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CHAPTER TEN

VALE

It’s got to be genetic. I swear there’s DNA that makes verbal bullets shoot from your mouth, because Blair and I get in a girly gunfight today.

I’ve had it with her pity party. It’s been almost four months since her Valentine’s date killed her vagina. She doesn’t go out like she used to. She doesn’t smile. She’s a real pill, and you’d think she’d be happy because she’s writing her romance books when she’s not being a pathetic pain.

But no. Today, she narrows her eyes, glaring at me as I sit at my desk.

Ready. Aim. Fire.

“What did you do to your hair?” she snipes.

I shoot back, “Can you fix your face so it doesn’t look like you’ve sniffed a fart?”

“Can you fix your hair so it doesn’t look like Exxon is your stylist?”

Jace snorts by the door. Nash taps his foot over mine under the desk, and I know I should be nice to her, but that hurt.

“What?” I touch my strands. “I’m wearing it down and straight. Is that a crime?”

“It is when it’s all oily like that.” She slumps in her usual chair. “When was the last time you washed it?”

I can’t tell her how I’m afraid to take a shower. She can’t know how I’ve slept next to Nash all week, and every morning when I wake up beside him, I’m all hot and aroused and agitated. So, when I take a shower, it’s the only privacy I have from him, and I ache to touch myself and come, but now?

Now, I’m so damn flooded with emotions for Nash; coming at the thought of him feels like more than lust.

It’s starting to feel like love between us, and that scares the hell out of me. It scares me how he smiles at me when I brush my teeth. It frightens me when I catch him grinning as I type. It terrifies me how he watches me brush my hair. How silently he makes me feel so beautiful. How I think he’s beautiful, too. How he may be a beast, but he doesn’t frighten me.

So, it’s been a couple of days, and I thought dry shampoo and a whore’s bath would suffice. But it doesn’t under the scrutiny of my sister.

“It’s been a minute,” I answer her.

“It’s been an eon, and eww .” She grimaces. “You’re gross.”

So, I snap, “You know, your fleece pajamas are making a stench and a statement, too. They’re giving ‘I give up’ vibes.”

“Because I have.”

“You can’t give up on love, Blair. Not over one man.”

“You have no idea because no man has ever loved you!”

The sting is instant. Tears bite at my eyes, and I look away.

“I’m sorry.” She rushes to me. “I’m sorry.” She kneels, yanking me into a hug. “I’m being a bitch, and I’m sorry. I’ve never been heartbroken like this, and I’m so sorry. I’m wrong. I love you. Alena loves you. And?—”

“I love you.”

I glance through my blurred vision at Jace, sitting on his stool by the door. Yes, he means it; it’s in his blue eyes. Not in a brotherly way; it’s more like a friend, but there’s a little something between us. A little flirt. A little fun. That’s all.

“Thanks,” I mutter, feeling the heavy silence on my right. It’s Nash, and he’s the only one in the room not saying a word.

I think I know why. I feel the same way.

“I started my period today,” Blair shares. “I’m bitchy and emotional as hell, and I’m sorry.”

“Oh, shit.”

Blair and I are synced up, and with all this Nash stuff going on, I forgot. But unlike Blair, my periods make me more than emotional. They make me sick.

“Do you have your Motrin?” Blair asks, smoothing my dirty hair. She knows what’s coming for me. “I’ll cover for you tomorrow, okay? And the next day. Just stay in bed, and it’ll be over soon.”

“ What will be over soon?”

Wonderful. Now Nash speaks? Yes, please, let’s all discuss my periods from hell.

“She has endometriosis,” Blair answers. “Like she murders menstruation. Blood everywhere.”

I close my eyes, dying inside. “Jeez, Blair.”

“What?” she scoffs. “There’s no period shaming here, and Mr. Allen has a daughter. Remember when Alena got her period at school? He was one of the cool parents who picked her up and kept her home a day.”

