“Let go,” I hiss, shoving against him, my chest burning with emotions, my palm burning where it’s landed on his chest. “I shouldn’t have come here.”

He grabs my other arm and pulls me to him. “Ella. Stop.”

“I didn’t mean to interrupt your . . . whatever that was.”

“It wasn’t what you thought. You’re hugely overreacting.”

“You’re right, and that only makes me angrier.”

“I don’t even know what that means.”

“It means I shouldn’t let you get to me, but you’re here with some big-breasted bartender, avoiding me, and I’ll just state the obvious. It upsets me.” I jerk against him. “Let go.”

“I’m not letting go. I told you that.”

“You don’t get to make that decision. I do. I do, Kayden.”

His arm circles my waist, bringing my hip to his, and he starts walking, forcing me to follow or make a scene we both know I don’t dare. My mind is plotting an escape, but there isn’t one. Far too quickly, we’ve traveled a short hallway, and he’s already opening a door and entering some room while taking me with him. “Rosa owns the bar,” he announces, pressing me against the desk and pinning me with his big body, his hips aligned with mine, his hands on the surface behind me.

“And you want to fuck her,” I say, oh so aware of his hard thighs against mine.

“She’s Adriel’s on-again, off-again girlfriend.”

“And you want to fuck her.”

“Holy hell. No, Ella, I do not want to fuck her.”

“You’re here, staring at her cleavage rather than being with me, and you smell like tequila. I guess that’s better than smelling like her.”

“That woman always has cleavage. I don’t even see it anymore.”

“You were here and not—”

“I know. I know.” His hands come down on my arms. “I wanted to be with you.”

“Then why weren’t you?”

“Because ‘this’—us—wasn’t supposed to happen.” Now he sounds angry.

“I can leave. Just let me borrow some money.”

He scrubs his jaw, looking tormented as he settles his hand back on the desk. “I don’t want you to leave any more than I want to be in this shitty bar right now.”

“But you are.”

“Because I don’t know how to protect you and be with you, but I also don’t know how to let go of you and trust you’ll be safe. And the honest fucking truth is I don’t want to let you go.”

My anger evaporates, my throat thick with the crazy emotions he stirs in me. “Then don’t.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“Make it simple.”

“I can’t just make it simple. If you’re with me, you’re with The Underground, and it comes with risks that I can’t, and won’t, walk away from. Kevin maintained the values of the organization. I promised him I’d do the same when, and if, that time came, and it came.”

I reach down and turn his hand over, revealing the tattoo on his wrist. “Protector.”

“Yes. And that is the way I honor Kevin.”

“I admire you for that commitment, and it doesn’t scare me. I can handle it.”

“You think you can handle it.”

“I have a mobster chasing me. I’m not exactly living a life of roses and chocolate, with or without you.”

He studies me for several heavy seconds. “We’re going to fight.”

“Yes. We are.”

“We’re going to fight about my insane need to protect you.”

“I’m a redhead. I’m good at giving what I get.”

His jaw sets hard. “You say that, but after what you told me about that man—”

He hits a nerve, and my response is instant. “I told you. I don’t even know the person I must have been to let him treat me that way, and you’re nothing like him.”

“That’s not completely true. In his fucked-up way, he claimed he was protecting you. And I will protect you at all costs.”

“Just don’t tie me up and leave me and I won’t shoot you with the gun you gave me, like I most likely did him.”

“Sweetheart, if I tie you up, it’s about pleasure, and I’ll be right there giving it to you, but to be clear: I want you, just you, but you need to know that women and sex have been vices that have served me well, and now I’m focusing all of that on you. I need to know if you can handle it.” He leads me to the door, opening it and placing me in front of him, his cheek near mine as he whispers, “Let’s go find out.”

I swallow hard at the erotic challenge, and his hand settles at my back, branding me and guiding me forward. We enter the bar again, and I swear I feel Kayden’s powerful presence in every nerve ending of my body, anticipation burning through me. We pass tables, and random people, and I do not miss the way heads turn as he passes, the way he claims the attention of those around us as he does me. I cannot be alone with him soon enough—a desire sidetracked as two dark-haired men, one tall enough to be eye level with Kayden, the other slightly shorter, step in our path.

The taller one speaks to Kayden in Italian, and the only pieces of information I pick up are the names Enzo and Matteo. From there, the three of them have an exchange, and it’s clear to me the dark-haired men are Hunters looking to Kayden for guidance. The two men leave without so much as a glance in my direction, and I’m not sure if that’s because I’m considered just another one of his women or because they don’t think it will please Kayden. Whatever the case, he urges me forward and outside, and it hits me that he still doesn’t have on a coat, but is seemingly immune to the cold. I suspect there is far too much Kayden has been immune to these past five years.

“Adriel was waiting for me across the street,” I say as Kayden drapes his arm over my shoulder and we begin walking.

“Fuck Adriel.”

It’s a harsh, guttural statement that speaks of tension between the two men, and a shift in Kayden’s mood from sexy to troubled, even bordering on angry. “Are you okay?”

He stops walking and faces me, hands on my arms as those pale blue eyes of his fix me in an unreadable stare. “Do you know how long it’s been since I let anyone close enough to know or care to ask that question?”

I am not sure what reaction he’s looking for from me, if any, and I’m not blind to the honesty and vulnerability he’s dared to expose. “Do you want to talk about it?” I ask, my gut telling me he does.

“Enzo,” he says without hesitation, confirming I was right. “He’s a French kid that works for me. I let him take a job against my better judgment. He didn’t show up for the chartered flight from Milan back here tonight, and no one can reach him.”

This is his life. Danger. Torment. And it should scare me. It does scare me, but there is no denying that part of me is already too connected to this man to care. “What kind of job?”

His cell beeps with a text and he digs it from his pocket, grimacing at the message, his gaze lifting to scan the area we’ve just traveled, his jaw setting hard. “We have company.”

I frown and follow his gaze, my lips parting at the sight of Gallo fast approaching. “What is he doing here?”

“According to Adriel’s text message,” he says, returning his phone to his pocket, “he followed us from the bar. I hope you memorized that file, because now is the time to get your memory back and shut him down.”

“I did. I’m ready. I hope.”

“You’ll do fine. Just follow my lead.”

“It’s almost midnight, Kayden. Why would he be here? What if he found the real me? What if I—”

“Easy, sweetheart. We couldn’t find the real you. He didn’t. And he’s here now for the same reason he was at the house at three a.m. last night. He’s on a mission to rattle me, and you because of me, it appears. Let’s show him he can’t win.”

“Yes. Okay.”

“Good. We’re going to turn together and face him.”

I nod, inhaling as we move, his arm casually draped over my shoulder again as Gallo stops in front of us, his hands in his trench coat. “Twice in one day,” Kayden greets him dryly. “Proof there is a God.”