Beast

  “Do you even know her boyfriend?” Lila asked.

  Her sister caught the exchanged glance between her and Jen, and Allison could see how quickly Lila was already losing her patience.

  “Hey, you’re—” The attendant began to say as he recognized Lila, but Lila brought her finger to her lips and pulled the hoodie over her head.

  Lila and Sonny had been all over the news lately. Even before Lila had won the title a few weeks prior, the paparazzi had begun to get a little out of control. Sonny had been famous and a household name even before she met him, but now Lila couldn’t go anywhere without being recognized.

  Thankfully, the distraction was enough that it changed the subject. “Where are you taking her?” Lila asked the attendant.

  He explained about the doctor ordering an MRI to rule out a concussion. Then he added that the X-rays would be a while because they’d be taking so many since she was so banged up. “It’s just my ribs and hand,” Allison said, annoyed that he was making it sound so bad. “Mostly my hand.”

  “And your head.” Lila made sure Allison knew she’d seen the lump on her head, damn it.

  Allison gave Jen one last pleading look so her friend would be strong and not cave under questioning, but she wasn’t too hopeful. They wheeled her out, and after what felt like an eternity of X-rays and the MRI, she was wheeled back into the emergency room where Lila was now gone and an anxious Jen stood waiting. “She made me tell her,” Jen said.

  Allison’s stomach immediately took a dive. “Tell her what?”

  “I was able to bluff about not remembering Leo’s name and kept that vague enough, but the moment I mentioned Marcelo knowing who Eva was, she made me call him. Stupid Marcelo told her he might be able to find out how to track Eva down. She asked for my keys so she could get past any paparazzi out by the car that brought her here; then she bolted.”

  “Oh my God!”

  This was a nightmare. Her sister was going to get herself arrested at the height of her career all because of Allison.

  “But Sonny called me. He’s on his way. He’ll calm her, right?”

  Like an angel opening the heavens, Lila’s boyfriend walked into the ER, turning every head in the room, but he charged through the room on a mission. “You have to find her, Sonny,” Allison begged.

  “I will, but first I need to know more.”

  Allison explained as much as she had to Lila. Remembering she’d never referred to Leo by his first name to either Lila or Sonny, she explained about the only Leo she even knew: someone she’d interviewed a while back. She mentioned she was occasionally in touch with him but left out what story she interviewed him for. Also, she made sure to mention there’d never been anything remotely romantic between them. “He said he didn’t have time for a social life,” Allison said, rolling her eyes. “He called women poison.”

  “Well, if this is someone he’s been involved with,” Sonny said, pulling out his phone with a frown, “then I can see why he’d think that.”

  “Oh, that reminds me . . .” Allison pulled out her own phone now.

  She told Sonny about having texted Leo earlier but hadn’t checked to see if he’d responded. Scrolling through her texts, she smiled when she saw he’d responded. When he’d gone back to being his broody tightlipped self, he’d also reverted to rarely responding to any of her texts. Not that she texted him much anymore. She hadn’t in a while, so she knew this text would catch his attention.

  Smiling smugly and feeling almost sneaky, she reread the text she’d sent him first.

  Curious. You ever go out with an Eva? She your girlfriend?

  She didn’t think he’d be able to resist his own curiosity as to why she’d ask something like this so out of the blue. Then her heart thudded, her eyes glued to her text still, because she was suddenly almost afraid to read his response. What if this really was his girlfriend and he knew about the fight now? Maybe he felt obligated to respond to apologize or something.

  Glancing a little lower, she held her breath and read his text.

  Nope. Never known an Eva. Never done the girlfriend thing. Poison. Remember?

  Despite being surprised by the utter relief, she frowned, looking up at Sonny and relaying the response, even the part about women being poison.

  “Then who the hell is this Eva chick? You think maybe she mistook you for—”

  “She’s Scar’s girl,” Jenny said, looking down at her own phone. “Marcelo just confirmed it with one of his friends.”

  “Scar’s girl?” Sonny asked.

  “So, this was retaliation?” Ali’s mouth dropped open. “He must really think I had something to do with him getting busted.”

  Sonny didn’t seem convinced, but he was worried because Jen said Marcelo was with Lila now and had told her about Eva being Scar’s chick. She was likely thinking the very thing Allison was—that this had been retaliation—and now Lila would likely be looking for some of her own—on Eva.

  Jen relayed everything else Marcelo was telling her via text. How he was stalling by taking his time gassing up the car and putting air in the tires.

  Good, ’cause something’s not right here,” Sonny said with a frown. “This doesn’t make sense.”

  “It makes perfect sense,” Ali insisted because it did. “Scar sent his girlfriend or maybe he didn’t even have to. Maybe she was just waiting to get her hands on me.”

  “If that’s the case, why the lie?” Sonny peered at her. “Why not just say that’s what this was? Retaliation?”

  They discussed further as Allison pondered that last question, but it could stand to reason and could be as simple as maybe Scar’s real name was Leo. She was about to make the argument when Sonny hit her with another good question.

  “Why would they just come after you? Why not go after Jenny too? She’s the one they saw taking the pictures, right?”

