fog and the picture outs
ide.
Just as in the library, Frankie was distant. She’d hardly said a word. Anteros had intended to ignore her; whatever was bothering her was not his problem. She was just eye candy, yet he couldn’t peel his focus from her, watching as she trailed her finger from the top to the bottom of the window, over and over again.
“Tell me what’s on your mind,” Anteros demanded.
Frankie sighed. “Christmas was the one time of year I enjoyed at my house. I wonder what he’s doing this year,” Frankie sighed again, finger resting delicately on the windowsill. “You wouldn’t understand.” Anteros leaned forward, forearms on his thighs, studying her. Maybe this was why she was so cold to him.
“You still think because I am an orphan that I don’t remember my parents?” he asked. “Don’t remember holidays?”
“Yes,” Frankie stuttered, removing her finger from the window quickly. “I mean no, I don’t.” She placed her hands in her lap.
“You assume I grew up in an orphanage, misplaced at birth.” She didn’t say a word at that, but her gaze flicked to his. “I knew my parents and I knew them well.” Frankie’s eyebrows creased, taking in what he’d just told her. His own forehead caved in response. To Frankie, he was two-dimensional, a monster born without parents, begot in the fires of hell without any concept of love. Which, to be fair, wasn’t that far off from the truth.
“Why…” she slipped.
“Because they were better to me dead.” Anteros sat back, rubbing a hand through his hair. She was like fucking heroin. He knew he should shut up. Ignore her. Be impassive, stolid, uncaring. In less than a week she would be dead, and he the one to kill her. The fact that she had pulled away earlier shouldn’t bother him in the slightest; the fact that she stared out the window shouldn’t matter, but it did. He watched her as if putting the needle to the vein, waiting for her to turn back to him.
She rested her head against the window and shifted to him, eyes locking. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” The needle broke through the skin.
“You’d rather me be something else?” she asked. Anteros met her fierce glare and she hit him, rushing through his veins, twisting in his blood, commanding his brain. Her eyes softened and she sighed, looking back out the fogged window. The lights outside blurred together, reminding him of a painter’s palette.
Her brown locks fell forward as she moved from the window and leaned toward him. “Do you think I can see him for a few hours? Just for the holidays?” Big blue eyes beseeched him. Eyes up, eyelashes thick, her hands gripped the leather seat, waiting, waiting for him to give her something he could not. Her father was gone, and Anteros had no idea where the fuck he was. Dead, maybe. If Anteros knew anything about deadbeats like him, it was that they were often bleeding for more than one shark.
She pulled her lip between her teeth, eyes growing even wider, hands gripping the leather until it puckered.
He hissed. “Your father is missing.”
She raised her chin slightly then slowly turned away, hands resting lightly in her lap as though he’d just informed her of the weather. Needless to say, it was not the reaction he’d expected. When she faced him again, her features were hard. He narrowed his eyes, preparing for the fight he’d expected.
Instead she calmly said, “He’s probably dead then.” Anteros narrowed his eyes even more.
When she’d traded herself to him, he’d been expecting a young, naive girl, someone to sell to The Institute, as young girls were most often easily moldable. From the minute he’d spoken to her on the plane, he knew that would not be the case. The more he discovered, the more he realized there were deep, hidden depths to Frankie—depths she didn’t even realize were there.
She was dangerous.
Like deceptively deep water, she appeared shallow, but could easily suck you down and under. What was most unsettling to Anteros was the need he felt forming in his gut. He found himself wanting to stop swimming, to see where her depths took him.
The car jolted to a stop.
“We’re here,” Anteros said, coughing slightly.