Page 113 of Filthy Promises
“Don’t talk.” He places the compress on my forehead. “Just sleep.”
I catch his wrist as he starts to rise. “Stay? Just for a minute?”
I expect him to refuse. To cite work or meetings or any of the thousand things more important than watching me sleep.
Instead, he settles beside me, his back against the headboard. “Just until you fall asleep.”
I curl onto my side. My head comes to rest against his thigh. His hand hesitates, then settles on my hair, stroking gently.
“My mother used to do this,” he murmurs softly, after what feels like a long silence. “When I was sick as a child. Before everything changed.”
My eyes flutter open, surprised by this rare glimpse into his past. “What changed?”
He’s quiet for so long I think he won’t answer. When he does, his voice is distant, as if speaking from another time, another place.
“I was ten when my father first took me to a Bratva meeting. I thought it was just business. Men in suits talking numbers.” His fingers continue their gentle movement through my hair. “Then they brought in a man who had stolen from my father. Made me watch what happened to him.”
I swallow painfully. “What did they do?”
“Nothing you need to hear about.” His voice hardens briefly, then softens again. “My mother found out. She tried to take me away. To America, away from the Bratva. Away from my father’s world.”
“What happened?”
“My father caught us at the airport.” His hand stills in my hair. “He gave my mother a choice. Stay and accept our life, or leave without me.”
The implications hit me through my fever-haze. “She chose to stay.”
“For me,” he confirms. “She gave up her freedom for me. And I’ve been paying for that sacrifice ever since.”
“By becoming what your father wanted.”
He laughs bitterly. “Not just what he wanted. What heneeded. His heir. His perfect soldier. The son who would never question, never resist, never fail.”
“But you do question,” I whisper, fighting to stay awake despite the medicine pulling me under. “You resist in your own way.”
His hand resumes its stroking. “Not enough. Never enough.”
“Is that why you’re going through with the arranged marriage? For her?”
“Among other reasons.” Something in his voice shifts, closes off. “But that’s enough family history for one day. Sleep now.”
I want to ask more. Why stay in a life he resents?
But the pills are working, dragging me down into darkness. The last thing I’m aware of is Vince’s hand in my hair and the strange, tender quality of his voice as he says, “I’ll be here when you wake up.”
I believe him.
And that’s the most dangerous thing of all.
I drift in and out of consciousness as the fever burns through me.
Each time I surface, Vince is there—offering water, adjusting blankets, checking my temperature with a gentleness I didn’t know he possessed.
“You don’t have to stay,” I mumble during one lucid moment. “I’m sure you have better things to do than play nurse.”
His mouth slants. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. Running your empire. Intimidating business rivals. Counting your money Scrooge McDuck style.”
