Or tried to. The words came out in a breathy rasp.
Clearing my throat, I tried again. “Are you…mad?”
Nico tightened his hold on me. “Very.”
Shit, I knew it.
I pushed away, but he held me tight.
“I’m mad that someone is coming after you,” he rumbled. “I’m mad that you haven’t told me what is going on—something you’ll fix as soon as you’re feeling more yourself. But Magnolia Rae, you listen and you listen well. I am not madatyou.”
“How can you not be?” I whispered. “I shot three people. I put a target on your mob.”
He understood what I was saying despite the stumbling, stuttering words trying to choke me. “You come to me.” He leaned us forward, reached out, and turned the rushing tap off. “I am the one you call whenever things are bad. Do you understand?”
With a sigh, I leaned back into him. The context of what he said was sweet. I wanted to believe that he was there for me. I wanted it so badly.
Right now didn’t seem like the time to argue with him that this was just sex. I let myself float on the daydream. But images of today’s trauma kept popping into my head.
“It helps to talk about it,” he murmured into my hair.
“How did you know?” I laughed bitterly.
He cupped his hand and drew the water toward me, letting it wash over my shoulders. “You keep starting and jerking every time you relax. I’ve been in yourshoes, Rae. The first time I shot a man dead, I couldn’t stop replaying it over and over.”
My gut twisted. The words tumbled out without my permission. “That wasn’t my first time.”
Nico went very still behind me. He didn’t breathe. Even his heart seemed to stop beating.
“There was…once before.” I lifted his hand and pulled it over my wrist. “They didn’t find the body, though.”
“Magnolia.” My name was a prayer of pain.
The story came out, pulled from the recesses of my mind where I kept it hidden away. “My dad died when I was seven. It broke my mom. She wasn’t mentally stable to begin with, and the prescriptions turned into narcotics. Guys came and went for the next few years. A lot of them were ones she partied with, but occasionally they were stand-up pillars of the community or from towns not too far to drive to. One of them, he was with her, but he was always looking at me—until I made sure he never looked at anyone ever again.”
Nico jerked and cursed in Italian.
I shrugged.
Water dripped from the faucet. One bead chased another. There was a pause in between, but the next always came sneaking out.
“And the phone call? The other night, when you helped me?” Nico’s voice was deadly low. He was holding back, but from what, I couldn’t tell.
“Oh, no.” I laughed roughly. “That’s a whole different mess. But, since you helped me clean it up, I guess I owe you an explanation.”
Nico shifted. “I need to know so I can help you.”
A funny pressure squeezed my chest tight.
He wants to help me.
At this point, telling him everything made more sense. “Today’s episode was brought to you courtesy of my no good ex-boyfriend, who while in jail, told his dealer that it was me who stole thousands of dollars’ worth of drugs.”
“And now they’re coming after you,” Nico surmised. “I’m going to need some names, Rae.”
“Why?” I turned to look up at him. Death never looked so beautiful.
“No one comes into my city, threatens my people, and gets away with it,” he said simply.
