Craft II (The Craft Saga)

39 - Two For Two

I had no idea what to feel as I stared back at Roman but it was a cocktail of emotions. I was thankful that he had saved my life yet I was terrified that it was only so he could take it away himself.

My mouth opened to speak, but I closed it again. I had no words. My world was falling apart; I had just found out the man I had spent months living with and falling for was out to kill me the whole time and my brother had organised the whole thing. Where did Roman fall into this? He had just killed Ollie - no, Thatcher, to save me but what did it all mean? Was he here to take me back to be his prisoner? If so, I wasn't going without a fight, even if he had saved my life.

After waiting for me to say something and realising that I wasn't about to, Roman sniffed out his amusement and shook his head at me. 'How do you still manage to look so beautiful after being on the run with a hitman who almost just killed you?'

'How do you know he's a hitman?' I asked, but it was more of a demand. The words had flown out of my mouth before my brain could even decide whether to say them.

He smiled softly with one corner of his mouth and I had a feeling it was because I was finally speaking to him. 'I've known for a while. Junior was the one who figured it out and by then, Ollie, or should I say Thatcher, had stopped showing up to work for us. We asked around, realised he wasn't actually Ollie Lagdon and discovered the truth - he had saved you from us to kill you. That's when everything changed...'

I waited for him to elaborate, but he just continued to stare at me. 'Well? What changed?'

He bit the inside of his cheek, raising his brows at my tone but he refrained from reacting to my impatience. 'It was no longer about dragging you back to Newton as a prisoner. I had all my men looking for you to get you away from that fucker.'

'But to what end?' I questioned. 'Save me from him and still throw me back behind bars for betraying you?'

I saw the wince at my words. It was slight and it was barely noticeable, but it was there. What I had done was still a wound within him that hadn't fully healed, but it appeared that Roman may still care about me enough to be done with punishing me over it.

'No,' he replied. 'I think you learned your lesson, don't you?'

I narrowed my eyes at him. 'What you did to me was inhumane.'

'And what you did to me was treachery,' he fumed, taking a step towards me. 'Does that make us even, Cece?'

Maybe it did make us even, but I still did not trust Roman Cabrera one little bit, even if he did still make my heart pound a thousand beats a minute.

'What do you want from me?' I asked him. As much as I wanted to believe that we were really even, I could not leave this cliff top with Roman. I couldn't trust him completely and it was obvious that he wasn't totally over what I had done. I needed to flee here alone, but how I was going to do that was proving to be difficult. He was blocking my only way out of here and I had no vehicle or money or anything besides the clothes on my back.

'I don't want anything from you,' he answered, and his words surprised me. I was sure there was going to be a catch to saving my life. 'I came here to put an end to this bullshit and to tell you to stop running. I am no longer hunting you down.'

'So, what? I'm free?' I asked, and the mere thought of it made my chest bloom with warmth. I hadn't known freedom all that much in my life, not at least until I had left home to live with the Cabreras, and even that had been short-lived.

'Yes, free from me at least,' he said, knowingly, his eyes flickering over to Thatcher's dead body. 'Now tell me, who hired him?'

'You don't know?' I queried, frowning softly.