What if it’s all true?
My knees buckle, but Rowan holds me tightly to his side.
When he opens the passenger door, I whirl around, my shock slowly turning into something darker, colder. “Who are you?”
His gaze shutters. “Get inside.”
I shake my head. “Rowan, who the fuck are you? You justkilledthose men. Why did you do that? Why didn’t you call the police?”
I’m screaming, my grip on reality coming undone. It feels like I’m disassociating, like I’m looking down at Rowan and me from above.
“Get. In. The. Car.” He wraps his hand around my elbow and nearly lifts me inside. “I’ll explain everything, but right now, we have to leave. We have to get out of here before the cops come. Someone must have already placed the call.”
Someone. Not him. As in, he’s running from the cops, not hoping they’ll arrive to help.
“What is wrong with you?” I whisper harshly.
He stares at me for a long moment and then slams the door shut.
We get on the road. He’s driving fast, but there’s nothing frantic about him. He’s cool and in control.
Someone who’s just killed a person for the first time wouldn’t behave like this.
He’s done this before.
Bile rises up my throat. “Start talking.”
“My name is Nero De Luca. I was the consigliere of one of the five New York mob families until I had to fake my own death.”
The words feel like sharp stabs right through my chest. I gasp for breath.
It’s…true.
Everything Uncle Lyle said was true.
“My boss’s name was Rafaele Messero. His wife was taken, and I was supposed to get her back, but I didn’t know Rafaele asked one of his allies, the Ferraros, to provide backup. When their guys arrived, I thought they were there to fight us, not help us, and I killed one of them. It was a clusterfuck. The Ferraros wanted me dead. Rafe felt that wasn’t fair, but he couldn’t riskstarting a war with them, so he sent me away. Gave me a new identity. Told me to start over.”
He delivers all of this so calmly, as if he’s completely oblivious to the way he’s destroying me.
“You’re a criminal,” I whisper.
His jaw clenches. “I am.”
“You’ve been lying to me the whole time I’ve known you.”
“I’ve been lying to everyone.”
He hasn’t just been lying. Heisa lie.
The Rowan I thought I knew—the Rowan I thought Iloved—never existed.
He played me for a fool.
All the signs are so obvious now. That dark look he got in his eyes when he looked at Brett. The way he was never scared of Uncle Lyle. Why would he be when they’re both cut from the same cloth?
The fucking gun he brought home?
The cufflinks.NDL.
