Rafe took another long swig before he threw the bottle at me. After the bottle exploded on the wall behind my head, he rushed at me. The manic look in his eyes chilled me. “Fuck you, Leo.”
“I was just trying to help.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you coming at me with your trite little proverbs when I’m dying? I don’t want words! I want to bleed out for not being able to have her!”
“I understand more than you think,” I protested.
With a dark sneer, he shook his head. “Bullshit. You’ve never truly loved a woman. One you’d take a bullet for. One you dream about seeing your child growing within. One who is your beating heart outside of your body.”
Harsh, guttural sobs overcame him then, doubling him over at the waist. As I thought of Drea, all the anger and frustration I felt about not being able to have her boiled over in that moment.
In a flash, I barreled into him, shoving him back until he slammed into the wall. Grabbing the long strands of his hair, I jerked his head up to look at me. “Listen here, you selfish bastard. You’re so wrapped up in your own suffering you can’t even see that I’m fucking dying right before you!”
Rafe’s glassy eyes narrowed. “What the fuck are you saying?” he slurred.
“I know exactly what it’s like to love someone you can’t have. For this fucked up world of ours to deny you the only woman you’ve ever truly loved. To know you’ll have to spend the rest of your life watching her belong to another man.”
Blinking at me as if trying to clear his alcohol soaked brain, Rafe asked, “Wait…who?”
A maniacal laugh rumbled through me. One that once it started, I couldn’t stop. All that built up pressure and desire and heartache purged out of me through psychotic laughter.
“Leo?”
“It’s so fucked up,” I wheezed, as I swiped the tears from my eyes.
With a grunt, Rafe shoved me away and stalked over to the table where another bottle of whiskey sat. He’d chugged half of it before I recovered enough to stomp over to him.
“You’re going to kill yourself,” I growled before I jerked the bottle out of his hand.
He swiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “No shit. That’s kinda the plan.”
Staring at him, I shook my head. “You don’t deserve her.”
“Don’t you think I know that? Maeve’s always been too good for me.”
Now it was my turn to hurl the whiskey bottle. “I’m talking about Drea! You don’t fucking deserve her.”
“What does she have to do with anything?”
I threw up my hands. “She haseverythingto do with it. She is everything, you bastardo. She’s sassy and creative and sexy and smart. Despite being raised by utter assholes, she has such a kind heart and sweet spirit.Sheis the world tome.”
This time, the tears that streaked down my cheeks weren’t from laughter. They were fucking heartbreak leaking out of me. “She deserves to be happy.” Slamming my palm against my chest, I screamed, “I deserve to make her happy.”
Rafe’s neck jerked back like I’d slapped him. “You and….”
Before he could finish, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he collapsed to the floor. “Way to make this about you again.”
Leaving him to sleep off his misery, I downed the remaining whiskey and then collapsed onto the bed.
***
The next morning, I woke up in bed littered with bottles out of the mini bar. The moment I lifted my head, a Sicilianbandestruck up a lively tarentella in my skull. Moaning, I collapsed back onto the pillow.
“Stay there,” a voice instructed above me.
When I cracked open one eye, Gianni glared down at me. “Jesus, Leo. I gotta deal with youandRafe today?”
“My apologies,” I muttered.