“And you both were sweet to her,” he answers. “Thanks for showing her how to … uh?—”

“How to put a tampon in?” Blair interrupts. “Yeah, we had it covered because some girls go for the wrong hole the first time and?—”

“Blair. Just. Stop ,” I groan. “You’re making this worse.”

By the end of the day, it is worse. I take my birth control patch off, and my period hits me like a freight train. My core cramps, my stomach is sick, and my thighs ache. Then, I realize I’ll have an audience for my massacre tonight, so I add to my agony by gently banging my head on the desk.

Nash whispers to me, “Let’s go. Let’s get you comfortable.”

With my cheek smushed against the wood, I look at him and confess, “Comfortable is not on the itinerary for the next three days. This will be bad and bloody and so fucking embarrassing. Do you really have to witness my mortification?”

Blair is upstairs with customers. Jace is in the kitchen, scarfing down his third lunch, so we’re free to talk.

“Yes.” Nash takes off his glasses. Rubbing the bridge of his nose, he answers, “I don’t like invading your privacy, but you’re not safe. One of the men on the bridge survived. He just got out of the hospital, and he’ll be coming for us.”

“Us?” I pop up.

“Yes. He’s going to go after everyone I care about. That puts you at risk and me by your side, protecting you.”

“Oh, god,” I groan, rolling my eyes. “Can’t you just shoot him and get this over with? Or give me the gun. I’m cramping so bad all of humanity is in my crosshairs.”

“If he comes around, yes, I’ll take care of him, but he likes to hide, too.”

“Where?”

“If we knew, he wouldn’t be hiding.”

“What does he do that’s so bad?”

“The exact thing you feared I was doing, and if he gets a hold of you or Alena? I’ll rescue you, don’t worry. But when I catch him, I won’t kill him. Death requires no imagination, and I’ll get creative with his pain.”

We’re sharing the same fear: what would happen to me if I get kidnapped by his enemy?

“So, he’d … traffic me?” It fills me with terror.

“To torture me, yes,” Nash answers, “he’d torture you.”

Sucking his teeth, for the first time, he truly looks like the beast he said he is. Like blood drips from his sudden fangs. His beauty turns dark, his eyes blank. Emotions can’t find his face or heart. He looks dead inside, just like his ambitions for his prey.

I don’t recognize him, but I recognize he’s a serious threat. Who? Yeah, I mean both men.

It worsens the next twist in my gut, and I groan, feeling my pale face turn pallid. My pain suddenly makes the beast disappear. Nash brushes his hand over the small of my back. “I promise I’ll give you privacy for this.”

“But…” I can’t believe I’m about to say this, “I don’t want you to go. I mean, I like being kidnapped by you, not the Bridge Bastard.”

Nash grins. “Yeah, you’ve made it clear that I annoy you with how amazing I am.”

I grin back, even through wretched cramps. “And you thought kidnapping me was gonna turn out for you, but here we are. Me, about to send you to the store to buy two boxes of super-plus-plus tampons. How’d that turn out for you?”

He huffs a laugh. “Blood doesn’t faze me.”

Then he stops my breath. His fingers gently brush a greasy strand from my face. “Let’s go,” he soothes. “I got you covered.”

Our routine is that Nash leaves first. He uses Delta’s back exit and waits for me in the shadows of the blooming courtyard behind the house. A few minutes later, I leave, and he follows me home using the narrow, cobblestone alleys that snake behind the homes in Charleston’s historic district.

But this evening, when I leave, Nash leads me to a black RAM pickup truck, pulling up to the curb. When he opens the passenger door for me, I’m not surprised to see who’s driving.

“I knew it!” I exclaim.

“Just get in.” Jace sounds serious while Nash slides into the back seat of his double cab. I fasten my seatbelt, but my mouth is unrestrained.

“I knew it. You two and that Cummings guy work together. Like three peas in a mafia Avengers pod. Wait.” I turn to Jace. “Does this mean Grant is, too?”

