Page 62 of Chicago Sin
“I don’t have the answers you’re looking for,” I admit.
“Everything is happening so fast. Like a raging storm.”
“It is.”
“So what is this? Is it just sex… a lot of it?”
I shake my head. “No, Flowers. It’s not just sex. I can tell you that much.” Although I can’t keep my damn hands off this woman.
“But it’s dangerous,” she adds.
A fist clenches in my gut.
“I don’t keep feelings locked up in a box. My emotions are big, and they bleed into everything. And I don’t want to fall in the deep end when I know there will be no one around to pull me out.”
I digest that metaphor. Does the deep end mean love?
Fuck.
I want to tell her I won’t hurt her. But she’s right. Someone wants me dead. I don’t know if I’ll live through the week. And even if I do, Hannah and I are worlds apart. She’s color and light and delicate flowers.
I’m darkness.
Death.
Destruction.
I live and breathe in a den of sin.
I have zero to offer her.
In fact, my continued presence in her life is only a grave danger to her.
As soon as I stop pretending I believe she’s actually a problem for me, I should walk.
Walk away and never look back.
If I had any decency, I’d do it right now.
But I don’t. I grip her face and claim her mouth like she just professed her love to me. Which, in a way, she did.
“We’re both in the deep end, Flowers,” I tell her when we break apart.
I’ve never been in so deep.
She bleeds…. I bleed.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Hannah
Armando’s phone rings in the middle of the night. The way he rips out of bed on a gasp tells me he’s used to waking up fighting. Another sharp inhale through his nose, and the light from his phone comes on. His expression is hard. Warrior-like. “Yeah?”
I hear a clipped male voice on the other line, the tone just as sharp as Armando’s. I hear the words shot up and cops.
Armando swears and starts pulling on his clothes like he’s going to battle. “‘Kay. I’m coming down… No, I’ll Uber… Yeah.”
I turn on the bedside lamp and climb out of bed, too. My heart pounds, even though I don’t know what the emergency is.
