Page 69 of Plunge into Obsession

I closed my eyes. I hadn’t realized how badly I missed him calling me that in that slight Spanish accent of his until now. Tears stung my eyes.

My reaction was ridiculous.

But I couldn’t help myself.

I was just so tired and emotional.

Slowly, I pulled away and looked up into his honey-brown eyes—the color glinting amber in the sun.

It was obvious he hadn’t shaved in a few days, and my fingers twitched with the need to reach out and touch him, to see if his beard was as soft as it looked.

I licked my suddenly dry lips, and he frowned at me. “Are you feeling okay,mi corazón?”

I opened my mouth to answer him, but I didn’t get the chance.

Black dots danced around the corners of my vision before a black haze entered from the corners, blinding me, and then…

Nothing.

11

GABRIEL

The nurse lookedat me nervously as she checked the IV line connected to Bianca.

My fists clenched as I took in her small form lying in the hospital bed, made so much smaller, much more vulnerable, from all the fucking machines beeping around her.

Johnny walked in, his eyes moving to Bianca before he shifted them back to me.

“That bastard didn’t touch her, right?”

He nodded, confirming what I already knew.

I had thought for a moment that perhaps I had missed something, that the bastard had touched her,hurther, and I didn’t see, but no.

“She hit him in the neck to get him to back off, but that was the only contact they made,” Johnny said, sounding almost proud.

I knew the fucking feeling.

My girl was a fighter.

“Then why the fuck did she pass out?” I asked, more to myself. The image of her eyes closing and her legs giving out from beneath her haunted my mind.

Fuck me, but my heart fucking stopped, and she would have hit the ground if I didn’t have my arms around her already.

Raphael came into the room, his expression worried. “What happened?”

I turned to him. “You tell me. You said she was fine.”

“Shewasfine,” he said. “On the days that I’ve seen her. I only briefly saw her in the car before her shift was set to start.”

I worked hard to keep from giving in to my anger. I might be my father’s son, but I wasn’t my father.

“You should have stayed with her until she got inside.”

He didn’t say anything for a beat before he nodded and looked away from me.

He knew I was fucking right.

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