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Glancing in the bed beside him, Carmine met Haven’s apprehensive eyes. “Yeah.”
“Yeah?” Corrado sighed. “Is that the only word you know?”
The sarcastic ass in Carmine wanted to say, “Yeah,” but he knew it wasn’t wise to fuck with a poisonous snake, so to speak. “No, sir.”
Corrado rattled off the Antonellis’ address as Carmine scoured the room for something to write with. He found a short, dull pencil in a drawer and snatched the Bible out of the nightstand, opening it and tearing out the first page. Haven gasped and sat up as he scribbled down the address. “I can’t believe you tore out that page. It’s the Bible, Carmine!”
He rolled his eyes. “Do you really think anyone who comes here would be reading this?” he asked, holding up the Bible. “People who stay here are far from holy.”
“We stayed here.”
“Like I said, far from holy.” He chuckled. “But whatever, I didn’t tear out anything with the story on it. The page says Holy Bible.”
“It’s still wrong,” Haven said.
“Maybe, but I needed to write down the Antonellis’ address.”
She froze, her expression panicked. “Why?”
Sitting down, he brushed some wayward curls out of her face. She looked so vulnerable, and he wanted nothing more than to right every wrong and make the world better for her sake. “You wanna see your mom, don’t you?”
She blinked rapidly. “Can I?”
He ran his fingertips along her cheek. “I’ll make sure of it.”
Her eyes glassed over with tears as she threw herself at him, knocking him back onto the bed.
* * *
Carmine punched the address into the car’s navigation system, and it led them back down the same remote highway from the night before. After a few miles, it alerted them to a path cutting through the desert, and Haven tensed a fraction of a second before the navigation system announced they’d arrived. She recognized it, he realized. She could sense it in the middle of nowhere.
Haven trembled as he crept down the path, her fear so powerful he could feel it. The ranch came into view, and she inhaled sharply as Carmine parked behind Corrado’s rented sedan.
“I don’t think I can do this,” Haven said, shaking her head so frantically it made him dizzy.
Carmine grabbed her hands. “Listen and listen good, tesoro. You may wanna run as far away from this place as possible, but you can’t. Not anymore. You can’t let them control you. You can’t let them win. You’re strong, Haven. These motherfuckers tried to tear you down, but it didn’t work because you built yourself up. You’re a force to be reckoned with. You’re tough and passionate, and you can’t let these people get to you. That’s what they want.”
The anxiety in her expression was replaced with something else, a look Carmine could recognize anywhere: determination.
“So we’re gonna get out of this car, and we’re gonna go in this house, and we’re gonna tell these people to kiss our asses, because they can’t touch us. And you’re gonna go out there and tell your mom you love her, because you deserve that chance.”
Having said everything he could say, Carmine got out of the car. He groaned at the heat, the bright sun blinding him. Grabbing his sunglasses, he put them on and unbuttoned his long-sleeved green shirt. “Fuck, it’s hot.”
Haven stepped out timidly. “I remember it being hotter.”
“Well, I’m about to burn up,” he said. “It’s hot as Hell.”
“It is Hell.”
He gaped at her. “You cursed.”
“Hell isn’t a curse word.”
“Yes, it is.”
She shook her head. “It’s in the Bible, Carmine. If you spent more time reading it and less time tearing pages out of it, maybe you’d know that.”
He laughed, but a slamming door interrupted the moment. Haven went rigid as Carmine glanced at the man standing on the porch, his eyes a familiar deep brown shade Carmine knew well.
