“No need to apologize.”
He glanced at her as he opened the passenger side door to his black Challenger. The car was a welcome and familiar sight to her after so many months. Mac’s clothes may have changed but at least his car hadn’t. Maybe everything else hadn’t either. She took her seat and waited as Mac got in before she faced him.
“I’m just trying to process everything. I didn’t realize how much being locked up would affect me.”
Mac started the car before he leaned over and kissed her cheek softly. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For the way things had to be. I never wanted this for you, doll. Not in a million years.”
“I know.”
Mac pulled out onto the highway before he glanced at her. “Do you?”
There was a challenge in his voice. A question in both words and tone. Melina swallowed hard. “Of course, I do. Why would you even ask me something like that?”
“Because a man who loves his woman, knows her, and from the moment I saw you in that lobby, everything about you has been off. You’re a spitfire on your worst days. But today—today, when I expected you to come at me with some smart remark or sexy quip, you looked at me as if you wanted to run. As if you thought you were safer behind concrete and steel than you were with me.”
He’d read her.
Like a fucking book.
And she didn’t like it, not one bit.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t I?”
Mac stopped at a red light and stared at her. A muscle moved in his jaw and there was a hard look in his eyes. She’d seen that look before, but it had never been directed at her. Her quiet restraint snapped.
“Well, since you think you know everything, did you know that every day that I was locked up in that miserable place, I was afraid? No, I bet you didn’t.”
“Afraid of what, doll?” His voice was gentler now.
“That I was a liability who would be eliminated. That … that I had nothing and no one to go home to when I was out.”
“Is that what you thought? Seriously? After everything?”
“What did you expect me to think, Mac? I’ve seen enough of your … lifestyle, to know Cosa Nostra doesn’t like loose ends. I’m a loose end. It would’ve been easier for everyone involved if I was out of the way permanently.”
Before Melina could blink, Mac was pulling the car onto the far shoulder of the highway. Leaning across the console, he captured her face in his hands.
“I regret every single minute that you were in that hellhole. I can’t even begin to imagine what you went through, but you were never in any danger from the family. Never. You could’ve sold me out to save yourself, but you didn’t. Even though it cost you, loyalty means something to you. That was enough for Luca and everyone else to see the kind of woman you really are.”
Melina swallowed hard. “You weren’t there, Mac.”
His thumbs caressed her cheeks. “I couldn’t be. After what happened the day of your sentencing, Luca wanted my head on a silver platter. I was supposed to stay hidden but I just couldn’t do it. I had to let you know that I was there. That I cared.”
“I get it. The last thing a boss needs is more attention on him and his organization. It didn’t look good for you to be associated with me. I understand, but that doesn’t stop the fact that it still hurt knowing that even if I called you, there was a high probability you wouldn’t answer. It hurt never getting a letter from you and it damn near killed me watching the other inmates on visiting day, knowing that you’d never set foot inside that place. Not even for me. Even the messages you passed through the lawyer for me to get were small and vague.”
Melina sniffled, doing her best to hold back the dam of emotion that was threatening to break loose at any moment. This was exactly what she hadn’t wanted to happen. Mac didn’t need her having a meltdown.
“Being without you was like stabbing myself over and over again. Staying away was a form of indescribable torture and I would rather slit my fucking wrists than do that again. But all that is over. We’re together now, and nothing and no one is going to separate us again.”
Melina sighed as she took in the sincerity on his face. He believed what he was saying with every fiber of his being. His eyes were soft and the hands that held her face were so gentle. A tear fell from the corner of her eye before she could stop it.
“That’s still what you want?”
Mac’s mouth crushed hers in a kiss so fierce it stole her breath away. His tongue teased the seam of her lips and her mouth opened, allowing him to deepen the kiss. Her body needed this. Craved this. Craved him. His tongue danced with hers and Melina leaned closer, suddenly desperate for his kiss. When Mac moved away, she found herself bereft.
“Does that answer your question?” he asked.
She nodded, unable to speak.