Page 12 of Under His Watch

I hung my head, exhaling heavily. Those men would be dead before the end of the night. I vowed it as I stared at the floor, but when I lifted my face to meet her eyes directly, I tried to soften my expression so she wouldn’t misinterpret my anger as something she was responsible for.

“I called a doctor.”

She reared back, tugging her hand out from my grip. “No. No doctor. No, I can’t afford?—”

“Not like that.” I shook my head. “Not at the hospital. Danicia used to work at the emergency room, but since we helped her out of a…”Shit.I couldn’t tell her that we saved Danicia when she was caught in the middle of a hostage situation. That would scare her more.

“Out of a what?” she asked, furrowing her brow.

“Out of a delicate situation,” I improvised.

She narrowed her eyes and tilted her head to the side. “Who are you, Romeo?”

I sighed.

“You said you wanted to help me out of the alley before the cops came. Are you on the run from the cops?”

I stared at her, knowing that confessing I was a Mafia man might frighten her even more.

“Are you a secret agent?”

I didn’t laughather, but the idea was so ludicrous that I couldn’t hold in a chuckle. She frowned, almost pouting at me, and I shook my head. “No, Tessa. I’m not a federal agent.”

“Then who are you?Whatare you that you would avoid the cops in an emergency like that?”

I licked my lips, hesitating. “I’m in the security industry, but in my line of work… I’ve learned that many cops and authorities we should trust are corrupt.”

When she nodded, I raised my brows. “You agree with that?”

“Sort of.” She shrugged one shoulder. “Yeah. I do. I’ve, um, heard some stories, and I wonder sometimes.”

“Well, Danicia used to work with the cops when they’d bring victims like you in. She’s able to bring a rape kit and help you get more comfortable.”

I stood quickly, recognizing that she wanted distance from me after I said the wordrape. “Danicia was an ER physician for twelve years before she came under my organization’s protection.”

She frowned again. “Like the witness protection program or something?”

“I guess that’s a close enough comparison.”

Danicia arrived, and just like I knew she would be, she was kind, take-charge, but compassionate. When she asked if she wanted me to stay during her “check-up” and Tessa said no, too embarrassed and on the verge of tears again, I led both women up to the master suite. I’d spent the most time making this room livable, and Tessa could have privacy here.

Once I knew she was safe and in good hands, I called Franco.

“Can you come watch over the house?” I asked. He was only a five-minute drive away.

“Yeah. But why?”

“I have someone here. And I need to go out and take care of a little business.” That was code for a variety of things, and Franco knew better than to ask any questions.

While I cleaned Tessa’s wounds and let Danicia in the house to look her over, Andy had surpassed my expectations. He’d found all three of the guys, because they stopped in the same hotel Andy had a room at. Maybe it was fate. Luck. Coincidence. I didn’t care what happened to line up their paths, but Andy grabbed them all and brought them to the nearest warehouse we owned in the area.

He didn’t need to be told what to do. That was the beauty of having well-trained and experienced soldiers.

Heading to the location he gave me, I let all the pent-up anger I'd tamped down rise to the surface. Rage coated my conscience. Dark energy had me tense and impatient to inflict pain.

I arrived primed and ready to kill those motherfuckers for ever daring to touch Tessa, to prey on her and make her cry.

“Need help?” Andy asked as I walked in and tugged on gloves. I wanted the men’s blood on my hands, but in a rhetorical sense. If I got too messy killing them, I’d need to take even longer to clean up before I returned to Tessa and saw to her care.

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