And it wasn’t from the adrenaline of having driven too fast.

  I’d left the parking lot in Santa Monica right after Sloane’s red Ferrari—subtle, Sloane—but had quickly realized that though I might know how New York traffic worked, I didn’t know the first thing about driving in LA.

  And if this town was anything like New York, the holidays made the drivers even worse.

  There had been at least a million people on the road—maybe more—and every bridge I passed under had not only garland but also Christmas trees or lights or fucking bells done in gold foil.

  I’d thought we overdid Christmas in New York but it turned out we didn’t have one damn thing on LA and their obsession with decorations.

  I’d fallen behind Sloane and Brooks but had been able to keep an eye on the bright red of her car regardless, and had seen when it made a sharp right into a parking lot about two blocks up from me. I’d stomped on the gas pedal of my own car—a rental that was a whole lot less blingy than Sloane’s monster—and shot through the traffic to get to said parking lot.

  By the time I parked, though, she and Brooks were already out of her car and heading for what I now realized was a café of some sort.

  And surprise of all surprises, the guy I’d seen following them at the beach had somehow appeared in the parking lot, his eyes on the girls and his hand resting inside his jacket. He was weaving around a row of tiny Christmas trees now, his strides slow and steady, his steps unerring.

  And I recognized him.

  Or… No, I corrected myself, it wasn’t that I recognized him, per se, but that I recognized something about him. The way his mouth moved, or the way his eyes sat over his nose.

  Something about him was familiar.

  And there was only one good reason for that.

  Shit.

  I slid out of my car, my own hand on the gun inside my jacket, and let my eyes dart over to Sloane, who was chatting with Brooks like she didn’t have a fucking care in the world. She was stopped at the door of the café, now, and fishing in her bag for something.

  It better be a fucking gun, I thought grimly.

  It wasn’t. She pulled out a goddamned Santa Claus hat and popped it onto her head, sending Brooks into peals of laughter, and the two of them strolled into the café.

  I ground my teeth, forcing myself to stay calm and keep my strides steady. I couldn’t exactly go running in there and grabbing her to get her away from the creep who I was now positive was following her.

  But that didn’t stop me from wondering what the hell had happened to her. Sloane knew better than to let her guard down like this. She obviously had no idea that there was a guy following her—a guy who definitely had a gun inside his jacket—and I couldn’t see how she didn’t know. I’d heard how her father talked to her and had been around her most of her life. I’d seen her slide from one shadow to the next like she was born in the darkness rather than the bright, golden sunlight that shone from her.

  She’d been raised to be more observant than this.

  What had she done, moved to LA and forgotten every single thing her daddy ever taught her? Was she losing her touch out here in La La Land?

  And why the fuck did I even care? That was the more important question, here, because let’s be honest: This was none of my fucking business. Sloane wasn’t from my family and she damn sure didn’t mean anything to anyone in the Rossi circle.

  Anyone else, that was.

  I shouldn’t have cared. I was literally putting my own career—and probably life—at risk following her around rather than taking care of what I was supposed to be taking care of.

  But I’d been watching her back my entire life, and I guess old habits die hard.

  At that moment, the guy who looked so familiar it was like a toothache slid through the door of the café, and I lengthened my strides. I didn’t want him to be in there alone with the girls for any longer than necessary.

  Three steps brought me to the door, and I yanked it open, cringing at the Christmas music that assaulted my ears. Another step and I was in the building itself, and God, it looked like Christmas had thrown up in the place. Every single inch of wall was draped in some sort of decoration and a large Christmas tree took up an entire corner, decked out in silver and red. The guy behind the bar was dressed as an elf and every table had a Christmas-themed centerpiece.

  They’d even spread that fake snow around at the corners of the rooms.

  I wondered if they knew it was 85 degrees outside. I wondered if they even cared. Maybe it was so normal for LA to have that sort of temperature during Christmas that they didn’t think it mattered.

  Which it didn’t, I reminded myself. None of that mattered. Sloane mattered, and the guy who was following her.

  I tore my eyes away from the fake snow and scanned the place, quickly finding Sloane and Brooks—at the bar ordering drinks—and then the guy who was following them—in the hallway that led to the bathrooms, backed up against a corner so he was in shadow.

  His eyes were on Sloane, and it didn't take a genius to see that he was getting ready to do something stupid. He was also way too hidden for her to have seen him yet.

  Terrific. That was going to make it a whole lot easier for him and me to have a little chat.

  I turned from the girls and headed right for the hallway, willing myself to be cold. Calm. Deadly. All the things my father had always tried to tell me I needed to work on if I was going to make it in the business.

  Things that I had never exactly mastered, unfortunately. My little brother was cool, calm, and collected.

  I had somehow inherited a lot more fire than ice, myself.

  I got to the hallway when I was still in the middle of that thought, which meant I also got there without having come up with anything even remotely resembling a plan.

  Another of my many weaknesses.

  It meant, though, that I was free to go with my instincts. Which I... kind of liked, honestly.

