Free Kane's Ransom: A BWWM Mafia Romance Novel by Samantha Westlake Page B

but the teachers suck, the boys flirt with you, and you figure, what's the point? No one else leaves, they all stay around. You might as well grab one of the good men before he gets taken up by some other slut."
    She paused for a moment, remembering. Killian didn't interrupt, kept his eyes forward, but she could tell that he was listening.
    "And then you sleep with the man, because you need to keep him around, and because he buys you things, gives you things, when you do," she went on, the tears once again back at the corners of her eyes, clinging to her eyelashes, as she remembered. "But before you know it, you're pregnant, and he's gone, from the gangs, or just because he got bored and another girl thought that she could hold onto him. And then you're trapped - no job, no money, no man, and a baby that you don't know shit about caring for." She took a breath, blowing it out in small sobs. "Just another generation, still stuck in that same ghetto."
    She couldn't see through the haze of tears, but she felt something soft and warm touch her hand. Blinking, she looked down - and saw that Killian had reached over to hold her hand.
    "But you got out," he said, his voice soft but strong. "You made it."
    "I wouldn't have, not without Marcus," she replied, turning to stare out the Maserati's window.
    Alicia closed her mouth, not trusting herself to speak any more - but she kept on holding Killian's hand, wrapping her smaller brown fingers around his big, white, comforting ones.
     

Chapter eleven

    An hour and a half later, they were in the city itself, surrounded by skyscrapers that towered up, so high that Alicia felt dizzy when she tried to tilt her head back and look up at their tops.
    "We should go check out your brother's apartment," Killian said. "Do you know where he lives? Can you get us there?"
    He waited for a beat as Alicia dragged her gaze away from the window and her thoughts back to the present. He really was putting her through the ringer, Killian couldn't help thinking to himself with a pang of guilt. She was a nice girl, a young woman. She shouldn't have to be dealing with the stress of all of this at once.
    He also felt a little guilty for taking her hand earlier, as she'd recounted some of her past to him. Sure, he meant it as a comforting gesture, nothing more - certainly nothing sleazy or implying anything between them. But still, he wondered if she might be reading his signals the wrong way.
    That thought was made more difficult by the fact that he wasn't quite sure what signals he actually wanted to send.
    At least this most recent question seemed to help wake Alicia out of her funk. She paused for a moment, looking around at the buildings and streets.
    "Yes, I remember how to get there," she replied. "It's actually not that far away." She smiled humorlessly. "Always made me feel a little strange, how close all the million dollar skyscrapers and apartments stood to the ghetto, where people didn't have anything more than a couple of nickels to rub together."
    Killian considered this, but decided not to comment. Instead, he simply followed her instructions as she guided him, turning off of the highway and down several side streets.
    "Is this car going to be a problem?" he suddenly asked, only now considering the downside to bringing a Maserati worth six figures into a very lower-class neighborhood.
    Alicia considered the question, and then shook her head. "Actually, you kind of lucked out," she remarked with another little smile. "If this was a nice Toyota or something, it would be jacked by the second we turn our backs on it. But a car this nice, well, it screams out that there's someone really powerful who owns it. No one's going to touch it, since they'll all be afraid of what they'll bring down on their own heads."
    "Too nice to get stolen," Killian echoed, and the thought made him smile a little.
    They were definitely reaching the less affluent part of town. The skyscrapers of gleaming steel and glass