Sweet Collateral

“Are you going to join me? Or are you just going to watch?” I shake my head numbly. I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know why I’m here. This is such dangerous ground with a man like him. “Just watch it is then.” His voice is rough and deep, carrying over the sound of the water splashing against tile.

He places one palm against the glass, allowing the water to wash over his back. Through the mist, I can slightly make out him dropping his other hand and moving it slowly, back and forth, back and forth. His eyes hold mine, imprisoning me right there in the bathroom as he watches me, watching him. The movement of his hand gets more violent. He swipes his free hand over the glass again, ensuring he can see me. The muscles in his neck tighten, his jaw twitching as his breaths come faster. His stare becomes so intense, and I feel like I’m burning under it, my body tingling with a foreign sensation.

A low guttural groan tears from his throat, feral and primitive, echoing off the shower walls. He never looks away from me for a second as his body tightens and jerks, hidden by the misted glass, but I know exactly what’s happening. It was my sole purpose, to give pleasure. I’ve seen it a thousand times before, but never like this. This is beautiful, intoxicating, hypnotic. Rafael’s eyes close for a second before they snap open, focusing on me once more. My cheeks heat, and his blazing gaze makes me fractious, so instinctively, I turn and run from the room. I keep going until I’m outside the house—until I can breathe properly again.

What am I doing?

27

Rafael

I smile as I watch Anna run from the bathroom. My chest heaves as I try to catch a breath. Shit. I can’t even find it within myself to feel ashamed. She came in here, she wanted to watch me, and fuck, if that didn’t make my dick rock hard. With her innocent eyes locked on me, I’ve never come in my own hand so hard. The girl turns me inside out, and she has no idea.

I rinse off and step out of the shower, wrapping a towel around my waist. I wonder how far she went? Will she be waiting for me in the bedroom? When I step through the doorway, I find it empty. Of course.

Anna is dancing that fine line between inviting everything I want to do to her, and running from it as far and as fast as she can. My little warrior is curious. She’s never been truly touched, kissed…loved. I see it in her eyes every time she presses her lips to mine, a ravenous kind of need, but it’s so fucking innocent. And it’s that innocence that makes me both long to destroy her and preserve her. I’ve never wanted to fuck anyone so much in my life, but she’s not ready. Maybe it wasn’t wise to show her just how much I want her, but shit, she shouldn’t come in here and look at me like that. A man only has so much restraint. At times I wonder if she was put in my life to test me, like some kind of punishment for failing Violet.

Carlos folds his arms over his chest, leaning against the back of the couch. “It’s too quiet.”

I flick ash off the end of my cigar and bring it to my lips. “He’s planning something.”

“He’ll make a move soon. He has to. He’s pulled all his dealers off the streets. That has to be hitting him hard.”

I don’t like it. I don’t like that Dominges might be ahead of me in any way. I strive to know every possible move an opponent might make, but he’s unpredictable and wily in ways that most of my adversaries aren’t. In any other situation I’d almost appreciate the challenge of it all, but not when I know he wants Anna. Not when he’s successfully managed to take her once already.

“Start upping bribes. Someone has to know something. One of his men will sing for the right price.”

“And if they don’t?”

I lift a brow. “I don’t have to tell you how the cartel works, Carlos.” Blood and violence. The only real currency there is. If you can’t buy a man, you bleed him out.

With a small smile and a jerk of his chin, he straightens and leaves the room.

It’s late by the time I leave the office, and as I drift down the hallway toward the stairs, I hear a sound, a lone, somber note echoing around the house. A piano note. Turning down the corridor towards the sunroom, I follow the sounds of more notes. The sunroom is bathed in moonlight, drifting through the windows and casting a silvery light over everything.