Toxic: A Dark Romance

My fingers clutch at the countertop behind me because if they weren’t occupied, they’d already be reaching for a part of him to touch. They’d be skimming along his shoulders and combing into his hair. He, however, has no such qualms about touching me. His hands drop to my shoulders before dancing over the neckline of my shirt and then down my arms, sliding along until goose bumps rise in their wake. On the upward movement, his hands round to my stomach where they trace along my ribs and skim to just underneath my bra.

As his hands are mapping my body, his mouth lays waste to the walls I’d carefully built since I walked away from him and my dead husband. When I can’t take it anymore, I release my grip on the counter and push him away.

“Okay,” I say, a bit more breathlessly than I would have liked. “That’s it. I held up my end of the deal. Now you hold up yours.”

He steps back, his lips flushed pink and glossy, and I have to look away to keep from drawing them back to mine.

“So you have,” he says a bit dazedly before taking a key ring down from a line of hooks hanging by a door. “This way.”

“Where exactly are we going?”

“According to intelligence I’ve gathered, Danny and his friends like to meet up at a bar a few towns over. If we’re lucky, they’ll be there, and we can tail them to Sal’s place.”

“Can I—”

“No.”

“You didn’t even let me finish my sentence.”

“That’s because chaos follows you around like a shadow. You’ll keep quiet, stay behind me, and do exactly what I say, remember?”

I grumble, but I don’t argue. The possibility of finding Danny shuts me right up.

“You know, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were almost excited,” he says.

I ignore the teasing tone in his voice and say, “I assumed you killed them. I mean before we left.”

“Unfortunately, no.” He spares me a short look. “I was more worried about getting you out.”

Color me shocked. Gracin just admitted to being worried about me. I tuck that knowledge away and walk next to him in silence. The short hallway from the security room to the outside spills out into a six-car garage, which is not the same garage I found last week. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t jaw-droppingly surprised. Even though I’ve been living in his house with his servants, cooks, assistants, and bodyguards, the reminder of his wealth is staggering. Each of the garage bays has a vehicle parked in it. The first has a truck, black, utilitarian and very capable looking. Next to it is an SUV of some kind, same color and very sleek—almost like it’s one of the government-issue kind I’d imagine the Secret Service uses. I don’t dare ask him how he got his hands on it. The next three spots are high-end sports cars in varying colors and makes.

“Jesus,” I whisper under my breath.

The keys jingle behind me, and I turn to find Gracin watching me. He indicates the SUV. “We’re taking this one.”

I have to swallow to wet my dry throat. “Okay.”

He chuckles. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so speechless. Cat got your tongue?”

Forcing my legs to move, I climb into the passenger seat as Gracin swings up beside me.

“I’m not speechless . . . I’m just curious. How is it that you can afford all of this? Or is that an off-limits topic?”

The car rumbles to life, and he maneuvers it out of the garage. I wait as he backs out and then shifts the SUV into drive. “There isn’t a lot that’s off-limits to you, Tessa. You just have to ask.”

“Then tell me, how is it that you have a mansion and a shit ton of cars? You worked for . . . someone to kill Salvatore, but in what capacity? Why?” I’ve been wondering about him since I first met him, and now that he’s in a talkative mood and we have time, I want to know more.

As he gathers his thoughts, I drink in the view and roll down my window to lift my face to the fresh afternoon breeze. I’d been allowed to go to the gardens, but there’s something about being cooped up that takes away its beauty.

“I take contracts for several ghost organizations,” he says, and I jerk my attention back to him, swallowing thickly.

“Contracts?” The word is barely a whisper.

He nods, a quick jerk of his head. He’d put on sunglasses so I can’t read his expression behind the tinted lenses. “Yeah, Tessa, as I said before.”

His admission steals my breath straight from my lungs, but I gesture for him to continue, not wanting to make him clam up.

He pulls out onto a highway, and I realize I don’t even know what state we’re in anymore. I’d been so out of it after the warehouse that I hadn’t thought to ask. The terrain reminds me of California desert, but we’re out in the middle of nowhere. We could be in Nevada or Arizona for all I know.

“I got hooked up with a crowd of bad people when I was younger, and I got a bit of a reputation for being a problem solver.”

“Should you be telling me this?”

“I can tell you whatever the fuck I want. The people I work for pay me because I’m the best at what I do.”

I lick my lips before I respond. “That doesn’t sound good.”

He shrugs as he merges into the far left lane of traffic. “It isn’t so bad. I had a shit home life and nothing else better to do. I had the skills they needed, and they trained me for a long time to make those skills even more deadly.”

I try to imagine Gracin as a honed killing machine and am staggered when the image isn’t as much of a stretch as I think. After all, he managed to fit into prison as a thug so convincingly that he had everyone fooled. I had no idea this man was lurking just underneath the surface. Sure, I had an idea he was hiding something, but never in a million years would I have guessed this.

“Too much?” he asks when he notes my expression.

I clear my throat. “No, it isn’t that at all. It’s just I’m realizing I don’t know you as well as I thought I did.”