  Before Allison could even think on that, he turned back to Jenny, who was busy tapping away at her phone screen. “Who’s your brother getting all this info from?”

  She glanced up from her phone and shrugged. “He has lots of friends on the street.” She frowned before looking back down at her phone again, further explaining about all his illegal connections.

  She stopped talking and read something on her phone screen again then looked up at Sonny, eyes wide. “He says he knows exactly where Eva is at right now, where they can find her hanging out, but he hasn’t told Lila.”

  “Tell him not to,” Sonny said, tapping at his phone and bringing it to his ear then cursed and hung up when clearly whoever he was calling—likely Lila—didn’t answer.

  Before they could exchange anything more, he started to walk out, stopping just outside the curtain. “Text me Marcelo’s number and tell him to do whatever he has to do to keep Lila put.”

  As bad as this had the potential to get, Allison felt almost guilty about feeling so relieved. She may have been sitting on pins and needles until she heard back from Sonny or Lila and she knew her sister wasn’t sitting in some jail cell arrested for murder, but she at least had this peace of mind. This had nothing to do with Leo.

  Fourteen

  BEAST

  It’d been over a week since Allison’s too noticeable absence around the gym that Leo paid enough attention to the ongoing tabloid gossip to get a clue. Maybe if he’d paid closer attention, he might’ve reached out to her sooner to ask how she was doing.

  Ever since he got the text over a week ago, he’d wondered if maybe that was why her texts and times she approached him had gone dry. Maybe she didn’t believe he hadn’t heard about the ongoing gossip about her sister that started around the same time he’d gotten that cryptic text from Allison. Now it seemed all the crap he’d been trying desperately to avoid hearing about on the news and everywhere online may have had something to do with Allison as well.

  It was beyond irritating that, of course, the girl he was trying so hard to not think about would have a sister who was a tabloid magnet. As if tryin
g to keep Allison out of his every thought wasn’t hard enough. Even before all the crap in the news started, she’d been distant. Aside from a smile from across the gym or a weak little wave, she’d hardly addressed him before she all but stopped showing up. But even then, those few and far between greetings he ever got from her were like goddamn crumbs he’d eat up like a starved man then try desperately not to follow up on them. So, her not showing up for her workouts this past week felt almost like a punishment.

  He was done for the day and getting ready to walk out of the gym when he stopped and did a double take at one of the TV screens up on the wall. It was footage of Allison getting out of a car. Her hand was in a brace, and she covered her face with her purse as she rushed into a building surrounded by body guards. The sound was off, but he read the caption:

  First public sighting since the attack

  “Attack?”

  Instantly, Leo’s blood began to simmer. The camera was back to the reporter in the studio, who had more to say as the still photo of Allison remained in the background, but he couldn’t hear anything. Then they moved onto another story.

  “What the fuck?”

  His mind raced as the familiar sensation of his blood thrumming at his ears began. Could this possibly be what he’d feared most all this time? Who the hell would want to attack her? Pulling out his phone from his pocket, he scrolled through his texts until he got to the last one between them, the cryptic one where she asked about an Eva. He hit the call button because there was no way he was waiting for her to respond to a text.

  It rang several times before it went to voicemail. With a near growl, he stopped to tap furiously at his phone’s screen, sending the text saying he needed to talk to her ASAP. Pacing by his motorcycle and taking deep breaths, he refused to get on in case she called while he was driving. He kept checking his phone for anything, even a text response.

  After waiting impatiently for several minutes with no response, he hit call again and waited. To his surprise, she answered, “Hey, I was trying to text you back, but I’m a little handicapped right now and—”

  “What happened? Who attacked you?”

  She was quiet for a moment as he cracked his knuckles with the fingers on his free hand. “A girl . . .” Her tone was a strange one, and she paused momentarily. “You didn’t know about it? It happened last week. It’s been all over the news. Hold on. Thank you, Gio. Yeah, I’m out of here.”

  Leo’s head was still obsessing about her initial two-word answer—a girl—when he heard that last part and spun around. “Are you here at the gym?”

  “Yes, I’m just leaving actually.”

  He searched the exit and parking lot frantically as he started back to the front door. “Where are you? I need to talk to you.”

  His heart pounded just from the thought that he’d be seeing her again, and here it’d only been a little over a week since he’d last seen her.

  “I’ve been using the VIP entrance in the back to avoid the paparazzi.”

  “VIP entrance?” he asked, slowing down, then stopped and started toward the back of the gym in an almost sprint. “Wait for me, please. I’ll be there in a sec.”

  He didn’t even know they had a VIP entrance, but he supposed it made sense with all the celebrity athletes that visited the gym. As he turned the corner, his heart began to calm a bit and thudded now at the sight of her standing near a town car, facing the other way. But she looked like she was looking for someone—looking for him.

  “Allison,” he called out, and just like that, the sight of her had him nearly smiling again until she turned to face him.

  Feeling the air sucked out of him, he nearly choked at the sight. The attack was more than what he’d begun to imagine. Her face looked like she’d been beaten. The bruises appeared to be fading, but Leo was no stranger to healing bruises. It’d been over a week, and they were still significant. Suddenly, the inferno inside him was blazing again.

