“Careful,” she says. “You’re talking about someone who took a bullet for Vince last year.”
“I’m talking about a man who just threatened you with your father,” Damian says. “That makes him my problem.”
“He thinks he’s protecting me,” she says.
“And you?” he asks. “What do you think?”
She exhales slowly.
“I think he’s terrified,” she says. “And I think he’s right about one thing.”
“Which is?”
“That you could destroy me,” she says.
He crosses the distance between them before he’s aware he’s moved.
Not pinning.
Not crowding.
Just close enough that if she leaned forward half an inch, they’d be touching.
“And yet,” he says softly, “you’re here.”
Her eyes flick to his mouth, then back up.
“There are more self‑destructive ways to spend a Thursday night,” she says, trying for flippant
