Page 73 of Dangerous Deviance
And screw it. I would take responsibility, by torturing that mother fucker until he wished he had never been born.
I punched in a code on the side of the cuffs, then inserted the key. The lock released and the restraints fell into Ellie’s lap. She looked at me with a questioning look in her eyes. I tilted my head.
“You’re going to have to trust yourself someday,” I said. Those words were meant more for me than for her, but I knew we both needed to hear them. I had to learn to trust my own instincts, to believe that I was right about Ellie. That she wasn’t a pure killer. She was more than that. I had felt it inside of me. I had to trust that feeling too.
But Muro’s words haunted me:What could be more reckless than falling in love with a dangerous woman?
I blocked them out, shaking my head, then motioned for Ellie to move to the edge of the seat. Opening the car door, I hopped to the ground, then undid the restraints on her ankles too. Elliewasdangerous. There was no doubt about that. I might have been stronger, but Ellie was faster, and if I wasn’t careful, she would kill me. And love, as stupid as it sounded, would make me more likely to trust her. To look past the red flags. To see only the good inside of her.
Like I was doing right then. I hoped that I wasn’t making a mistake.
I let go of the thoughts, staring past Ellie to the brick buildings of the Dahlia District. Ellie jumped down and rubbed her wrists. We walked to the side entrance on one of the attached buildings. Derek’s SUV and Axe’s van pulled in, parking beside mine. I nodded to them and their drivers then turned back to the building. Before I reached for the door handle, it opened.
A tall woman in twelve-inch platform boots with chink-length black hair popped out. Her arms, legs, and neck were covered in tattoos. She sneered at me, her black eyes rounder than ever.
“You’re late,” she said.
I had already checked my watch; we were actually on time. Iris tended to be kinder to Derek than she was to me, because I ran the gambling hall where some of her customers lost money that they could have spent on her girls. Her husband was out of town, working on a new business venture, or I would have suggested we dealt with him directly. Hell, I knew Iris would have agreed.
“We’re right on time,” I said.
She rolled her eyes. “Your brothers?” she asked.
I nodded behind me. “Bringing in the rest of them.”
When I was in my mid-twenties, Gerard had paid her to whip me with a single tail in front of the entire club as a birthday present. Oh, the joy of birthdays for the youngest son in a mafia family. I was in a position where if I ducked out of it, she wouldn’t get paid, so of course, I played along with the joke. She didn’t go easy on me, even when it was clear I was not happy about the situation. To this day, she still put a bad taste in my mouth.
“Hi,” Iris said, turning to Ellie. “You must be ‘his.’ Is he at least treating you like the queen that you are?”
Ellie cracked a smile, then looked between me and Iris. “Excuse me?”
“Wil said something about one of the lost female soldiers being ‘his’ woman, emphasis on the ‘his.’” Iris glared at me, then snapped her head back to Ellie. “I just want to make sure you’re getting the treatment that comes along with being owned. Or,” Iris smiled at Ellie, “I can see to it personally that he has an attitude adjustment.”
I chuckled, and Iris glared at me. Ellie backed away from us both slightly.
“Ellie is with me,” I said. Hell yes, she was mine. “But we need you to hold the other women here until we figure out what’s going on with the woods and Muro, and—”
“Don’t tell me,” Iris said, cutting me off. “Honestly, I don’t want to know why I need to hold your hostages here. I know I don’t really have a choice. So please,” she forced a smile, turning her attention to me and putting a hand on her hip, “Could you let me protect your hostages, so I can move on with my life?”
“They’re not hostages,” I said. ‘Prisoners’ was the more accurate term.
“Not completely,” Ellie muttered.
Iris glanced at Ellie. “At least she tells the truth. But yes, Iwillhelp them. Not you, butthem. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
She shoved past us and went to the parking lot, reaching for the four women with her outstretched hands, spouting off at Axe, and being polite, but volatile, to Derek as well. Axe never missed a beat, that stoic expression never fading, even when it came to Iris. But Derek scowled at her.
“You’re lucky we’re—”
“Actually, we’re even.” Iris narrowed her eyes. “I’m protecting your girls, and you’re protecting mine.”
I sighed, laughing to myself at the absurdity of it all. If it weren’t for her husband, I doubt we would’ve helped Iris.
Iris took the four women through the kitchen to the dorm rooms at the back of the club, calling a few entertainers out of their bedrooms to introduce them to each other. Ellie leaned on my shoulder, closing her eyes, a pinched look on her brow. I squeezed her shoulder.
“You okay?” I asked.
She shook her head. “The headaches,” she said.
