“I could ask you the same thing.” The relief he felt vanished only to be replaced by frustration and anger with how reckless she had been. “Why the hell haven’t you been answering your phone? What were you thinking running off into the mountains like that? Alone? In your condition?”
“My condition?” she asked, taken aback. “I’m perfectly fine, Besian.”
“You just had heart surgery.”
She rolled her eyes. “It was a simple procedure!”
“They burned your heart tissue!”
“Where was all this worry,” she gestured wildly, “when I was in the hospital and you never even came to visit?”
Neatly put in his place, Besian shut his mouth. Before he could try to apologize, a man who had been hovering nearby interrupted. When the younger and much handsomer man put his hand on Marley, Besian swallowed a possessive growl that threatened to erupt from his throat.
“Are you okay?” The man shot Besian a mistrustful glance. “Is this guy hassling you?”
“Mind your own business,” Besian snarled. “We’re having a discussion that doesn’t include you.”
“Look, man, I don’t know who you are,” the Spaniard—if Besian had to guess by his accent—stepped in front of Marley, “but you don’t tell me what to do when it comes to my friend.”
“Andres,” she said, touching the other man’s chest in a way that made Besian’s stomach lurch painfully. “It’s okay. Besian is my friend from Houston.”
Andres scowled. “The strip club guy?”
Hating how cheap and dirty the other man made his businesses sound, Besian bristled. Marley shot him a pleading look, silently asking him not to make a scene. Acquiescing to her request, he said, “Tell your friend goodbye. We’re leaving.”
Not giving her a chance to argue, he stepped away to give them a few moments of privacy. He slipped his sunglasses back into place and gritted his teeth when Andres dared to kiss her cheek and then her lips. It was a chaste kiss, barely a brush of his mouth against hers, but it spoke of a relationship between them.
Gutted by the realization he had fucked around and lost her to this new man, he glared behind his sunglasses. Fuck that Spaniard. Fuck him and his pretty boy smile and hair.
Marley turned back toward him—where she belonged—and he counted the steps until she was right in front of him. With an irritated sigh, she said, “I am not going to be ordered around like one of your dancing girls.”
“You could never be one of my dancing girls.”
She frowned up at him. “What does that mean?”
“As beautiful as you are, there would be riots at the front doors every night.”
She seemed even more upset. “Is that supposed to be a compliment?” She held up her hand. “You know what? Don’t answer that!” With a loud of huff, she asked, “Why are you here?”
Knowing there was no easy way to break the news, he said, “Something happened back home.”
Her entire demeanor shifted. Panic flashed in her eyes. “Is it Aston? The baby?”
“No, no,” he stepped closer and placed his hand on her shoulder. “Aston is healthy. The baby is healthy. Ben is fine.”
She frowned. “Then...what?”
Daring to touch her the way he had wanted for so long, he slid his hand from her shoulder to her neck and up to her jaw. He stroked her cheek with his thumb, marveling at the velvet softness of her skin and hoping she would find comfort in his touch. “The MC was raided by the ATF. There was a shootout.”
She gasped, and her hand flew up, gripping his wrist. “Is Spider dead?”
“No.” He stroked her face again. “He’s on the run. He may have been shot, but no one knows for sure.”
“Oh my God!” She crumpled against his chest, and he embraced her as well as he could, her bulky backpack preventing him from pulling her in as close or as tightly as he wanted. “Oh my God!”
“I’m sorry, Marley. I’m so sorry.”
She leaned back and roughly wiped the tears from her face. “What about my mom? Is she safe?”
He shook his head. “Aston said she went by your mother’s place, and it looked abandoned. The grass is overgrown. The mail is piled up.”
Marley groaned and made a face. “She’s probably still gambling in Lake Charles, or she met some new man at the casino and ran off again.”
“Again?”
She huffed. “It’s a thing she does. She meets some guy, lets him love bomb her and then she runs off on some crazy stupid trip, convinced she’s going to finally get her happily ever after. She’ll wander home in a few weeks, broke and depressed, and I'll have to pick up the pieces and put her back together.”
Besian had always heard her mother was a bit of a tramp, but he hadn’t realized she was so desperate. “Do you want me to try to find her? I could have my men follow whatever trail she left.”
“No.” Marley stepped out of his embrace. “She’s safer wherever she’s run off to, and she’s smart enough to know not to come back to Houston if Spider has disappeared.”
“Listen, Marley, there’s something else about the raid,” he said, lowering his voice.
She frowned and then her expression shifted to one of resigned understanding. “Oh. I see.”
He was sure she did. “Yes. It’s...not good.”
She reacted with fear and gripped the straps of her backpack. “Am I safe?”
“Marley, no one will touch you. I swear it.” He didn’t have to tell her what she already knew. He would kill the first man who tried.
“Besian,” she sighed, “please, I don’t want you putting yourself in danger for me. Not again.” Her gaze moved from his face to his chest. Was she remembering the night he took a bullet meant for her? “You almost died for me. Once was enough.”
Before he could tell her that he would die for her a thousand times, they were jostled by a group of young tourists. He shifted her aside, worried she would get trampled by the loud throng of students rushing to catch the bus. The spell was broken, and she patted his chest. “Wait here.”
“Where are you going?” he asked when she walked off in another direction.
“To get my luggage!”
“From where?”
“There!” She pointed at a building nearby, and his eyes nearly popped out of his head.
“A hostel?” He chased after her. “You’re staying in a hostel?”
She whirled around so quickly she whacked him with her backpack, causing him to stumble back a few steps. “Yes, I stayed at a hostel. I’ve been staying at hostels the entire trip.”
His blood pressure skyrocketed so quickly he was certain he was seconds away from dropping dead of a stroke. When Zec had given him the bus stop address, he hadn’t even considered it was because she was staying in one of the crummy hostels nearby. “Are you out of your mind? Do you have any idea how dangerous that is for a single woman?”
“You are so ridiculous,” she hissed. “It’s perfectly safe. They’re clean, tidy, affordable places that cater to people like me on a very tight budget.”