He tips my chin up with a finger. “You know me better than just about anyone, little mouse.”

That statement says way more than he probably intended, and I hate that I feel bad for him. I hardly know him at all, and if I know him better than anyone else, it means he has almost no one in his life. He doesn’t need, want, or deserve my pity, so I just say, “I didn’t know any of that.”

He shrugs. “It’s just history.”

“Yeah, but I feel like you know everything about me.”

He shoots me a smile, which I don’t return. “Fine. But only if you answer one of mine in return. Remember?”

I scowl, which causes him to laugh. “Fine. What do you want to know? I can promise you it won’t be as exciting as a secret past.”

He levels me with a look. “Everything about you interests me, Tessa, but we’ll start with something easy. Why did you decide to become a nurse?”

I blow out a deep breath and smile a tiny smile. “I guess I didn’t want to become my parents. They were both minimum wage deadbeats with no options. Nursing always seemed like a steady job with a good income. Something respectable.”

“Why the prison?”

I laugh. “Well, there aren’t many employment opportunities in that part of Michigan, or didn’t you notice? At first, it was only supposed to be temporary until I could afford enough money for a move to the city or somewhere warmer. Then I met Vic, and well, you know the rest.”

“What were your parents like?”

With a groan, I say, “Is that what you want to know? It isn’t what you’d call a happy story.”

“The real ones hardly ever are. Yes, it’s what I want to know.”

“Fine, but first you have to answer one of my questions.” He nods, and I say, “You mentioned you got into a lot of trouble when you were younger. Why?”

“You already know why. My dad was a drunk abusive son of a bitch, and my mom was more interested in her next score than raising a son.”

My hand reaches out to touch him of it’s own volition, needing to touch him, to soothe. Having grown up in a house just the same, I don’t have to imagine what it was like, I already know.

I may not be sure about what the hell we’re doing, or why I can’t stay away, but he hadn’t been lying when he told me about his parents. If I doubted it then, I don’t doubt it now. “I’m sorry.”

He shrugs. “It is what it is.”

“I think I get another question because you slipped in several.”

“Fair enough.”

“What happened to your parents? Are they still alive?” I almost hold my breath. Getting Gracin to talk, to open up like this, feels like a fragile opportunity and I don’t want to ruin it.

“No, they aren’t.”

I shouldn’t, but I ask anyway. “What happened?”

He looks at me, tugs off his glasses, and rubs a hand over his face. “Are you sure you wanna know these things?”

There’s a pause while I consider, but it’s a short one. “Yes. After what happened in Michigan, I honestly couldn’t think worse of you, so it isn’t like you’re going to ruin your first impression.”

At first, I think I may have insulted him, but then he smiles. “I guess you’re right, but remember, you asked.”

His left hand lies on the top of the steering wheel, and he rests his right elbow on the center console between us. As he talks, I stare at his arms, at his tattoos, and clutch my own hands between my legs to keep from touching him or pulling him close to me.

“My dad liked to get drunk, like I said, and he had a fondness for cards. He’d get wasted and piss away whatever money he had on him, sometimes more. When he’d win, he’d win big, and things would be great for a while. If he didn’t spend his earnings on more booze and lousy bets, my mom stole it to finance her meth habit. When they were both dry, she’d sell her body to come up with the money for her next fix.”

I don’t realize I’m holding my breath until white spots dance in front of my eyes. Slowly, so Gracin won’t notice, I let out the breath and draw in fresh air.

“When I turned ten, my father nearly beat her to death, but she was okay enough to go out and overdose.”

This admission shocks me into a stunned silence as I remember the way he looked at me when he first saw the bruises on my arms. Had he seen his mother in me? Is that why he chose me out of everyone to help him escape?

I clear my throat. “And your dad?”

“He went away for a while, and I went to live with my grandma, who wasn’t much better than the both of them.” He looks at me, his eyes bright and full of mischief now. “Your turn. Tell me something no one knows.”

This one I have to think about, and when I do, I start talking before I can think better of it. “Vic got me pregnant last year. He didn’t know because I was afraid to tell him about it. He didn’t want kids, or at least that was the impression I got, so I was waiting for the right time to tell him.” A tear slips down my cheek, and I wipe it away. “I didn’t get the chance. I did something . . . I can’t remember what it was, but it pissed him off enough that he beat me. I wasn’t that far along, but the baby didn’t survive. I kept it from him because he didn’t deserve to know. As far as I was concerned, he didn’t deserve to be that child’s father.”

When I glance up, I find that the SUV isn’t moving anymore, Gracin’s pulled it over to the shoulder. We rock to a stop.

“What are you doing?” I ask as he unbuckles and throws up the center console.

He undoes my seatbelt and pulls me across the console, so I’m in his lap.

“What I should have done a long time ago,” he says and wraps me in his arms. “It wasn’t your fault. It was mine, and I promise I’ll do everything I can to make it up to you.”

He holds me for a long time. Until the tears dry and my emotions steady.

“The only way you can make it up to me is to make sure they pay for what they did.”

His gaze searches my own, and he nods. “They will.”