Page 91 of Stolen Kisses
Luc took me through the door and it closed sealing off everything else.
Chapter 26
Maria
* * *
Luc pressed an ice pack to my head.
The damn ice hurt almost as much as the blow that gave me the bruise.
“Keep it there,” he instructed.
I did, despite the pain. Glancing up at him I noted the concern on his face.
He’d brought me back up to Dante’s office where he sat me down. Once again, he was waiting with me like a babysitter.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Could ask you the same thing,” he threw back.
“I’m working.”
“Dante allows you to work in his bar?” He tilted his head to the side.
I rolled my eyes at him. “I’m working, and … thanks.”
Thanks again. Always more thanks.
“Your welcome. Maria you were supposed to stay at the house. Fuck, you know the situation. Why would you go down to check the stock by yourself?”
I winced, unable to answer and defend myself in any light, because he was right. I was an idiot.
“I wasn’t thinking.” I sighed.
He crouched down in front of me and gazed into my eyes.
“This is some serious shit, Maria. You have to be more careful.”
“I should leave.” That was clear as day. I had to leave Chicago immediately. They found me, who knew what would happen now? It had just been the one that I saw the other night. Tonight there was a whole host of Franco’s men.
The other night was to check things out. Tonight they had absolutely meant business.
“Leave and do what exactly? Run, run with your son and no one to protect you?”
“I don’t want to put anyone in danger here.” A tear ran down my cheek and I wiped it away not wanting him to see me cry.
He took my hands. “Maria, we are danger. You know that it’s what we do. You’re in the best place possible and the safest place you can be. None of us are going to let anything happen to you or your son.”
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me doll. It was a given that we’d do this.”
“He won’t stop until he finds me. He won’t. I hoped that maybe he’d just give up or look somewhere else. I never told him I was from Chicago. I always lied about that and told him I was from Ohio.”
“Ohio?” There was a smile in his eyes. “That’s where you picked?”
“It was just far, from here. Maybe in the back of my mind I never wanted him to know how horrible my past was, but I also probably didn’t want him to know just in case I had to come back.”