  The closer he got, the more he thought he might lose his shit. The moment he was close enough, he searched her eyes, taking in all the damage. “Who the fuck did this to you?”

  She shook her head, her brows furrowing as if she didn’t understand his anger, but then, how could she? “I told you some girl on campus.”

  “Why?” he demanded, bringing his fist to his mouth because he could hardly stand it. The longer he stood there looking at her, the closer he felt to blowing up.

  This close he could see the scratches and just how bruised she really was. Girl or not, he felt ready to fucking kill someone because his gut was screaming there was more to this than just some cat fight. More than anything, seeing sweet Allison like this was something he’d never anticipated.

  She started to tell him about the girl who’d approached her in the school parking lot, saying something about her boyfriend.

  “Ms. Allison.” The driver apologized for interrupting them but then reminded her about a plane she had to catch.

  “I’ll have to tell you the rest later. Or Google it. It’s everywhere.”

  “No wait,” he said, feeling every hair in his body stand at attention when she turned to the driver and he saw the bruised bump on her delicate temple.

  “I gotta go.”

  “Fuck!”

  She jerked her head back in response to his outburst. Seeing the shock on her face had Leo spinning around, and he stalked off, not stopping even when she called out for him. He had to. He needed to get away from her before he blew.

  The whole way he raced home on his bike he cussed under his breath and banged at his handlebars in a fiery rage. He knew it was irrational to think this might have anything to do with him, but instinct told him it had everything to do with him. Something told him sweet little Allison’s attack wasn’t just some random thing as she seemed to think.

  By the time he got off his bike in his garage, he felt out of control. He’d always known his demons had only been dormant. That they’d be ready to blow the moment they were triggered and this was proof.

  Pacing furiously back and forth, it was all he could do to keep from roaring at the top of his lungs. “Motherfucker!” He lifted a box of tools and smashed it against the wall.

  Tool after tool, box after box that crashed loudly where he smashed them only fueled the firestorm inside him, not relieved it like he hoped it might. Visuals of Allison’s sweet face all bruised and scratched as she held her hand to her side cautiously only assaulted him, making him growl louder and smash things with even more fury.

  He didn’t even notice Nine and O in the garage, yelling for him to calm down until O jumped in front of him. “What the fuck, man?”

  Leo flung the wrench in his hand at the window in the back of the garage with one final growl, not even flinching at the loud crashing sound. Nine and O stared at him wide-eyed, but neither said anything as he stood there, breathing hard and trying desperately to calm himself.

  They hadn’t seen him like this in years but knew better than to ask for any explanations. Not at that moment anyway. Leo glanced around the trashed garage, surprised by the amount of damage he’d done in what felt like such a short time.

  No one said anything for too long, but Nine began walking around assessing the damage. With his breathing still labored, Leo somehow managed to speak calmly. “I’ll clean this shit up after I shower.” Before O could say anything, he added, “I’ll pay to have the window fixed. But I’ll board it up in the meantime.”

  Without another word, he stalked out of there, leaving his stunned roommates standing there, speechless. There was no time to explain now. His mind was already racing with how to fix this because more than anything his gut was sure now. Allison had been attacked because of him. He didn’t know why, but he’d be getting to the bottom of it. Probation or not, Leo had to make sure this didn’t turn into another nightmare.

  Fifteen

  Allison

  “Yeah, that works,” Allison said as she walked out of the ladies’ locker room. “It sound
s like fun, actually. I’ve heard good things about that restaurant. Friday night, right?”

  She walked out so absentmindedly she nearly collided with someone. It wasn’t until she looked up and saw who that someone was that she was reminded how effortlessly Leonardo’s intense eyes could turn her into a puddle.

  “Ali? You still there?”

  Carson’s voice snapped her out of the instant trance getting lost in Leonardo’s eyes had sucked her into. She shook her head. “Yes, I’m sorry, Carson. I am, but listen. I’m on my way out now from the gym, but I need to do a few things before I leave. I’ll call you back when I’m in the car.”

  To her surprise, Leonardo hadn’t budged. Instead, he appeared to be waiting for her to be free to talk. She finished up with Carson then peered at him curiously, feeling a bit breathless, and it annoyed her. Leonardo had made it abundantly clear how not interested he was in so much as a friendship with her. Then he’d stormed off so rudely the night he’d questioned her about her attack. He didn’t deserve to have this big an effect on her still. She was over the silly crush she’d developed on him—moved on.

  “You have a minute?” he asked, glancing around as if already looking for a place to discuss whatever was on his mind.

  For a millisecond, she considered saying no, but who was she kidding? Already her stupid heart was thundering away, and she was more than curious about what he might need to talk to her about.

  “Yeah.” She shrugged, moving aside from the middle of the path on the way to the door outside.

  He started to say something but then stopped and glanced around again. “Is it okay if we talk outside?”

  Now she was really curious. Thankfully, he seemed much calmer this time. His anger last time had confused the hell out of her; though she thought she might know the reason. But even that didn’t make much sense. Starting to walk was enough answer to his question, but she turned to him as they strolled to the door together. “Something wrong?”