Page 78 of One Second After Another

“Dare made me a deal, too,” Cree said, his finger wrapping the trigger. “You only have to die, Penny ... and maybe then you can live.”

He pulled the trigger back. The last thing Penny remembered was coughing and the taste of blood thick in her clogged airpipe as she stared up at a bright blue sky, and rolling white clouds. She heard a click—a digital ding as her heart fought to keep beating.

She felt every single one.

And how they slowed.

Penny would have liked to say that she had no regrets at the moment of her death, but that was a lie.

She regretted not saying goodbye.

21.

Luca

THERE was nothing quite like the streets of New York City, mid-week, at the end of a long workday. Often congested, and yet fast-paced in a blink, driving in that mess could make a normal man insane. He kind of liked it.

Luca could thank his father for demanding he learn how to drive in downtown Manhattan during early Monday morning traffic when he hadn’t even known how to back a vehicle up at that point. And it was one of the only times that he couldn’t focus long enough to think.

At least, not too deep. That was better, lately.

Thinking led him down too many rabbit holes—Luca didn’t enjoy the helpless feeling he was left with every time he was reminded that Penny was ... somewhere.

Somewhere without him.

Luca let those thoughts drift away as he finally rounded onto the block where he had to meet up with a Donati capo. Being the go-between to pick up payments so the capos weren’t forced into the same spot when things in the city were tense was just one way Luca was helping to keep shit steady for Naz and la famiglia.

He didn’t mind.

It kept him busy, too.

And if this was the only way he could help to keep the streets of New York from becoming anymore bloodier than they already were, then this was what he was happy to do. Simple as that.

Before long, Luca was able to pull his car to the side of the street where temporary parking allowed him to sit for five minutes or less. He sent off a quick text—a confirmation that he was outside the coffee shop where the capo spent his evenings in a rear office handling paperwork.

Luca didn’t expect the capo to bring out the money—the dues owed to the new, sitting Doanti boss. He was right. A familiar family enforcer stepped out of the alley at the side of the coffee shop, telling Luca he had probably exited the business from a rear door. He didn’t linger at the open window of Luca’s latest buy—a new, two-door Mercedes that was blacked-out from the rims to the front windshield.

Money could make shit move in little time. He figured it was about time that he started spending some dollars. What good was it sitting there doing nothing, anyway?

It was also another way for him to distract himself from the giant hole in his life. A black space that seemed to be sucking all the good energy he had left with every passing second that he tried to pretend it wasn’t there.

He assumed this was what it felt like to be heartbroken—a little empty, lost, and too quiet. Not quite right.

“Thanks,” he told the enforcer when the man passed an envelope into the car. Luca packed it away in a bag on the passenger seat, and was already maneuvering the car out of the parking spot by the time the man had turned to leave. He gave the enforcer a two-fingered wave but didn’t glance the man’s way to see if it was returned.

Just as he pulled the car back onto the road, the Bluetooth in the car connected a call from the newest cell phone he had picked up to keep in contact with the important people who needed him. Or those he was paying to keep him up-to-date on information.

The number on the screen told him he was dealing with the latter.

“Keys,” Luca greeted when he picked up the call. “Tell me the good news, man.”

He drummed his fingers against the steering wheel as the car came to a stop behind a white SUV at a red light. Good news was reaching—he mostly expected the same news Keys had been giving him for days when it came to Penny and any possible sightings or word about the white ghost.

“Where are you?” the hacker asked.

“What’s wrong?”

It wasn’t unusual for Keys to ask Luca about his position when the man called—he was convinced it was because the hacker just couldn’t help himself and everything was a challenge. Even finding Luca’s digital footprint down to the goddamn millisecond.