Carter Reed

ignore it that night. I slept on the floor beside him. When I woke, his foot had slipped off the couch and rested against mine.
    I didn’t move for hours. I held still until Carter took his foot away. When he woke, he never said a word. He got up and went back to his home. Thinking about it now, a few tears for him came back to me, but I remained quiet. When he wanted to talk about that, I would be there for him.
    “Farve vouched for me. He said I was a good fighter and loyal.”
    I knew the rest. They had taken him in and there had been more massacres left behind by him. When I was taken into social services and shuffled between foster homes, I still heard stories about Carter Reed, the Cold Killer. The stories had stopped by the time I graduated high school. It wasn’t until my first year at college that I realized why, he had moved up. Octave opened, and a few more clubs followed.
    Four years later Carter Reed had turned into a legend.
    He held me now and pressed another kiss to my cheek. He whispered, “Franco Dunvan replaced Cristino in the Bertal Family. They found out that everything I had done stemmed from AJ’s death. Everyone knew he’d been my best friend, so he wanted to put a hit on you.”
    “What?”
    He nodded, his eyes were remorseful. “But they couldn’t. What I had done was too big. The police were never pulled in because Tomino’s house was their base for making sex slaves. The Bertal family hid everything and cleaned it all up, but Franco wanted to avenge Cristino to make more of a name for himself.” Carter shook his head. “We heard his elders never allowed it. You were too young and you were an innocent, but that didn’t stop Franco from trying. He just never made any outright moves that the Bertal Family could link back to him.”
    Everything in me hurt. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to feel. It hurt to think. It hurt to speak, but I rasped out, “They tried to hurt me? All my life?”
    He nodded, framing my face with both of his hands. “I’ve been protecting you all your life, Emma. Mike and Thomas are only two in a long line of men that have been watching you. All your life. Since that day. This has all been for you.” He frowned. “You were supposed to have a guard at the penthouse. He was taking a piss when you slipped past, but the others followed you.” He laughed now. “I couldn’t believe that one. He vowed he’d never piss again to me.”
    All my life? They’d been watching me? All my life? I couldn’t wrap my head around that. Wait, did he mean—I sucked in my breath. “Did you know about Jeremy Dunvan before I came to you?”
    He nodded, waiting for my reaction.
    My eyes were wide-open and panic rose. My chest felt tight. Something was pressing on it. But—I shook my head. It didn’t make sense. He knew, but how? Why had he waited for me to come to him?
    I had looked away as I started to comprehend everything, but he turned me back to him. His eyes were tender, loving. His thumb brushed over my cheek. “My men took care of the body and the gun. That’s why the reports said he was missing.”
    “But you never said anything to me…” I remembered the hysteria inside of me, the panic at what had happened, how Franco Dunvan was going to kill us. I gulped for a breath, my heart was racing again.
    “I knew you’d be scared, but it was your decision,” he murmured. “I’ve always wanted you to be free as long as possible, but when you came to me—”
    “Did your men know I was at Octave?”
    He nodded. “I was already coming back when they got the call through to me. I knew you were there and that you had decided to come to me.” He tilted my chin so I was eye-level with him. “Finally.”
    “You did all of that for me?”
    “I would declare war for you.”
    He stole my breath, again. It was becoming difficult to breathe around this man. I always felt like I was having a heart attack, and this was no exception. His hand fell down to my thigh and he trailed it over to the inside of my legs. As I closed my eyes and rested my forehead against his, his finger slid underneath my dress and slipped past my underwear for the second time that night. As I drew in a ragged breath, he pushed inside of me, all the way in. His breath was hot against my face, but I didn’t move. I didn’t want to move. He began to move in and out and I trembled on top of him. When he pushed a second finger in and kept the same rhythm, I opened my eyes. I was so close to