Chapter 74

He’s right, even I know how this business uses any tiny thing to get the upper hand. It’s all about control. Damaging someone’s armour and sliding in below it to use to their full advantage.

‘’You don’t care about me, so this is all so stupid,’’ I say it meekly, meaning every word and knowing it’s true as he comes around to face me and lean back in his original place, resting a foot on the chair I am sat in and looks down at me.

‘’I don’t trust you, I don’t like you most of the time, but I care, whether I want to or not.’’ He frowns at me, no hint of the panic I feel right now in his emotionless face, and he’s infuriatingly cool about this whole thing. He gets up and wanders off again, listless or restless where normally he is as still as a statue and I wonder if this is how he displays stress. Inability to stay at peace when he is working through a dilemma and has to keep walking or moving while his brain plays it out.

‘‘You have a really funny way of showing it.’’ I snap after him, my insides turning and twisting in terror at the thought I might be in real danger, lightheaded, trembling and clammy and again he turns on me with agitation.

‘‘You think you know me? You don’t know anything about me, Cam … beyond the person you see here in this place. If I didn’t care, if I had zero shits to give about you then I would have handed you over to Sid any night of the week.’’ His bark takes me by surprise, sparking my inner flight or fight and I react with equal aplomb.

‘’I actually don’t know what stopped you; there’s a huge difference between caring and ownership, I don’t think you know the difference and you certainly don’t act like there is one.’’ I point out angrily not even sure why my anger is directed at him when it’s Santagato who is fucking up the life I am only just warming to. Alexi is an easier target and he’s here. I guess everything in some way could come down to being his fault, and I need to vent and yell at him because my head is about to explode.

‘’In this business ownership is everything, it’s the only language these people understand.’’ The only language he understands.

‘’That’s not caring. I don’t think you’re capable of really caring and you just use all of this as an excuse for being a complete controlling shithead.’’ Ironic that it’s coming from my mouth because I didn’t think I was capable either, until Alexi. Whether I want to admit it or not … the arsehole has made me care about him and I hate him for it.

How the hell can a girl with no ability to feel anything about anyone start to fall for the devil himself? I didn’t think I had an ounce of heart left inside of me to even beat anymore, and he has done nothing to warrant any feelings for him. Yet Santagato posed a real threat and all I kept thinking was—don’t hurt Alexi.

‘’Either way … one outcome, whether I care about you or just own you, it makes no difference. Santagato isn’t going to just back off. If the roles were reversed I would use any obvious weakness to get at him and throw him off his game. You pull out one brick and the tower starts to come down, I exposed a brick … He won’t let that go.’‘

‘‘This world is the reason you are such a twisted prick. If this is the norm between people who you play friends with face to face, and invite to your clubs as acquaintances, I would hate to meet one of your enemies.’’ I am completely deflated with all of this.

‘’Baby … they are all one and the same, that’s why I trust no one except blood. Out here they greet you with one hand while putting a gun to your head with the other. This is WHY I am the way I am.’’

Trusts no one, not even me. I shouldn’t care because I don’t trust him either but I have never given him anything to doubt since he walked into my life. I have enough sense to know where the lines lie, he is the first person in my life I have never lied to or played for my own ends. He is the first time in my life I have stability, security and protection, and he doesn’t demand me to give over my body to get paid. He made me stop running and gave me a taste of feeling safe and cared for, like I finally belong somewhere.

Alexi was the ‘’someone’’ who first showed me an ounce of worth by taking me under his wing and giving me shelter from a cold world in which I was endlessly trying to survive in. It’s no wonder my fucked-up brain has latched onto him as someone to feel something for.