Page 142 of Perfect Rhythm

“You’re not fooling anybody, Nyx. I know she’s been talking shit about me to you.”

“Okay, fine.” I huffed. “You’ve worked her last nerve, and she’s having me break it to you…she won’t be home when we get there tonight.”

“What?”

“She got a ride home while we were out.”

“A ride from who? It better not be Enzo’s fucking nephew. I swear I’m?—”

“Calm down, Shade. It’s not him. That shit ended before it could even begin, thanks to y’all’s little feud.”

“Well, who picked her up?”

“It was Xandie and one of her friends.”

“Oh, hell no,” he said as he pulled his phone from his pocket. I grabbed it out of his hand and hid it behind my back. “Yo, Nyx, give me my phone.”

“No.”

“I’m serious. If you don’t give me my phone?—”

“What? What are you going to do?” I said playfully. “Your sister is fine. It’s time for her to go back home and be in her own space. She needs that.” I lowered my mouth to his neck and kissed him softly. “And if I’m being honest, so do we.” I could feel his fury dissolve. “Aren’t you ready to fuck me in every room of your penthouse?”

His dick poked my center.

“Well, since you put it that way?—”

“Mmhmm,” I whispered. “Just think, now we can be as loud as we want wherever we want as soon as we walk through the door.”

“Hell yeah.”

“I thought you would agree.”

And just like that, Jassi was free.

She could thank me later.

“Damn, I love your fine ass,” he whispered.

“I love you too, babe.”

For a moment, we just stared at each other, our eyes saying things that we’d said out loud when it was just the two of us. I didn’t think I could ever be this in love with a man. Not after what I’d gone through with Eli, and damn sure not with someone that carried Shade’s reputation.

But he’d made it clear that he knew how to love me, and that was all I ever wanted.

A vibration buzzed through my purse.

Giving Shade back his phone, I dug into my bag and pulled out mine.

An alert from FDL flashed across the screen, and I tapped it without thinking.

The second the homepage loaded, my heart dropped.

I stared at the screen in disbelief, my eyes blinking nonstop at the image that was in front of me, and the name that was in the headline.

It was Eli.

The picture showed his car mangled beyond recognition. The front end crumpled around a thick tree trunk in the woods.