Page 64 of It Hurts Me

“Then did you know Scarlett before he did?”

He gave a quiet sigh like he just wanted to go to sleep. “No. You want the full story or just the headlines?”

“Whole story, always.”

“Alright.” His eyes shifted away as he collected his thoughts. “Scarlett is the daughter of a drug kingpin. A psychotic one who’s thrown a fat wrench in my plans. He forbade Scarlett from seeing Axel, so naturally, Axel did whatever he could to have her. He fell hard right off the bat, but then her father tore them apart. Threatened to kill Axel’s parents if he came near his daughter again. They broke up for six months.”

“Jesus, this guy sounds like a jackass.”

“Jackass is too generous,” he said coldly. “He tried to make a deal with me and cut Axel out of the business. But he’s a fucking idiot who doesn’t know how his shit, so he was unaware of my relationship with Axel. We don’t exactly broadcast it, but if you have a business partner, you should know where he eats, sleeps, and fucks. But that worked in Axel’s favor, so we crossed him when he thought he was crossing Axel.”

“As interesting as this is, I don’t understand what it has to do with you and Scarlett.”

“You said you wanted the whole story, right?”

I nodded.

“Dante—that’s his name—asked me to marry his daughter.”

Both of my eyebrows jumped up my face. “What?”

“He thought it would be a good business move.”

“For him. But what about her? Had she even met you yet?”

“No, she hadn’t. So, I asked her out like he wanted me to, and we went on a couple dates.”

“She didn’t know you and Axel were brothers?”

“No.” He shook his head. “She was depressed and bitter. Not interested in intimacy, only sex. She made several moves to get me into bed, but I stayed on my best behavior for Axel. Even if they weren’t together anymore, he would have been devastated. Our relationship wouldn’t have been the same. Some would argue she was fair game, but I knew he loved her. So she wasn’t fair game to me.”

I listened to the story and felt an ugly burst of jealousy. “So…that means you wanted to?”

He didn’t avoid my gaze or look uncomfortable at the question. “When a woman wants to fuck, I don’t say no.”

“I mean, you wanted to, even though she used to be with Axel?”

“It’d been six months, and they’d both been with other people. Besides, she laid it on really thick.”

“You think she would have done that if she knew who you were?”

“After what Axel did to her, she probably would have tried harder.”

“What did he do to her?” I asked.

“Dante made him pretend to cheat. It was the only way Axel could get Scarlett to walk away.”

“So he basically had to break her heart irreparably?”

“Yes.”

The jealousy disappeared, and pity replaced it. “That’s horrible.”

“It all worked out in the end.” His warm arm hooked around my waist, his skin warm like a pan left on the stove. His fingers gently caressed me as he held me under the sheets, his heavy mass making the mattress dip farther in his direction.

“Does Axel know all of this?”

“She told him.”