Page 41 of Green Flag (StormSprint #2)

Though it wasn’t just him. Because he had his hand around the waist of a young woman. My age? Maybe younger?

“Surprised to see you here,” he said and gestured around us.

I scoffed. Yeah, right, Pedro. As if you haven’t constantly been on my heels for nearly a decade. The thought surprised me — the harshness of it. The disgust.

But, that was right, he might have loved me, but he’d used me.

It just hadn’t sunk in yet.

“Here? In London? Where I live? After you said you’d ‘see me soon’?”

“You haven’t spent Christmas with your family in years,” he said with a shake of his head, ignoring the remark about his message in front of the woman beside him.

“I’ve been busy,” I said stiffly.

“Indeed,” he sighed and squeezed the young woman closer to him. She was smiling. “But I meant here as in a fight. You hate violence.”

“I just wasn’t any good at violence before,” I said, a sweet smile accompanying my threat. “But I was here to give support.”

“You were here supporting Tyler?” he asked with a frown, looking over his shoulder to where I’d been sitting.

“No. Obviously not.”

“You were sat—”

“Keeping tabs, are you?”

I looked over the clueless woman. She was petite, with dark hair and a polite smile on pink lips. For someone related to him, her complexion was far paler than his warm, dark tones. “Nice to meet you,” I said and offered her my hand. “My name is Everly Bacque. I assume you’re his niece?”

I’d never met his niece before, but I knew she was as interested in horses as I had been. She screamed rich, with her long, glossy hair. We were meant to go to riding school together in the summers when I stayed with Pedro when I was a teenager.

She blinked and shook her head.

“Niece?” Pedro asked. “I don’t have a niece.”

The stadium went quiet.

Because that wasn’t what I remembered.

“Your niece who has her own stables,” I said as if he were stupid. Was there an incident in prison that knocked his head and gave him long-term amnesia?

“Your niece,” I said again, desperate for something to twig and for him to say ‘gotcha!’ or something. Anything.

He waved a dismissive hand. “This is Katherine, my partner.”

Partner? Not even just girlfriend? Or friend?

“Like I said, nice to meet you, Katherine. How old are you?”

She blushed and glanced at him before opening and closing her mouth.

“Right,” I said, nodding, because of course.

How hadn’t I seen it before? Had he told her she was special too? Had he taken her virginity as well, saying you only gave yourself completely to someone you love? And then forced her to love him? Would he use her too?

His niece was why I’d gone to his place in the summers. His niece was… imaginary.

I was fourteen.

And he’d found an excuse for me to spend the summers at this house.

Bile rose in my throat.

“Good on Mendes for winning,” he said with a deep nod, looking over to my boyfriend. “If he didn’t get the knockout, I worry what would have happened if it went to points.”

“He would have won, is what,” I said with a smile.

My anger was rising, but I had to play it cool. While my thoughts were everywhere, I needed to think. Not act.

Because I was going to take this fucker down.

Tears were burning in my skull because… I wanted to pretend it was anger. But he’d never loved me. I hadn’t been mature. I was fourteen when he set his sights on me.

Fia was a child. I’d been a child.

His eyes widened as if he didn’t quite believe that and I was delusional, but he stroked his partner’s back.

The touch made me sick. How old was she?

“I’m sure.”

I wanted to keep talking, just in the hopes that he could smell Luca’s cum on my breath. I’d breathe and sigh all over his stupid face if I weren’t repulsed at the idea of getting closer to him.

“Well, I’ll hear from you when you break up.”

There was no time between that comment and when he pulled his partner into the current of people and outside. My hands were fists at my side, ready to use my new skills against the first man I’d ever dated—

No, we hadn’t been dating. I’d been groomed.

And yet he still thought he had some godly grip over me.

“Steady now,” Nix said, grabbing my shoulder and pulling me back as the dribs and drabs of people finished walking out.

“When did you—?”

“I saw Pedro with you,” he said with a soft, concerned smile.

“I thought it was best I got rid of him before your dad noticed. I didn’t want you to go all Rambo and try to beat his ass.

” He looked over to Luca, his smile beaming.

“Leave that to the champion you’re fucking, he’s got a better right fist than you. ”

“We’re not fucking,” I said, my only defense because I knew he was right.

“You’re… not?” Nix asked, frowning.

It was just the two of us now and I hadn’t noticed Luca’s interview was over and he was now standing surrounded by fans.

“No, we’re not,” I snapped. “But, yes, he’d beat him up far better than me.”

He looked me over before placing his hands on my shoulders. “Give yourself a second.”

I breathed in deeply. Once. Twice.

There had been a few years since the last time I was truly friends with Nix, but he’d always given me older brother comfort.

For once, his security was nowhere near us. They’d hung back with Livie and Saliha.

No doubt he could look after himself. And me.

“I’m calm,” I sighed. “He just riles me up.”

“Don’t tell Luca that,” he said with a shake of his head. “It will only set him off. As far as Luca needs to know, he doesn’t affect you at all. If you want to continue not fucking him.”

I laughed through my nose, then put my smile on, rushing through the crowd to get to him.

Luca’s grin lit up when he saw me and he lifted me up in a hug before spinning me around. “Did you see it? Dropped a weight class, but I did it!”

I held him so tightly that when he placed me on the ground, he whispered in my ear, “Are you okay?”

I nodded over and over. “I’m so proud of you.”

His dimples showed as he looked overly chuffed before his face fell. “What happened here?” he asked and ran his thumb over my bottom lip, just as his cock had nearly an hour before.

A breath of incredulous laughter escaped me. Of course he was worried about the self-inflicted cut when his face was swollen and a black eye was fast approaching.

He couldn’t hurt me. He would tell me. Eventually.

“Was just worried about you. Only for a second.”

Something flashed in his eyes as his lips parted, but then he looked at our feet and wrapped me back up in his arms as a camera flashed.

Because that was the purpose of our hug.

The purpose of our being.