His lips twist evilly. “I don’t remember asking.”
My heart thunders in my chest, and I consider refusing, but Alvarez is not only a drug lord. He owns this restaurant and he’s demanded that I join him for dinner, rather than service his dinner, as is my normal job as a waitress assigned to his private basement dining area. Somehow, I step forward, the brutal stories of drug cartels my father had thought perfect dinnertime conversation, often focusing on female sex slave trafficking, playing in my mind, and a kind of tunnel forms around me. I just have to get through meeting him and get out of here alive and well. I’ll call Kara. I won’t come back to work.
The man behind me is close, at my heels, and not about to let me escape, and it’s pretty clear to me this isn’t a good thing. Alvarez had seemed a little too intrigued by me when I’d taken his order, a bit too eager to chat, which makes the moment I reach the steps leading down to the private dining area where he’s seated, all the more daunting. Inhaling, I start walking, my heart racing with every step, torture. Too soon, I am at the bottom level, and I find Alvarez alone, sitting at the table…waiting on me.
I blink back to the present and shove aside the memory, and Alvarez with it, my fingers touching my lips the way Kyle’s lips had, and in that moment, I am the woman I was that night in the restaurant. The one thrilled with possibilities, romance, and the future. The one who wanted to get kissed like she’d never been kissed. I pull my fingers back and curl them into my palm. That me can’t, and doesn’t, exist anymore. But it doesn’t seem to matter. I can still smell Kyle. I can still feel his mouth brush mine. And I’m feeling things I shouldn’t feel. Wanting things I can’t have and do not dare even let my mind name. I back up and lean against the wall, balling my fist at my chest, and then it happens. I do what I haven’t done in nine months. What I swore I wouldn’t do ever again because it’s a weakness I can’t afford if I want to survive.
I cry.
Chapter Eight
Kyle
Clean shaven and standing at the bathroom mirror, I finish knotting the silver tie, which I’ve paired with a light gray suit, after all of three hours of sleep, but morning has come with no regrets from the night before. Undercover, you make split second decisions you believe will keep you and others alive. I did exactly that when I told Myla I want her and I have zero regrets about that decision. The fire between us is clear and present, and she’s right. It could easily get us killed if we let anyone else have the slightest idea it exists, which is something we’ll have to talk about today. It’s also a magnet pulling her to me, it’s clear to me that I’m going to need to use it to get her the fuck out of here, the Walker clan will just have to deal with it. And she does want out. I am certain of that now. She just doesn’t know how she can do it and protect Kara, and I have to show her that path, before I tell her who I am, even if that path is me killing Alvarez.
Exiting the bathroom, I walk to the desk in my room and sit down, keying up the security feed, and then shifting to my instant message function to look for updates, finding none. Knowing Royce was catching some shut eye like me, I key in: Asher?
The reply: I’m here.
Short and to the point, about summarizes everything Asher does by choice, but unlike any one else I’ve ever known, the man is a chameleon who can don leather and boots as easily as he does a suit. Which makes him one hell of an asset.
Me: Anything I need to know before Myla and I leave?
Asher: Royce and Jacob are already monitoring Alvarez Clothing, and waiting on you. We have four of our best contractors on a plane here now. And I’m caffeine and bacon deprived, which is fucking hell. Oh and SFB is parked across the street, and dumb enough to think he’s discreet.
Asher gives people nicknames, and “SFB” stands for Shit for Brains, the nickname he gave Juan after watching him for a few hours last night.
Me: We’ll be down in half an hour
Asher: Bring coffee. Or bacon. Bring both.
Standing, I rest my hands on the desk, considering any stone unturned, and while I’d hacked the security to get our team into Alvarez Clothing unnoticed last night, I consider running over there myself for a quick preview before I taking Myla there, but quickly rule that out. I can’t leave Myla alone, with Juan, who clearly needs to die for touching her, hanging around, ready to demand entry into her room.