Page 28 of His Deadly Devotion

“I was. I have no idea why Ares was arrested. Maybe he was racing someone else?” Zara suggests. I can see through her argument, though.

The kid is the son of one of the De Bellis brothers. There’re five of them and they all belong to a prominent crime family here in Melbourne. My cousin Zoe married one of Ares’s uncles.

“What’s going on?” Lorenzo looks right at me, like I’m the cause of all the chaos.

“It wasn’t me. She’s in trouble for street racing with Ares.” I smile. “But she won, so I don’t know why everyone is so angry.”

“Sort your sister out, Lorenzo,” Dominic tells my brother. Then he turns to Zara. “Car, now!” With that, he storms out of the room in the same fashion he stormed in.

“Good luck,” I tell Zara as she passes me.

“I’m his favorite. I’ll be fine.” She smirks. “I’m not the one who ran off and got married in Italy.”

Lorenzo looks at me. “You’re drunk,” he states.

“Tipsy, not drunk,” I tell him.

He walks over to me, bends at the waist, and before I know it, I’m over his shoulder.

“Whoa, the room is spinning. Put me down!” I yell.

He doesn’t. He continues walking. To where? I have no idea. All I can see is floor. I hear a door open, then my body is flying through the air and I’m landing on a bed.

“She’s your problem now. I don’t have time to babysit her.” Lorenzo storms out and slams the door behind him.

I roll over and find Connor staring at me with a puzzled look on his face.

13

Iheard Aurora screaming at her brother from outside my bedroom door. Just as I was about to get up and find out what was going on, that same door burst open and Lorenzo stormed inside with his sister draped over a shoulder.

After tossing her next to me on the bed, he threw out a hand and told me she was my problem. Now I’m lying here, staring ather, wondering what the fuck she managed to get up to in the matter of a couple of hours since I fell asleep.

Aurora rolls on to her side, blowing out a puff of air in an attempt to get her hair off her face. I reach over and tuck a loose strand behind her ears. “Hey.” I smile, and then I get a whiff of it. Liquor. “Are you drunk?”

“Pfft… no,” she says.

Raising a single eyebrow, I don’t say a word. I can see that she is. Her cheeks are rosy as fuck and she smells like she bathed in a barrel of red wine.

“Okay, fine… I’m a little tipsy, but not drunk,” she admits.

My fingers twirl in the hair that falls over her shoulder. “How much did you drink?” I ask her.

“Two bottles,” she says.

My eyes shoot up to hers. “You drank two bottles of wine by yourself?” That’s a lot of fucking wine.

“No… I was drinking with Zara. She was hiding too.”

“Who’s Zara?”God, please don’t tell me Aurora has imaginary fucking friends.I mean, I’d get on board if she did. I’d probably go as far as to pretend I could see them too. For her, there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do. I’d just prefer not to deal with that level of crazy.

“Kyla’s little sister. “

“How little?” Kyla is young herself.

Aurora rolls her eyes at me. “She’s the same age as us. Relax.”

“What happened that made your brother literally throw you on my bed?”