For me, love is not patient, nor is it kind.
From the moment I fell in love when I was fifteen, it had been hard and painful. Full of loss and frustration. Because I’ll never be good enough for the woman I love. That’s the hard reality I’ve lived with every single day for the last twelve years.
There was a time when I allowed myself to have her. Just a taste. Stolen moments I’ll always remember. But even then, I knew someone like me could never be with someone like her.
And so I watch from the shadows, looking over her life, protecting her from a distance, and seeing her live without me. Seeing her happy is bittersweet because I remember a time when I was the one that put the smile on her face, when I was her whole world, when she looked at me like I hung the moon just for her. She looked at me like I was the creator of worlds, and there’s only one thing that has stopped me from seeing it again.
Her life. Her safety.
The reason I left all those years ago to live a life in the shadows was to keep her safe. A man like me has enemies, more than I can count, and it was safer for me to let her go than to stay and put her in danger. Every moment we spent together was a risk I shouldn’t have taken, but I will never regret my selfishness. Those memories are the ones that keep me from the darkness that beckons me.
I come from a long line of bad people. People who have no right to walk the earth with people like Wynter. Their legacy taints me, making me wrong for her in so many ways, but the only time my world has ever felt whole was in the moments when she was in my arms.
I stare at my computer, trying to find it in me to finish the design for the prototype missile Storm wants to start production on next year. I used to love doing shit like this. I’ve loved tinkering with things since I was a kid, even if I rarely had the opportunity. But things have changed. I’ve changed. The moment I graduated college, Ron Saint James hired me as head of product design. A fancy title that basically just means I design and build weapons, security systems, and anything else that’s asked of me.
I think about putting the cameras I have scattered around Wynter’s apartment on. When I put them there, I told myself it was for her safety, but if that were the case, I wouldn’t watch them as often as I do. I would have one of our security guys watch them to make sure she’s safe.
But she’s mine. Even if I can’t have her physically, she will always belong to me.
Instead, I scroll through the file on Angelo Russo for what feels like the millionth time. There’s nothing new. No new investments. No new property. No new transactions. He’s gotten smarter over the years, but to me, he’ll always be a fucking moron. To trade in skin in a city owned by the Saint James family only proves how dumb he is, and if that doesn’t, threatening one of their women does.
Letting him walk away after taking Emerson is one of the hardest things Storm has ever ordered me to do.
My phone buzzes on the mahogany desk, and I reach for it without checking the caller ID. “Hello?”
“There’s been an accident.” Storm’s voice is cold and distant. The distinct sound of ice against a glass tips me off to his drinking.
“Is everyone okay?” I sit up straight in my chair, quickly pulling up the feed for Wynter’s apartment, the need to check she’s okay overwhelming me. My heart beats in my chest painfully when I see the lights are out. She’s not home. She should be home from Rayne and Emerson’s wedding by now.
“No,” Storm croaks.
“Storm, what the fuck happened?” I snap. The idea Wynter could be injured, that someone could have hurt her, makes me both violent and sick to my stomach. I can’t handle the thought.
“One of Russo’s men ran my parents off the road,” he tells me. “They’re dead.”
The words hang between us long after he says them, but I don’t have a response. The Saint James family were my second home, the safe place where no one hurt me, no one made me do unthinkable things against my will. They were warm and loving, and even if they had their own darkness, they were more welcoming than anyone had ever been in my life.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper. The words seem like so little considering the circumstances, but I have to say something.
“They were your parents too, brother,” Storm says quietly. “Everyone is on their way to the estate. Wynter and I just got here.”
“I’m on my way.” Standing from the desk, I barely stop to pick up my wallet and keys before I’m out the front door.
I expect for Storm to argue, for him to tell me it’s best I not see her, but he doesn’t. “Good. She’s going to need you.”
We’re going to need each other.