  I got within three steps of the guy, noticed his eyes roving up and down—probably taking in Sloane's body—and grabbed him by the front of his expensive-looking t-shirt, ripping the thing in the process.

  Luckily, I didn't give two shits about his t-shirt.

  I backed him up against the wall and then kept going until my body was so close to his that I could feel his breathing picking up as he looked up at me, his face covered in shock and something that looked like... anticipation.

  Oh, he was one of those, was he? One of those guys who thrived on violence and thought he'd found his way into a fight without even looking for it?

  "What the fuck are you doing?" he snarled, his voice forced into something rough and gravelly.

  Yeah, the guy was definitely looking for a fight. Unfortunately for him, I'd remembered how to get to that cold, calculated personality I'd been working so hard to achieve.

  I bent toward him, leaning down so that my face was closer to his, and did my best to make my eyes as icy as possible. "I would have thought that was obvious," I said quietly. "I'm pinning you against the wall in the hallway where the girl you've been following can't see you. Care to tell me why the fuck you're following Sloane Brennan around like some sort of stalker?"

  He actually leered at me. "What the fuck is that to you?" he hissed. "What are you, her newest boyfriend or something?"

  I jerked him toward me and slammed him back against the wall, and then did it again for good measure, taking more than a little bit of joy in the dull thud of his head hitting the brick the second time.

  "Wrong answer," I muttered. "I'll ask again. What are you doing following Sloane Brennan?"

  He spit in my face. The little fucker actually spit in my face. "None of your fucking business," he snapped. "And the last time I checked, she was a grown woman. She doesn't need some piece of muscle trying to—"

  He was cut off by the server who suddenly stepped into the hallway and jerked to a stop, her big eyes swiveling from me to the guy I'd cornered and back again, her mouth already opening up to scream or say something cliche and dramatic.

  Shit.

  I dropped my hands and took three steps back, knowing without even having to think about it that I couldn't afford for her to make a scene. I wasn't supposed to be in this café and I damn sure wasn't supposed to be roughing a guy up in a back hall.

  Too many people had already seen my face in LA, if I was being honest. I'd had orders to lay low, and I was doing pretty much the exact opposite of that.

  "Just a small misunderstanding," I told her quickly, stepping back again so I was in the shadows. "Sorry about that."

  I slid out of the hallway, on my way to where Sloane and Brooks were standing, with one thing on my mind: Grab Sloane, warn her about the jackass in the hallway, and demand that she get someone to watch her back before she ended up getting hurt.

  Then my phone rang.

  I jerked it up and hit the button to accept the call without bothering to look at the ID. "Rossi," I snapped.

  "Where the fuck are you? Donny says you didn't show. Get your ass to that meeting or you're going to have to answer to me, Joseph."

  I clamped my mouth shut on the smart-ass answer that had sprung to my lips, knowing it would just make things even worse.

  "I got delayed," I said instead. "Something came up."

  My eyes went to Sloane, who had thrown her head back in a laugh, and let my gaze travel down her long neck to the edge of her t-shirt, which was draping down to reveal a slice of that red bikini.

  Yeah, something had come up, all right. Something that had been brewing since I was seven.

  "Get your ass to that meeting, Joseph, or you're going to have a world of trouble when you get home," my father snarled, breaking into my thoughts. "I don't have time for anything else to come up, got it? Anything else comes up again and it's going to come right out of your ass."

  "Right, I've got it," I answered, hating how easily I was giving in to him.

  Hating that I didn't have a choice.

  I dragged my eyes away from Sloane, forced myself to turn back toward the door, and started walking.

  "It won't happen again."

  From here on out, Sloane was going to have to take care of her stalker on her own. I might have risked my life for her when we were younger, but those days were long gone, and I no longer had the leeway I'd had when we were kids.

  At this point in my life, with all the responsibility hanging over me, it was my life if I fucked something up. My father would make sure of it.

  These days, saving Sloane's skin wasn't worth risking my own. No matter how much I wanted it to be otherwise.

  6

  JOSEPH

  A MEETING TO GET TO

  Of course, even the best of intentions—or the worst, as the case may be—are pretty easy to push to the side if you’ve got what you think is a good reason.

  When Brooks and Sloane stepped out of the café while I was still in the act of opening the door to my car, and were then followed by the guy with the snarl, all thoughts of actually getting to that meeting with Donny Parletti—and saving my own skin—fled.

  Sloane was laughing again, her eyes bright and sparkling and an incredible silver color, her hands wrapped around something steaming and foamy. She tipped the cup up to take a sip of it, and when she took the cup away again, some of the foam—or was it whipped cream?—stayed on her lip.

  And I was suddenly transported back to my fourteenth birthday and the cups of hot cocoa we’d shared in the back of that café. The way we’d bribed the owner to let us hang out in the stock room after hours, just so we could have some time together without the streets outside watching us.

  The way I’d threatened him with the gun I’d stolen from my father, telling him that if he ever turned us in to either of our families—or did anything to hurt Sloane—I’d be taking it out of his hide.

