Cadillac Payback: Rising Tide by AJ Elmore (the false prince .TXT) 📕

own presence. I don't even want to speak, but words rend themselves from me anyway. They claw from part of me that's been digging its own grave a little more every day since…

“Everything changed when Charlie died in our kitchen! When I saw my first bullet-ridden corpse, who just happened to be my best friend! I was scared, and in shock, afraid I was about to die, too. In the midst of the shock, I dropped it all on you. That wasn't fair.”

Her gaze shifts to the old men at the end of the bar, who must be staring. Then she looks down to my hands, idly holding my beer as it gets warm. I think there's a trace of that familiar sadness there, but it's just for a flash. Her mask holds steady.

She says, “You're right. That's when everything started to change, but it didn't end there.”

Finally her eyes find mine again. My anger has melted into misery, and the fact that I have no idea where this is going. It could be to a reviving fountain of love lost, or it could be straight off a fucking cliff.

I take a hard swallow. I want to bridge the space between us, and kiss her until she drops the mask completely. But I can't even move.

“Do you think you can love me now?” I ask.

I don't want to, but I can't stop the words from forming. I don't want to know the answer.

Her brow creases, and I win. The mask cracks, and tears rise along the bottom rims of her eyes. The pain shows through so fully that it hurts me to see it. I move without thinking, grab her hand in mine. The contact startles her, and she blinks.

“Please don't answer that,” I say before she can reply. My thumb traces light circles on her hand. She's so soft. “I wanted today for you to relax, not to be upset. So please don't answer. I'll be whatever you want from me.”

Her eyes skip down to the contact between us, and the stitches in her brow ease. She draws in a long breath that's a little shakier than the others. I'm breaking the rules again, but she hasn't told me not to touch her.

“Maybe,” she says quietly, “maybe I never believed in love like that.”

“Eres la reina de México,” I mutter.

She stills, and her attention narrows. I've never spoken Spanish to her, never let her know that I learned it. As an added point of mystery, she was too drunk to remember saying those words to me last night.

“And maybe I never knew exactly what it was that I wanted from you,” she says, like I said nothing.

This is it, my chance to change the direction of this heavy reality. Her honesty hooked me, but it's too early to be so intoxicated on her. What I really crave is her will to fight breaking beneath my fingertips. I continue to make trails on her hand with my thumb and lean a little closer.

My voice is only loud enough for her, when I say, “I know what you want from me.”

She watches me long enough that I'm sure she's about to stand on the brakes and put this night to a stop. Her stare is so intent that I'm starting to believe I've pissed her off again. Then her eyes roll like slow motion to my lips, and I smile, full of sexual glory and swamp heat.

I murmur, “But you have to say it.”

Her defenses are going up, but not quick enough to hide the desire I've managed to stoke. I brush across her wrist before I let her go, and say, “Anything for the Queen.”

She slowly leans into my space, so close I think – hope – she's going to kiss me. She doesn't touch me, but she levels stern eyes at mine.

“I'm not the Queen yet,” she says. Her tone and inflection perfectly match mine. There's no fear or uncertainty in her expression.

Her words cause a shotgun blast of reaction and response in my brain. I want to pull her against me. The taste of her is fresh on my lips from the past few days, and it's hard to want anything else. A significantly smaller and smarter part of me says to run. I've already said too much to maintain my farce. A year's worth of distance and denial – destroyed in a matter of minutes.

Then there's what she actually said. Yet. She's railing against the whole fucked up system, and she still wants more of it. One word, a bloody knife in my damn chest. Or is this one of her bluffs? What would Freddy do?

I don't move, and I don't answer. I'm barely breathing. I passed the ball to her. All I can do is wait.

She sits back, kills her drink, and scans the mirror behind the bar. It's still just us, the old men, and the bored but charismatic bartender who keeps checking her phone.

“Let's go,” Maria says.

Part 3

Chapter 22 Too Far Gone

Isaiah

The sun is setting, finally. The hotel pool is deserted, mostly because it's raining. I'm sprawled on the steps in the shallow end, kind of drunk, staring at the gray sky. I've seen lightning a couple times.

An hour ago, the weather was the usual oppressive, hot, and muggy kind of afternoon that wraps around your throat and won't let go. Now it's still heavy, except it's actually raining. It has occurred to me that I should be concerned for my safety, but that seems stupid, and definitely pointless, given my current station.

There's been just enough lag time between this morning's meeting and whatever tomorrow brings for me to fuck it up. That's never been my style, but I'm considering forcing my hand just to change course, really shake the dice until they bounce