Page 15 of Nemesis
I didn’t know what overtook me, but before I was able to stop, I found myself reaching out, the sudden urge to touch her swarming my senses.
But that hadn’t been the strangest part of our interaction. An ominous feeling had sparked when my fingertips had grazed against the pulse point on her delicate wrist.
A simple touch, thelight graze of mythumb on her bare skin had set a flurry of goose bumps skittering up my arm, a shiver moving throughbothof our bodies.
I hadn’t had a similar reaction to someone in a very long time, not sinceher.
I couldn't even bring myself to say her name because it would make every memory I’d pushed away to the farthest part of my brain resurface. Not that that had ever worked.
Reminders of her had always been present in every confine of my mind, haunting me like a living ghost.
But Olivia looked so much like her,feltso much like her.
The delicate features of her face, the slope of her nose, and a mouth you couldn’t take your eyes away from.
The last time I’d touched her was still crystal clear in my mind, reminders of her soft lips and how perfectly they’d molded against mine taking up permanent residency.
Olivia reminded me so much of my Sofia.
Your Sofia,the voice in my head tsked.She was never truly yours. It continued, taunting me.
But it wasn’t her.
It couldn’t be her because that would’ve meant I’d spent the last seven years looking for someone who was right here all along, right within reach. It would’ve meant I’d spent the last seven fucking years looking for someone who didn’t want to be found.
Because she’d never reached out. Never looked for me.
I’d messed up that night by kissing her,wantingher. But if she’d stayed, I would have given her anything she wanted. Even if that had been a life without me.
I only wanted her to be safe,happy.
I was at the warehouse that night, working on our latest assignment, when I received the call about the shooting atSeñorHerrera’s house.
The bureau had been keeping an eye on his family ever since his office had announced that he’d wanted to enforce a new legislation that would restrict deliveries through the ports. Something we’d known the cartels wouldn’t be too happy about since the new restrictive measures would be a hindrance to their primary mode of trading.
We’d busted a few smaller groups over the years, but the bureau had always struggled to find the leading cartel. We’d eventually figured out that the Amoretti and the Valente families weren’t the only players in the drug and gun trade between the countries. They’d only been sourcing whoever was monopolizing the business here.
However, during my last years at the bureau, I’d become more suspicious of the Barreras, a highly influential family down south, but it had been difficult to concretely tie them to the disappearance and bodies we’d suspected they left in their wake.
Whoever was in charge had always gone after rival families or people who might become a problem later, but they had never aimed their target on high-stakes figures.
At least not until that day.
I’d seen a lot of crime scenes throughout the years, but the Herreras’ murders had probably been the worst. When I’d arrived at the scene that night, I’d been met with a deafening echo of silence.
Andsomuch fucking blood, you couldn’t even tell who it was originating from.
That had been when I’d found her, thready pulse and barely breathing. The moment I’d laid eyes on her face, my heart had stuttered inside my chest, my throat growing impossibly tight.
Despite all the blood she’d lost, she had been by far the most beautiful person I had ever seen. Crimson strokes painted her tanned skin, dark brown curls framing her like a halo, her beauty shining through the macabre sight.
I’d rushed to her side and tried to contain the blood that was seeping out of her side while we’d waited for the medics that had been on their way. When they’d arrived, we’d rushed her to the hospital where they’d spent hours in the operating room, trying to control the internal bleeding the bullet had caused.
If I’d arrived a minute later or the shooter had aimed his shot a millimeter up, she wouldn’t have made it.
And I would have been robbed of the best year of my life. Robbed of meeting the love of my life, no matter how brief my time with her was.
It was all worth it.
