“I’d prefer if you stayed away. I don’t want you near me when they try again.”
“When? Notif?”
“It’s always awhen.”
“I need you to stay alive. There are things I need to tell you in person. Things I haven’t said yet, Emilio, and I need you to know.”
“I already know,” I assure her. “I don’t need you to say the words, Frankie. I know.”
“Good.”
“My dad and brothers are on their way.”
“Don’t make me wait long, Emilio. I got used to being near you.”
“I like you being near me too, babe. Just don’t go anywhere.”
“Okay.” Frankie cuts the call before I can say anything else.
I head up to my room. I need to shower. I have a feeling the next few days are going to be fucking busy.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Itried. I really did try to just stay home. But when I overheard my dad was going to meet my uncles at the Lopez compound, I made him bring me. He wasn’t impressed,especially when I threatened to walk out the door alone and take myself. Which he knew I would follow through on.
Besides, Emilio said it himself. Nowhere is safer than their house. They have so much security surrounding that place. It always made me laugh how paranoid my Tío E was. Now, I’m grateful Emilio has so much security with him. I saw the report on the news. Someone had filmed a helicopter fly up, stop at the level of the building Emilio and I live on, and open fire. It only lasted a minute before the helicopter started falling. The camera panned to people running on the street.
“Stay with your sister,” my dad tells Alfie as we step out of the car. I turn and glare at him.
“I don’t need a babysitter, and I don’t need a chaperone.” I storm off towards the front door. The guard greets me with a smile before opening it for me. “Thank you,” I say as I pass him, because I might be shitty at my dad’s attitude, but it’s not this guy’s fault.
“Frankie, princesa. How are you?” Tío E is waiting in the foyer, probably for my dad and my other uncles.
“I’m okay. Where is he?” I ask.
“Back there, living room.” Tío E nods his head towards the hall that leads to one of the more casual living rooms in this palace of a house.
“Thanks.” My steps are quick, my heart beat even quicker. I’m nervous, mostly because I know he’s going to be pissed that I’m here when he told me to stay put. He’ll have to get over it.
The moment I walk into the living room, four pairs of dark eyes land on me, but it’s only the one pair that I care about seeing right now. I don’t think. I run and jump at him. Thankful he has quick reflexes and catches me. My lips fuse with his as my legs wrap around his waist.
“Yeah, that’s not ever going to be not fucking weird,” Ezekiel says.
“Kissing cousins isn’t supposed to be not weird,” Esterio says in Spanish and laughs.
Ignoring them all, I focus on Emilio. His touch, his kiss, his smell—that citrus scent that I can’t seem to get enough of. Leaning against his ear, I whisper, “Te amo.”
I feel his breath catch, and then he’s kissing me again.
“Fucking hell, really?” My brother’s voice is like a bucket of cold water splashed over me. I untangle myself from Emilio, but he doesn’t let go of me, keeping his hand flat on my lower back.
“What are you doing here? I told you to stay home.”
“And I told you, you aren’t the boss of me, Emilio,” I snap back. “Besides, this place is the safest house in town—you said so yourself.”
Emilio looks past me to Alfie. “You couldn’t keep her home?”
Alfie shrugs. “She threatened our father.”