Page 63 of Dangerous Men (Fortune City Mafia #1)

She pauses to take a breath. “I promised myself that I would never be that person again. And then Chase… with Chase, I could finally prove that I wasn’t that person anymore.

I could fit with someone. And even when things got bad with him, I proved that I had control over my anger. That I didn’t have to fight back.”

“Sydney, I—” My thumb strokes her cheek again, but Sydney jerks away from me. She takes a few steps away, putting distance between us, and turning her back on me.

“And you think you can just ask me if it bothers me? Does it bother me that you’ve killed people?

Hurt people?” She shakes her head. “I don’t want this violence in my life.

And I’ve worked so hard to move past it.

And now… now you’ve ruined it, you know that?

You and your fucking brothers. You’ve ruined it. ”

Her shoulders shake when she says it. I want more than anything to hold her. To comfort her. I reach out for her without thinking, but stop myself, letting my hand fall to my side.

Instead, I stand there and watch as she curls in over herself, whispering so softly I almost don’t hear it. “Bad things happen when I get angry, Alec.”

“Bad things happen when I get angry, too,” I tell her.

She doesn’t say anything to that. Just hugs herself tighter.

“I don’t want to lose you, darling.” That’s another lie. I don’t know if I can stand losing her. I don’t know if I could survive it. “If this is too much for you… it can be just the two of us. If that’s what you need, we can do that. If my brothers are the problem, if Viper is too much?—”

She flinches at the mention of his name, and my heart shatters. For the first time in my life, I hate my brothers just a little. I hate that they might be the reason she leaves me.

“Please,” I plead. “I can’t lose you.”

But it’s happening already. She’s retreating, curling in over herself, her arms wrapped around herself so tight she’s sure to bruise.

I take a panicked step closer, desperate to be near her. “I know he scared you. But we can keep him away. We can?—”

“That’s not—” Sydney shakes her head. “Him scaring me wasn’t the problem, Alec.”

Of course not. It’s so much worse than that. He hurt her. He showed her how violent we really are, the darkest side of all of us. Made her relive some sort of fucked up trauma she has with her own anger. “I can send him away,” I promise, reaching for her. “You’ll never have to see him again.”

“Alec—”

“We can keep him away from you. Sebastian knows how to handle him. We can?— ”

“I liked it!” she cries out, turning back toward me. “I liked it, okay?”

She doesn’t look at me when she says it, staring at the ground next to me instead, and I let my hands fall back to my sides in shock.

Sydney takes a hysterical breath, more like a sob. There are tears in her eyes, and when she blinks, they spill out and over her cheeks. “He put a knife…” She stops and swallows hard. “He bit me, Alec, and I … I liked it.”

My heart beats hard in my chest. Once. Twice. Thrice. Three full heartbeats before I realize what she’s really saying. Before I understand.

“You liked it,” I say softly. “You… you wanted him.”

Sydney takes a quick step back and turns away from me, distancing herself.

No . I surge forward into her space, taking her face in my hands, needing her to look at me.

It’s not just me. It’s not just me she’s fallen for.

“You don’t want me to keep him from you, do you, Red?” My voice is raspy. Hungry. “Any of them?”

Sydney shakes her head, still refusing to meet my eyes. “I know it makes me sick, but?—”

“You have no idea, do you?” My voice is thick with awe when I say it. “You have no idea what a wonderful creature you are?” I trace my finger over her cheek, gathering the tears there, marveling at this beautiful queen before me. Made for us.

She looks at me then, and her eyes are so beautiful, sparkling with tears.

“You can have it,” I promise her, brushing her tears away when they fall. “All of us. And we’ll give you everything. We will give you the fucking world if you ask for it.”

My brothers have always been a part of me. The best and the worst parts. And this beautiful woman ?

She wants all of it.

“I could make you a queen,” I promise her, meaning every word.

She draws in a quick breath, staring at me in shock.

“Why?” she breathes. “Why me?”

There are so many reasons. Everything I learn about her leaves me wanting more.

“When did you know?” I ask her. “When did you know you wanted to open your own store?”

Sydney’s so shocked by the question, she almost laughs. She blinks a few times, considering.

“Way back in high school. After my parents died, I… I spent a lot of time at Jade’s,” she says.

Her lips quirk up into the ghost of a smile.

“I’d just hang out and read, and she … she would bake things for us.

I think it started as a joke. Our little shop, just for the two of us.

But then… the more we talked about it, the more it became real. ”

Another tear slides down her cheek, and this time, I duck my head down to kiss it away, tasting her salt on my tongue.

“And you made it happen,” I say, lips against her skin.

“It wasn’t easy,” Sydney whispers. Her gaze is distant as she remembers it. “And it took all of my savings, everything I had left over from my inheritance. But… we did it. I did it.”

I know all of this, of course. I know from Sebastian’s research how long she spent planning it, how many business electives she took during her degree. I know the name of the bank manager who granted them their first business loan.

I know how hard she worked to build an empire of her own.

My beautiful queen.

“You want to know why I care about you, Sydney?” I ask her.

Slowly, she nods.

“Because you’re smart. Angry. Ambitious. Because you had a dream and you made it happen.” I thread my fingers through her hair while I say it. “You remind me of me, do you know that?”

Speechless, Sydney shakes her head.

“For a while, I think I mistook my fascination with wanting to save you. Protect you,” I admit.

“And now?” she asks.

“Now I think you’re something that I’ve been missing.

Something I want in my life more than I’ve wanted anything.

” I stare down at her, willing her to see the truth in my face.

“I can’t stop thinking about you. Wondering what you’re doing.

Wondering what you’re thinking. You’ve consumed me, heart, body, and soul. I’m yours.”

She wants to believe me. I can see it in her eyes. She wants this, all of this.

And all she needs to do is take it.

“I care about you too much to let you run away from who you are. To let you run away from us .” My fingers flex in her hair, just enough to tilt her face toward me. “I’m addicted to you. Your dark and your light.”

She swallows, and something in her eyes shifts. She’s so close. So close to being mine.

To being ours.

“So what will you do, Red?” I ask. “Will you run away from us, knowing we’ll chase you?”

And I will. I’ll chase her to the ends of the Earth if I have to.

“I’m so tired of running,” Sydney whispers. Her body relaxes as she says it. She blinks, and a fresh tear slides down her face as she reaches up to grab the back of my neck, fingers playing with my hair.

“Tell me what you need. Anything. And it’s yours.” I promise her .

I watch her consider it. Watch as she weighs the dark and the light.

“You,” Sydney answers, finally. “I need you.”

And then she pulls my mouth down to hers and claims me with an earth-shattering kiss.