  I snorted now. I’d been fourteen fucking years old and hadn’t known down from up or right from wrong. I’d shot guns but I definitely hadn’t shot them at other human beings, and I had no clue what I was threatening that guy with.

  But I’d already been head-over-heels in love with Sloane Brennan and protecting her had become part of my daily life. She’d had no clue about my feelings, of course, but I would have given her my last breath if she’d asked for it.

  She’d kissed me that night, I remembered. Not a real kiss. It had been a stuttering, halting thing, a pathetic excuse for a kiss, full of childish nerves and doubt.

  But I could still remember exactly where we’d been, and exactly how it had felt. She’d tasted like chocolate and whip cream, and I’d been so caught up in the moment that I’d—

  “The rec center next,” a voice said, far too close to where I was standing.

  I dropped into my car without having any conscious thought of being on the way down and ducked toward the floor like I was searching for something, my eyes up and flitting from side to side as I looked for the source of that voice.

  God, I was fucking losing it, standing in a parking lot in LA daydreaming about the one time Sloane kissed me while the girl herself was walking around in the same parking lot and I was supposed to be somewhere else entirely.

  I’d lost my fucking mind.

  My eyes found her at that point, three cars down and looking at her phone while she talked to Brooks, who was getting into the passenger seat of the Ferrari.

  “The one in Santa Monica. It wasn’t my first choice but by the time I got around to signing up—”

  “Let me guess,” Brooks interrupted. “You were too busy doing something noble for someone else and didn’t have time to get there any sooner.”

  “Fuck you,” Sloane replied.

  I snorted with laughter, one hand over my mouth to try to keep it down.

  Same old Sloane Brennan. She’d always had the face of an angel and the mouth of a sailor—plus the education to out-talk anyone she came into contact with.

  She was also the only person I’d ever met who used profanity so naturally that it became part of her everyday conversation, even with her friends.

  Brooks knew her nearly as well as I did, though, and I could hear her fizzing with mirth as the doors closed.

  Sloane, much to my surprise, turned away from the car and became suddenly serious, her eyes narrowed and flitting across the parking lot like she was looking for someone. She must not have seen what she was looking for, though, because within three seconds she’d turned back to the car and was getting in, grinning like nothing had happened.

  Something inside me eased a bit at that look, though.

  Sloane might be living in LA these days, but evidently that hadn’t changed how much she cussed—or her habit of checking the places she’d just left, to see whether anyone was following her.

  I didn’t think she’d seen the guy I’d seen. But at least now I knew she was keeping an eye out for trouble.

  I busted through the swinging door at the front of the restaurant in Malibu, my face held carefully expressionless and my mouth tight.

  I might not be good at the icy demeanor—yet—but this expressionless mask? The appearance that nothing mattered, and that I couldn’t give one single fuck about anything?

  Yeah, this part I was good at, and I’d been thanking the universe for that every day since I figured it out. I had a hot temper and ran way too fiery at times when I should have been cold, but I’d always been able to hide it. I’d always been able to convince everyone else that I didn’t care about what was going on.

  It had saved my life more than once.

  Over the last half hour, it had helped me convince Donny Parletti and his crew that the Rossis were quite willing to work with them on their jewel importing—even buy from them—but only if the Parletti operation was willing to give us the price we were looking for.

  We wanted the valuables Parletti and his people brought in. But we also wanted a pretty significant discount. My father had sent me out here to make sure that happened, and he’d let me come because he knew I had a better mind for numbers than anyone else in his crew. I could run circles around other people when it came to on-the-spot calculations.

  And ten minutes ago, I’d used that capability—and the mask I’d worked so hard to build—to get Donny to agree to half the amount he’d originally been asking for.

  I allowed the mask to drop a bit at that, and a grin touched the corners of my lips.

  My dad hadn’t wanted to send me out here. He’d been sure I was going to screw it up, and that I’d lose the deal. It was my mom who’d convinced him to let me come out here and prove myself. My dad had given in only because he knew how good I was with calculations.

  I wasn’t completely positive, but it seemed to me that a price of $7 million for the first shipment rather than the $14 million they’d originally asked for would make dear old Dad sit up and pay attention.

  And that right there meant success. The fact that it had taken me a week less than he’d originally given me?

  That just meant I was in the city for the rest of the week on my own, with nothing further to occupy my time.

  Nothing but Sloane Brennan, that was.

  I slid back into my car, started it, and typed a name into the mapping app on the screen.

  “Santa Monica Rec Center,” I said aloud, watching the words—and the corresponding choices—appear on the screen. I touched the one I wanted and watched as the system mapped out the route I needed to get there.

  It looked like it was in the middle of Santa Monica, which told me… well, absolutely fucking nothing, honestly, as I didn’t know anything about that city. But it certainly wasn’t in a high-profile sort of place. Nowhere near the beach or anything like that.

  What the hell was Sloane doing there?

  Then another thought flew through my mind—one that had more to do with why the hell I should care what she was doing there, followed by one that reminded me that it was nowhere near my business what she was doing.

  And then one more. The face of the guy who was following her, and the familiar planes of his face.