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I pushed the door open.
Shirtless, he stood in front of the mirror. His well-built back rippled with muscle as he washed his battered face. I inhaled sharply as he turned. His jaw was clenched, his eyes hard.
I rushed to his side. “What happened?”
He shrugged, turning off the faucet. “Just the job. Comes with the territory.”
I reached out, brushing a strand of hair off his cheek. “That looks painful.”
“It’s not too bad.”
I rummaged through drawers, finding expired ibuprofen and painkillers.
He waved it off. “I hate pills.”
“You need to take them. Your hand looks worse than a patched-up quilt.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“But Jack, bless him, what’s he gonna think when he sees his daddy all beat up?”
He sighed.
My hands trembled as I opened the bottle and dumped two ibuprofens on the counter. “Mama always said a bit of mountain wisdom and a tender touch can cure most things. Guess we’ll see if it holds true for Mafia men.”
He chuckled. “And what about your mountain wisdom?”
A smile tugged at my lips. “It’s got its limits, but it does wonders for a weary soul. First rule is, you don’t go looking for trouble in a bear’s den. But here I am, doing just that.”
He stepped closer, and my heart did a little dance. “And the second?”
“Sometimes you find the sweetest berries in the thorniest bushes.”
He smiled, curling a finger in my hair.
I squeezed his arm. “Take your pills. You don’t want to scare Jack, do you?”
He shook his head. “What will we tell him?”
“We’ll say it was an accident, simple as that.”
“What happens when he’s older and sees through our lies?”
“I-I don’t know.”
Achille swallowed the pills without water, his Adam’s apple bobbing. I watched him, a painful knot forming in my chest.
“I hope you gave the man who did this a piece of your mind.”
His mouth twitched. “Why? You wanna kill him, too?”
“I just don’t fancy spendin’ my days lookin’ over my shoulder.”
“He’s not going to be a problem for nobody.”
Meaning, he’d put him in the ground. My stomach flipped. “Who was he?”
He waved a hand. “Some loser who slept with a made man’s wife.”
