VIOLA
Back at the main campus, Dante is indeed waiting for me in the medical bay. He cocks a brow but doesn’t say a word as I hop onto the exam bed like I have been doing every day since we got here.
“I want you in the gym tomorrow,” he says, like we’re back in training and he has the right to order me about.
“My wrist hasn’t healed.”
“Then you’ll work the rest of your body until it has,” he says, checking the splint is still applied correctly.
“When did you become a doctor again?” I say flippantly.
He raises a brow and carries on checking me over. My lip has all but healed and the cut on my thigh has crusted over nicely. I was lucky. So was Dante. His gunshot wound turned out to be a bullet that went straight through and did minimal damage. He didn’t need too many stitches.
Dante has medical training, that’s obvious. I made a joke. But he’s patched me up professionally one too many times too for it to be a fluke. And watching Dante fish bullets out of his own body, as well as sew himself back up, tells me once again I know hardly anything about him. We grew up together, but there was a period of his life when he left, and I have no idea what he did in that time.
I don’t blame him for leaving. Although, it was after he left that everything went to shit. My mother got worse. Adrien brought me to his parties and made me do things I still have nightmares about today. I want to blame Dante for leaving me. But if anyone should be blamed, it’s Adrien. He gave me to Kristian, just like he gave me to all those other men.
Lorcan and Quinn are wrong. Dante has always protected me, and in the best way possible—by teaching me to protect myself.
“Okay, tell me what’s on your mind before you draw blood,” he asks, curtailing my trip through memory lane.
I look down to see my nails digging into Dante’s forearm. He raises both brows at me but doesn’t move his arm until I let him go.
“Why the hell are we waiting here?” I ask. After what Lorcan said, I need to know.
Dante walks over to the counter and picks up a black book with Chinese symbols on it. He tosses it onto my lap. “Here, read this.”
“Really? You want me to read a book?”
“Honestly, you don’t read enough.”
I slit my eyes at him, then exhale as I pick up the damned book. “The Art of War,” I read out loud.
“Chapter five,” Dante says with a nod.
I flip to chapter five, humoring him. “Tactical Dispositions.” I roll my eyes. This isn’t some military attack we’re planning.
“Just fucking read it and stop whining,” he says, a slight twitch to his lips.
Trust Dante to make this into a fucking learning experience. I take the book and get off the bed.
“V,” Dante says softly as I start to walk out of the room.
I turn around and suddenly he’s there, seizing me by the neck and pulling me to him. I throw the book at him, expecting an attack, but all he does is kiss me.
His mouth is soft, but his kiss is hard and unyielding. He pushes me up against the wall and devours me against it until I’m no longer capable of breathing.
I’m kissing Dante.
My mind can’t comprehend it, but I don’t push him away. My body reacts, wrapping itself around him as he traps me between him and the cool white tiles. He smells like he always has….
Of fire and gasoline. Of death and darkness.
The lamp on the desk next to us falls with a clatter as we move on to it.
As his hands, calloused and rough, glide under my running top to grab my breasts, thumbs teasing over my nipples. I bite down on his tongue as it plunges inside me and swirls all the non-existent emotions up so they come roaring to the surface.
Breathing hard, he pulls back slightly, eyes dark. “I’m not one of your schoolboys,” he says.