Mine to Crave (Mine #4)(33)

He eased away. Just enough to stare down at her in the darkness. “You think that if you leave, he won’t come after me? That he’ll focus just on you?”

No, she thought he’d still go after Drake, but she had a plan.

“I should’ve kept that bounty hunter,” Drake said, the words low and hard. “Made him talk.”

She shivered.

Drake shook his head. “Wait. What the hell am I doing? I know better. We can’t just stay out here.” And he was back to pulling her down the street. Or rather, he pulled her back to Canal Street and she was sure grateful to see the bright lights and cars again. Drake opened the door of a Porsche for her, one that had been parked near the edge of the street.

Another Porsche?

Before she could question the man’s choice of cars, he was driving away with her.

And she just let him do it.

The city passed in a blur and she pounded her head against the seat rest.

She felt his eyes sweep over her. “Want to tell me what that’s about?”

That? Her head-pounding routine? “I shouldn’t be trusting you.”

“Why?”

That point should be obvious. “Because you’ll hurt me again.”

They stopped at a red light. Jasmine looked toward Drake, and she saw his fingers tighten around the steering wheel.

“You get to me,” she confessed. That was the whole reason she was in the car with him right then and not running like mad down the streets of New Orleans. “You make me feel…feel in ways I haven’t before.”

His head turned. He held her gaze.

“You were looking for me.” It hadn’t just been a walk on the wild side of Bourbon Street.

Drake nodded.

“Why?” So much depended on what he had to say. Her fingers curved around the handle of the door. She could jump out. Flee fast right then and get on the trolley.

“Because I need you.”

Jasmine’s breath left her in a rush.

A car horn sounded behind them.

“Don’t take me back to your house in the Quarter. He’ll just have eyes there.” Maxwell would have eyes everywhere.

“Don’t worry, princess,” Drake said as he drove them forward. “From here on out, I’ve got you.”

***

“She’s here,” Wayne said into his phone as he hurried down the New Orleans’ street. “But Archer is still sticking to her like glue—”

“And you didn’t think to pull her away from him?”

Wayne glanced to the left. To the right. The street looked deserted. “The bastard is tough. I’m just biding my time until I can attack.”

“No, you’re being a coward. And your services—they’re rather disappointing.”

Lights flashed on then. Bright and blinding. Lights from a car that shouldn’t have been so close.

If I’m watching Jasmine…who does he have on me? That thought rushed through his mind once more. Too late, this time.

“No…” Wayne whispered.

“Disappointing and no longer needed. And…by the way…”

The car was accelerating toward him. Wayne tried to run.

He had to make it across the street. Maybe he could break down the door of that old voodoo shop and— The car didn’t hit him.

Bullets did.

And then Wayne hit the pavement.





Chapter Seven


When she walked through the casino, she could hear the slot machines, playing like music. No, playing over the music that filled the Masquerade. She spun around, her gaze caught by the glitter and glamour all around her. The casino was decorated in Mardi Gras style, with purple, gold, and green colors featured prominently. Large masks hung on the walls, masks that seemed to watch the casino-goers with glee.

The place was gorgeous. Phenomenal.

Then Jasmine looked up—up at the chandeliers that shone like diamonds above her. Amazing.

Drake’s arm wrapped around her waist. “Do you like it?”

She thought about the home she’d had as a kid. The old trailer on the rough patch of land that no one else wanted. “It’s…a little excessive.”

He laughed lightly. “It was the trees in the lobby, right?”

She didn’t even know how those trees—real trees—were alive out in the lobby.

“When you come from nothing,” Drake said as he guided her toward a private elevator. “Sometimes you want everything.” He swiped a keycard over the security control panel, and the elevator’s doors slid open.

The mirrored walls of the elevator tossed Jasmine’s reflection right back at her.

“What do you want?” Drake asked her.

The elevator was rising. He was close to her. So very close. Drake seemed to fill that small space.

She had decided to be as honest with him as she could be. Because Drake mattered and, most shocking of all, he seemed to be saying that she mattered to him, too.

I need you.

“I want to belong.” To some place. To somebody. She wanted a home. A real one. When the holidays came around, she wanted to bake cookies and stare up at a Christmas tree and be held in the arms of a man who loved her.

She didn’t want to be alone forever.

“You can belong to me.”