Shoving the exit doors open with all my weight, I left Ryker in my dust as the cold air bit at my skin. Enzo and Patrick hadn't gone far for their confrontation. Patrick knelt on the ground in front of Enzo, cradling his face in his hands. Blood stained them, dripping down over his forearms. "What the hell did you do?" I asked Enzo, moving up to his side to inspect him. Without a mark on him, the only sign that he'd even been involved in the brief fight was the blood staining his knuckles.
"Worried about him, Baby Girl?" Enzo asked, his voice just as dangerous as Ryker warned me it might be.
"No! I'm worried about you. You don't like violence for no reason."
"Killing people is very different than beating up a pushy man who needs to learn the meaning of the word no," Enzo scoffed.
“Broke my goddamn nose,” Patrick said, his voice muffled by his hand holding it delicately. “Fucking not worth all this shit. She’s a great lay, but a complete pain in the ass.”
Enzo growled as my body went still. I worked to keep my face neutral, but the words found their mark. Wounding the part of me that had always known they were true.
Enzo grabbed Patrick by the collar of his shirt, lifting him to his feet. “She’s only a pain in the ass because you aren’t man enough to be her equal and you’re too fucking stupid to see it.” He slapped Patrick’s hand away from his face, watching the blood drip down over his chin with the detached satisfaction of a killing machine.
Enzo’s fist connected with Patrick’s face as Ryker came out the doors with my jacket in his hand. A spray of blood stained the front of Enzo’s suit as Patrick went limp in his hold, knocked unconscious by the force of it. Enzo dropped him to the sidewalk, reaching out to accept my jacket from Ryker and staining it with Patrick’s blood like the caveman he was.
That stain was never coming out.
"Figured you'd be in a hurry to get out of here," Ryker said with a smile.
Enzo's eyes trailed over my body, heating as he studied me. "No!" I said, wagging a finger in his face even as I accepted the coat despite the unsanitary blood all over it. It was too fucking cold to be without it. "You do not get to go all caveman and then just expect me to spread my legs for you to take the edge off. I am entirely capable of handling Patrick's bullshit. Punching him until he’s an unrecognizable limp noodle on the sidewalk is not acceptable!"
Even if my blood was like fire in my veins from watching it and desire pooled in my belly.
There was something seriously wrong with me.
"I think," Enzo said, leaning forward to wrap his blood-stained hands around my bare thighs and lift me into his arms as he made his way toward the parking garage where he'd parked his SUV. "That you should just be pleased I didn’t give Ryker permission to play with him.” I couldn’t deny that truth. He’d recover from a broken nose and possible concussion.
He’d even have ten fingers and toes.
I glared at his profile from the comfort of the Range Rover. A bit of my fury eased away at the fact that he'd had the foresight to take the SUV instead of the Harley.
I'd freeze my nipples off, and I quite liked them attached to my boobs.
"Are we not going to talk about what you just did?" I asked finally as he turned the corner to the gated Bellandi community.
"Nothing to talk about," he grunted. "I hit him a few times. He deserved it."
"I had it covered!" I protested.
"Is that why in the eight days you've been mine, he's poked his head into your business twice? I don't even want to think about how he knew he could find you at Indulgence tonight, because that poses a serious security risk. Did you post where you'd be online?"
I snorted. "God, none of us are that stupid. Let's just advertise where Tiernan should bomb if he wants to take out all the Bellandi women in one shot. That's us." A roll of my eyes made him growl in warning, but it did nothing to stop me from continuing to give him attitude.
Maybe at the start I might have feared the consequences, but after a few rounds with his version of punishment? I had to say it was more a motivation than a deterrent.
"Stop being jealous and needy. It doesn't suit you, Lorenzo," I teased, glancing at his hands where they stained the steering wheel with Patrick's blood. "That's unsanitary."
He chuckled, but it wasn't his usual sound of amusement where I was concerned. It was the dark, foreboding laugh he only used when the beasty was ready to come out and play.
I poked the bear. If I was lucky, he might poke me back.
"Are you intentionally goading me into fucking you, Baby Girl?" he asked as his house came into view. He drove straight for the garage, only glancing at me from the side of his eye once.
"It isn't nice to get blood all over the place," I said, keeping my tone matter-of-fact despite the tingle of excitement that he might see through my games. "Is it some kind of caveman thing? Smearing your enemy's blood all over your car?"
"Be careful, Carina. The caveman thing would be smearing his blood all over you. I'm dying to see his blood on your skin and know that I put it there after annihilating my competition."
"He isn't your competition if I don't want him," I said as he pulled into the garage. "Doesn't that take something away from the fantasy?"
Enzo laughed, clicking the button