Grant is Jace’s older brother and Delta’s nighttime bouncer, and I swear they might as well be twins. They look and act alike, like big, beefy bouncers in Armani suits, so if one is mafia, both are.

“Listen, Nancy Drew,” Jace warns, “we’re not mafia, not like you think. But you’re too smart and ask too many damn questions and see too much stuff for us not to tell you a few things because honestly, shit will go sideways soon, and you have to know who you can trust, and we’ll have to protect you.”

“And you need to protect us from your mouth,” Nash adds from the backseat. “We’re serious, Vale. No one can know. Not your sister. Not my daughter. Not your boss. No?—”

“But,” I ask, “isn’t your Cummings guy renting the room on the third floor of Delta’s now? How can Stacey not know who he is and who you are?”

“He’s given Stacey a reason to trust him,” Nash answers, “so she gives him a place for his meetings. Our meetings. No questions asked.”

“Meetings?” I have no idea where we’re going, but who cares? This makes no sense. “Who has meetings in an adult store?”

“Adults,” Jace quips.

“Okay, smartass.”

“Pot,” Jace makes a fast left turn, “meet Kettle.”

“So, do I go to your meetings now?” I’m excited. “Is there like a secret knock and a code word to get in? Am I in the not-mafia-mafia club, too?”

“Over dead bodies,” Nash answers with so much ice in his voice, I shiver.

But I don’t have a chance to ask more questions because Jace pulls into The Mercier Hotel’s parking garage. Immediately, I figure it out—Nash got us a suite here so he could protect me while I can have some privacy.

It’s so damn sweet; I can’t speak as Nash grabs three duffels from Jace’s cab before Jace drives away.

The elevator takes us from the garage to the grand lobby. We step out to find a crowd gathered by the hotel’s front glass doors, and I see why.

Redix Dean and Daniel Pierce are here. They’re not only Hollywood hotties but also in the most famous polycule in the world, and the paparazzi won’t leave them alone. They stand with their wives, chatting with Luca Mercier, the hotel’s owner, and his wife, Scarlett, as camera flashes pop outside.

I know them. They’re friends with Stacey and loyal Delta’s customers but I’d never divulge their proclivities.

I guess that’s the discretion Nash says I require now, as he gently tugs my arm, not wanting us to be spotted.

Once we’re on the gold elevator to our room, he reveals, “I went online today and read how hot baths can help with your symptoms. You don’t have a tub at your place, so I?—”

So, you’re really melting my heart. I’m speechless, stunned, and staring up at him in awe.

“Look who’s being the asshole now,” he mutters, leaning over to kiss my strands. “And for the record, I think Exxon is doing a beautiful job with your hair, and it’s cute when you dress like a tampon, and there is a man who cares way too much for you, and he’s not your father.”

I rest my head on his arm. “And he’s not in the mafia, either.”

“ Vale ,” he warns.

“Okay, okay.” I loop my arm over his. “Take me to a tub, please.”

Blair said no man has ever loved me, and maybe that’s true, even of our father.

But no man has ever swept me off my feet, literally, like Nash Allen does. Once the suite door locks behind us, he drops our bags and, in one deft move, carries me to a king-sized bed.

“Rest here,” he says, “while I fill the tub.”

No man has ever considered ordering lavender-scented salts from a hotel spa and having them sent to our suite so he could fill my bath with them.

No man has ever neatly placed a plush robe, a pile of towels, and a shot of tequila by a tub for me, either.

“I read you shouldn’t drink alcohol,” he says before leaving me in our suite’s palatial spa bathroom, “but I know you like Casa Amigos and cheeseburgers. I’ll order some for our room service while you relax.”

Relax? No. I undress, then slowly ease my aching body into the soothing water while I drown in an even warmer feeling. It surrounds me, and I close my eyes.

I let a tear fall.

Yeah, no man has ever loved me, but I don’t need love if I have Nash.