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“It’s complicated.”
The Wilde brothers and Khan folded their arms, the way Marco had always done when he was annoyed. Was it something arrogant men learned in in some secret ritual?
“It’s true. I told him my name was Madison. Well, I’d told that to everybody. To every prospective employer. And—and, see, I live in a neighborhood that’s not so great—”
“Not so great?” Travis said in a dangerous voice.
“It’s what I can afford,” Emily replied, her chin angling up. “It’s difficult to make much money, playing piano in bars.”
“Holy crap,” Jake snarled. “Playing piano in—”
“That was how I met Marco. I’d been playing in a bar that was—that was kind of run down. And the owner fired me. And it was almost two in the morning and it was raining and I missed the bus and—”
Caleb made a sound that was more a snarl than anything else.
Without thinking about it, Emily folded her arms. Her brothers were upset. She got that. But she’d be damned if she’d let them make easy judgments about the choices she’d made. Right or wrong, they’d been hers to make.
This was her life, not anyone else’s.
“Here’s the deal,” she said. “You want to know what happened? Then try listening instead of playing judge and—”
The sound of an engine roared up outside. Good. The women were back. She might as well get this over with instead of having to tell the story twice.
Somebody knocked at the kitchen door.
“The girls must have forgotten their keys,” Khan said.
“They don’t need keys,” Travis said. “They know that. The doors are never locked at El Sueño.”
The knock came again. Harder. Much harder. Emily could almost see the door shake.
A strange feeling swept through her. A premonition. An awareness.
“Who in hell could that be?” Travis said tightly. “The last damn thing we want right now is visitors.”
Jake strode to the door. Grasped the knob. Swung it open. It was dark out
side; no moon, no stars.
“Yeah?” he said. “Who—”
Emily took a step forward.
“Marco?”
“Emily,” that accented husky voice said, and he stepped through the door, the man she hated, the man she pitied, the man she had loved...
The man she would never stop loving.
Her Marco, dressed in jeans and a leather jacket, his hair a little too long, his face a little too thin, his eyes a little too haunted.
“Are you Marco Santini?” one of the Wilde brothers said.
“Emilia mia,” Marco said, his eyes on the woman he loved and had lost.
“Screw this,” Jake growled, and Emily screamed, and that was the last thing Marco knew before a clean right uppercut connected with his jaw and he went down in a boneless heap.
******
