She’s been talking with her sister for seventeen minutes already, and my restlessness grows with every second.
“If you hurt her—” he starts, but I cut him off.
“Never. You don’t know me, and I understand that. I even appreciate the care you have for her. But I would never hurt her. Not deliberately, at least.”
For a man who has always anticipated every step, who has planned ahead and calculated everything in his life, I feel like this time my own system let me down.
If I had told her the truth before I left, we wouldn’t be standing here today.
“I watched you put yourself in front of that bullet for her, and that’s enough for me. It’ll be enough for Julia too. Whether it was enough for Amalia…that remains to be seen.”
When I saw that gun raised toward her, all my mind produced was the thought that I would never again see her eyes light up when she tastes a hot chocolate she likes, never hear her say my name, never feel her touch on my skin. And in a fraction of a second, even though reason tried to push forward the fact that I have a nephew who still needs me, that I have Karina and Andreas, who are my only friends, my body moved of its own accord and stepped in front of her.
“She’s special.” Maksim clears his throat. “She has an extraordinary mind, but?—”
“She always doubts it,” I answer, because I know. “And she’s more than special. She’s singular. And I can’t believe that this entire time she was only a few hours away by plane.”
“You couldn’t have found her, Silas. That was by design, mine and Julia’s. After everything that happened with Aleksandr, we wanted both her and Lupe to have a chance at a normal life, whatever normal looks like for them. But you ground her, and that’s huge for someone with a mind like hers that feels like it’s running multiple subprocesses at the same time. I just hope you, if you’re given the chance, take care of that. Of her.”
“You got it wrong. She grounds me. I am a man of reason, but being without her these past months made me doubt every thought, every decision, every step I took,” I tell him, trying to move my shoulder, only to hiss through my teeth when a sharp sting cuts through.
“Well, now the only thing you need to do is wait.”
It’s officially been twenty-one minutes that I’ve been waiting for her to come back out, and I know that if she asked it of me, I would wait a lifetime.
Iwatch as Julia waits impatiently for me to say something, to give her some kind of explanation, but my mind is blocked.
I can’t hear my own thoughts. Something in my chest stings painfully, and I don’t know what to do or what to say.
“I let my guard down for a few minutes and didn’t sense him come at me with the syringe.”
When she raises her eyes to mine, I see they’re full of tears, and I want to sink through the floor because I hate seeing her like this.
“You could have died, you could have been assaulted, we might not have found you. So explain to me why I shouldn’t go out there and put holes in the man who put you in danger, right now.”
I know what could have happened to me. But I can’t blame him, not after seeing his desperation. He was willing to take on the Italian mafia just to get me out of there.
God, he stepped in front of a bullet for me.
My eyes are burning and I want to sleep for at least twenty hours, but when I look out the window and see Silas talking with Maksim, my heart starts beating far too fast again.
Julia comes and wraps her arms around me, and for a few seconds I wish Lupe were here too. A week ago she left for Vermont, where she’s starting college.
“He’s quite handsome,” she tells me, and even though I can’t see her face, I know she’s smiling.
Because he is handsome. He’s grumpy. He’s still the most interesting man in the world, and he came for me.
“Why didn’t you tell me anything about him?” my older sister asks, and I draw in a slow breath.
I can feel the curiosity in her voice but also the doubt. Arms crossed over my chest, I answer her.
“Because he broke my heart the very day everything went down with Lupe and Aleksandr.”
For a minute I feel her turning it over, measuring her words, but in the end she asks, “Do you love him?”
Almost instantly I want to say yes, but my brain pulls me up short. I know what I feel for him, but there were plenty of opportunities for him to tell me something, at least half the truth.
Julia turns me toward her, taking my face in her hands.
