Page 109 of Free to Judge

For the next hour or so, I trail her at a distance. I come close to ripping the eyeballs out of a few men who can’t seem to meet her eyes instead of her plunging décolletage. When they manage to look away and meet my feral glare, they falter before stammering something—likely incoherent—and shuffling away.

That’s right, fuckers. Get the hell away from her. She’s taken.

After a while, she and her cousin separate from the rest of their group and I decide to make my approach. He tags me first. The second he does, his lip curls. I find it amusing he thinks it will have the same effect on me as it has on the other twenty or so men who have approached Kalie.

I let my fingertips graze against her elbow. When she turns around, the world stills.

Her dark red lips part as she sucks in a gasp of air. She must steal mine because I can’t quite get my lungs to work. Then my brain reminds my organs to work. She pales even as I reach out and murmur, “Firebrand.”

Peter mutters, “I’m going to get your dad before I kill this guy here and now. Don’t move, Kalie.” There must be a god because I’ll take the small favor of my impending death if it means we’re alone in the middle of the swarming crowd.

Up close, her dress is a work of art. Jeweled straps lead into a satin bodice with a black overlay that turns the sharp red into Harvard crimson. Her skirt isn’t crimson as it appears from a distance, but a multitude of layers that reflect again the depth of not only the dress but the woman wearing it. I open my mouth to compliment her, but she beats me to it. “You look nice.”

“You look exquisite, Kalie.” Reaching out, I lift her wrist to my lips. I need to feel the pulse of her heart against my lips since the location I truly want to place them might be visible, but would be utterly scandalous to this crowd.

She jerks her wrist back before hissing, “Are you insane?”

Instead of answering the question about my sanity—since the fact I was a damn idiot about how I treated her is clear evidence I wasn’t, I lean in to share with her the information I haven’t even told Keene yet. “It’s over, firebrand. That’s why I came tonight.”

While I was sitting at home, staring at the Fair Harvard invitation, knowing exactly where Kalie would be, I received a call from Ace. He informed me, “We swept up the rest of the Tiberis. Sal is back in jail after singing like a canary. You know hewas at Velvet Vice the night you gave me the intel, and we raided it.”

“I do.” Fortunately, the team found Nerissa and immediately took her testimony before arranging witness protection, so she’ll be around to testify in a few years. Her full story, shared with me by Holder, is nothing less than heartbreaking. I just hope she’s able to reunite with the people who matter most to her.

Maybe someday.

“As for the Irish, Paul, James, and Thomas Byrne have all been taken into custody.”

“And Marshall?” I asked. “What about him?”

“They’re on their way to get him right now,” he crowed. “It’s over, Dec! You did it!”

Kalie drags me back to the present. “What do you mean, ‘it’s over’?”

My voice drops to a bare whisper as I brush my lips against her ear. “The Feds took down the Tiberis. They’re in the process of rounding up the remaining Byrnes.”

I should have known better. Kalie isn’t the type of woman to have had a normal reaction. Instead of her body sagging in relief, she takes a step back and offers me congratulations on a job well done.

I inform her that I came to her the night we FaceTimed. Her cool, “I wasn’t there,” churns up acid in my stomach.

“I know. I know you left. That was probably for the best. It freed me up to focus on doing my job.”

“Did it?”

Warning bells go off in my head. Still, I need her to know the truth. Daring much more than I should, I cup her cheek. “I meant what I said that night, Kalie.”

“Which part?”

“The part where I told you I’d come back for you.”

He cups my cheek. “I meant what I said that night, Kalie.”

“Which part?”

“I kept texting you because I wanted you to know I was thinking of you. I didn’t beg you to come home the way I wanted to because I didn’t want you getting caught in the crossfire.”

She moves further away. I step closer.

That’s when she hits me with a reality check. “It wasn’t the danger that drove me away, Declan. You broke me. That day, you decided my heart wasn’t worth caring for.”