This Cruel Love

“Caine,” he barked into the phone, and turned his back on me, walking over to the windows as he spoke. His shoulders tensed suddenly.

“What’s wrong with her husband’s club? Why’s she gotta come to mine and give me the fucking headache for tonight?”

I had no idea who he was talking to, or what was getting him all riled up. I reached into my clutch and grabbed my lip gloss, applying one last sweep as I eavesdropped on his conversation.

“Fine. I’m coming in though. I don’t trust anyone else to oversee things. If shit were to go down, Marquez would have my head on a spike. I can’t risk it.”

He shut off the conversation and threw his mobile onto the couch in annoyance, then rubbed both hands wearily over his face. I guessed his evening had just taken a turn for the worse, and this Marquez guy was trouble.

“Problems in hell?”

He shoved both hands into his trouser pockets and looked across at me, plastering a neutral expression on his face. He looked pale though, like he’d just been given a death sentence.

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

That response didn’t give me the information I wanted, so I bit my lip and pushed back a little harder.

“Who’s Marquez?”

He smiled through a chuckle.

“You never give up, do you?”

I grinned back. “Nope.”

He picked up his phone and dropped it into the inside pocket of his suit jacket, then gave me a stern look.

“Luca Marquez is a very important and very dangerous friend of mine. His wife is having a night out tonight, and she’s chosen to come to my club.”

I was still clueless why that’d put him in such a bad mood.

“And that’s a problem because...?”

“Because if one guy even so much as looks her way, or breathes in her direction, I’ll have Marquez cutting my balls off. I could do without babysitting his wife tonight, what with you being out as well.”

“What’s my being out got to do with anything?”

“I might be needed,” he said in a matter-of-fact way.

I couldn’t stop full-on laughing at him now. He wasn’t impressed.

“What would you be needed for? Holding my hair back while I puke?”

He grimaced.

“Don’t panic, I’m not planning on drinking much tonight. There will be no puking. Not from me, anyway.”

He checked his watch, then grabbed his keys and asked me where I needed dropping off.

“Nowhere. I’m calling a cab.”

He went to argue, but I stopped him in his tracks.

“Did you think I’d let you drive me tonight? Yeah, ‘cos that won’t raise my friends suspicions and give me a million and one questions to answer when they see you. Thanks, but no thanks.”

“Where are you going tonight?” he asked.

He was sounding more and more like my dad every second.