Redemption - Garrett Leigh Page 0,61
that fact that you’re weak as fuck, I’m still terrified you’ll hurt the man I love. “I need money. How much you giving me for this transport shit?”
“Nothing. You’ll get your cut when it’s sold.”
“I can’t wait that long.” Luis could wait a hundred years for dirty drug money, but if he couldn’t convince Dante it was all he cared about, the game was up. “I got sacked, remember? No back pay, and I need to make rent now he’s not paying it for me.”
“You can live here.”
“No.”
“Why not? I need you close if you’re going to be my wingman again.”
“I was never your wingman. I was just an idiot who did as he was told.”
“And now?”
“Now I’m an idiot who needs to pay rent, so give me some fucking money.”
Dante kept his gaze locked with Luis’s as he slid his hand into his pocket. He came up with a thick roll of notes that made Luis’s heart leap and sink at the same time. A fraction of that sum would’ve set him for a year, but the knowledge of where it had come from made him want to die. He didn’t want Dante’s money any more than he wanted his love.
“How much do you need?” Dante asked.
Unable to speak, Luis shrugged. Dante peeled off an amount that was more than Luis would need for the next three months. He held it out. “This do you?”
Luis took the money and shoved it in his pocket. “It’ll do. Now move.”
Dante stayed put. “I’m not moving till you give me some honesty about that dude you’ve been tapping. Is he something I still got to worry about?”
“I already told you it’s done. Why are you so obsessed with him? You wanna bang him too?”
“Would you care if I did?”
Rage blazed through Luis, sharp and true, and he fought to swallow it down. Dante was as straight as he’d once thought Asa to be, but he’d fuck anyone to get what he wanted. Shame he didn’t seem to know Paolo would set himself on fire before he let Dante into his bed. Luis too, for that matter, considering their last encounter had seen Luis’s fist break a wall that didn’t belong to him.
Shame replaced the fury bubbling in his chest. He hadn’t frightened Paolo—fuck no—but he’d hurt him and tainted every moment they’d ever spent together by regressing to the stupid boy who’d followed Dante all the way to a fucking prison cell. And now here they were, about to go back in time and do it all over again.
Genius. If it hadn’t been so tragic, Luis might’ve laughed. But there was nothing funny about the leer twisting Dante’s face. It shot arrows through Luis’s armour, shattering his tenuous grip on his self-control. Anger rose again. He gripped Dante’s shirt and hurled him away from the door, far harder than he’d shoved Paolo more than a week ago, but nowhere near hard enough.
Dante stumbled, shoulder colliding with the wall. He slid to the floor, amusement and pain fighting for dominance on his smug face. “So you would care? Funny that, when you’re saying he’s sacked you off and kicked you out of his bed. Maybe I can’t trust you after all.”
“I never said you could trust me,” Luis ground out. “Get Asa to put a bullet in my head for all I care. I don’t give a fuck anymore.”
Leaving Dante on the floor, he wrenched the door open. Asa stood on the other side, face a study in apathy, but Luis remembered taking him apart well enough to see the signs that he’d heard every word. The creases beneath his ocean-blue eyes, the tick in his strong jaw. Luis had liked him once, cared about him even. But now he knew he was no better than Dante; the sight of him fed the beast Dante had awakened.
Luis barrelled into him, crowding him against the balcony railing. “What do you want, Asa? You want to bend over for me, or my brother?”
Asa easily had two stone on Luis, but he didn’t fight Luis’s hold on him. His gaze darted to the end of the corridor. “You need to get out of here, man. If Martell comes back, he’ll cut you up, no questions asked.”
“I’m not that lucky. My brother doesn’t want me dead. It would spoil his fun . . . you know, the kind of fun that has him send cash-hungry motherfuckers to my bed?”
Asa swallowed thickly. “It wasn’t just about that. But