“You need information, you’ll get it from him. But he’s not worth another piece of your soul.” She stepped toward him. He didn’t move. He didn’t dare move.
Siobhan whispered, “I still love you, Kane.” She kissed him. He stood rigid, willing himself not to respond to her. She stepped back and smiled, just a little turn of her lips, and he itched to take her to bed, right then, show her that he wasn’t the man she thought he was. That he took what he wanted, and he had wanted her for years.
But Siobhan wasn’t a one-night stand. She wasn’t a woman he could screw, then walk away. She was a woman who demanded lovemaking, not mere sex. She knew it, and still she pushed him. “I will love you no matter what you do in Monterrey. But you’re better than Zapelli. You’re better than all of them. I’m not letting you disappear on me again, not anymore. I will hunt you down and make you realize that you are the man I see, not the man you think you are.”
And then she walked away. Siobhan walked out of his bunk and left him shaking with a hard-on.
He didn’t want to love anyone; love was dangerous.
He especially didn’t want to love Siobhan Walsh.
It looked like he had no choice in the matter, because as soon as she walked away, he craved her even more.
*
It didn’t take long for Angelo Zapelli to break, and Kane Rogan didn’t have to say another word.
“Fuck you.” But there was no venom, no fight. He was resigned.
“Names.”
Zapelli gave up three names, and after continued questioning, Kane was fairly certain those were the only players Zapelli knew. Kane had heard of two of them. One he was certain was dead. The other in hiding when he found out Kane was looking for him. And the third … a new player? Or an alias?
Kane would find out. He stood.
Zapelli started to cry. “I don’t want to die. Please.”
Had the women he sold as sex slaves cried and pleaded for their lives? Zapelli hadn’t cared about them, and Kane cared less about the whiny, sniveling bastard in front of him. Angelo Zapelli was a waste of oxygen.
But he’d made a promise. Even though he didn’t explicitly say he wouldn’t kill Zapelli, Siobhan had walked away believing he had.
He should shoot Zapelli now to prove to Siobhan that he was unworthy of her and her love.
But Kane was tired. Tired of the violence and the heartache and the misery that he’d been fighting for well over twenty years.
“Is Jasmine alive?”
“I don’t know! I swear, I don’t. I … I think so, but I haven’t seen her, I swear! I’m out of the business. I only work for my dad now. I swear.”
He was blubbering, but Kane didn’t believe him—Zappelli wasn’t out of the business. Maybe this beating would change him, but Kane wasn’t holding his breath.
“If you want to live, tell me one thing.”
“Anything. Anything.”
“Who bought your son?”
Zapelli’s mouth opened and closed and no sound came out, until a gut-wrenching sob. “No. They’ll know it was me.”
Kane raised his gun.
“New York! That’s all I know, someone in New York, a business tycoon who has four daughters and wanted a son. He’s powerful and has money. My son will have everything, everything! Why do you care? He’s not yours! Marisol can’t give him shit, she’s nothing!”
Kane pistol-whipped Zapelli and he fell over again. He holstered his gun and took out his knife.
It took all his willpower not to slit the bastard’s throat.
Instead, he cut the binds at his wrists, leaned down, and said, “I will kill you if you ever threaten my people again.”
He rose and walked away. It might take the sobbing asshole a few hours to get out of his leg restraints, but Kane lived up to his promise. He didn’t kill him.
In fact, he lived up to both promises. He’d promised Marisol that he would find her son, and now he had a lead.
Time to call in the cavalry.
And time to go home.
Home.
CHAPTER TWO
Lucy Kincaid heard her fiancé Sean slip out of bed at four that morning. Monday. She groaned, then stretched and sat up.
He walked over and kissed her. “Go back to sleep.”
“I can’t.”
“I didn’t mean to wake you up.”
“You didn’t.”
She hadn’t slept well as it was, and neither had Sean. On Saturday he’d received an email from his son Jesse and immediately knew something was wrong, but it was against the rules of witness protection for Sean to contact Jesse outside of the Marshals’ office. Then yesterday, Jesse’s handler in the U.S. Marshals service called because of the email—Jesse had violated the terms of the program by contacting Sean. Sean convinced Jesse’s handler to let him talk to Jesse, and they agreed that a face-to-face meeting might help the twelve-year-old understand the gravity of the situation.
If Jesse left witness protection, he would have a target on his back. And it pained Sean that he couldn’t protect his own son.