Total pages in book: 48
Estimated words: 44435 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 222(@200wpm)___ 178(@250wpm)___ 148(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44435 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 222(@200wpm)___ 178(@250wpm)___ 148(@300wpm)
I knew that as well. The Russians hated the Mexican cartel. The cartel was powerful and was run by an equally as powerful man.
It would be a fucking bloodbath.
“We need you back home now,” Scorpion told me.
I looked at Gabriel. He twisted his fingers together but nodded once. I sighed and looked back at my president. “Then, we’ll come home.”
Scorpion grunted. “Good. Jessica and Sophia have missed your boy anyway.”
Gabriel smiled a little but otherwise stayed silent. I knew he wasn’t happy about going home, but he’d asked me not to give up the club. So, I wouldn’t. But I’d do my goddamn damnest to bring him his dream.
To bring him everything he could ever want or need.
I just needed a little bit of time to get it all together first.
21
Gabriel
Ricardo tightened his fingers around the steering wheel as we drew closer to the clubhouse. I knew the feeling—sort of. I didn’t want to be here either. I wanted to still be holed up in the cabin on his property, having Tango slowly fuck me to sleep each night, only for us to wake up early the next morning to help Ricardo with chores.
The past almost three weeks had been pure bliss, and I was loath to come back home. I’d been comfortable there. I’d felt safer than I had in… well, ever. Because not only was Tango with me, but we were secluded from the world. It’d been almost as if nothing could touch us.
But I refused to let Tango give up this part of himself for me. I already knew he would flay himself open and bleed for me if I asked him to. Tango had proven time and time again that he would do anything to make me happy.
But losing his place in the club, losing his spot in this family, would kill something in him. It would create a void that would be near impossible to fill. Like me, Tango needed structure and he needed something to belong to, even if forming attachments was hard for him.
Well, hard for him unless it was me. He and I had become hooked on each other so easily, it was like we took a breath in each other’s presence and that was it. We were bound.
“You’re uncomfortable,” Tango noted from the passenger seat, his eyes locked on Ricardo’s white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. I frowned, noticing it, too.
“Because I am,” Ricardo told him honestly. “I hate venturing from the mountains. I need my seclusion. But I wanted to make sure you both made it back here safely, and frankly, I don’t fucking trust your club.”
Tango sighed. “I told you—”
“Don’t,” Ricardo warned him. “You are the closest thing I have to family anymore, Tango—you and Gabriel.” He glanced at me through the rearview mirror, and I smiled at him—just a tiny tilt of my lips—to let him know how much his words meant to me. They warmed me. It was nice to know that Tango and I had somewhere to go, somewhere we could belong, if something happened to the club. “You two came to me on the run. Needing a safe place to live for a while. I don’t trust that you two are a hundred percent safe, but I can at least make sure you’re safe on the way back to your home.”
Tango nodded once, letting the conversation drop. Ricardo glanced at me through the rearview mirror again as he slowed down to turn through the clubhouse gates.
“Keep Tango in line, you hear me?”
A blush stained my cheeks when Tango turned to look at me, arching a brow at me. I ducked my head, making Ricardo chuckle.
“Just take care of him,” Ricardo told Tango.
Tango nodded once. “Always.”
I felt his vow all the way into the marrow of my bones, down into the depths of my soul. And it made a shiver roll down my spine because I knew all the ways Tango could take care of me.
And he was good at all of them.
Sophia beamed when I walked into the clubhouse, Tango a massive shadow right behind me. Just because my father was dead didn’t mean that Tango was letting his guard down, which was perfectly fine with me. Being back here had me feeling like I was crawling out of my skin. I needed Tango close, at least until I got reacclimated to being back here again where threats were always lurking.
I didn’t mind it when Tango hovered; I preferred it honestly—needed him to. I was safest when Tango was right there—right where I could easily access him. Touch him. Breathe him in.
I never not needed Tango. He was a part of me, and being away from him, without him, was like trying to survive while trapped underwater.
No matter how desperately I held my breath, my need for oxygen would eventually weigh out, and I knew I would eventually open my mouth and breathe in nothing but water. Fill my lungs up with it, drowning myself.