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No more laughing, or smiling, or much of anything other than breathing and blinking. Dying would really suck right now.
“Are you scared, Neve?” He returns to stroking my spine, which feels soft, amazing.
I return the gesture by running my fingers over his beautiful torso. “Yes.”
“Of me?”
Styx could end my life right here and nobody would care, but I know he won’t. I hope he won’t. “A little.”
“You’re not wrong to be scared. I’ve done some pretty shitty things in my life.”
“Like leave your mom, steal from her?”
His movement stops. “She told you that, but that’s not the truth. My mom used her money to private jet me out of here and get me to my father across the world. It was the only way of getting me out of Europe without a record. Commercial flights are easy to tap into, secrecy can be bought in private planes.”
Believing him may be foolish, but I do. He hasn’t given me a reason to think he’s lying. “Why did you have to leave without anyone noticing?”
“Because I did the right thing, which put a hit on my back.”
Him doing the right thing, validates the emotions I’m starting to feel for him. “I knew it wasn’t safe for you, but I didn’t know the details. Your mom just said you ran with wrong crowd.”
“I stayed as far away from them as I could. I hated every single one of them, regardless if I knew them or not.”
“It must have been hard, then. To leave her behind.”
“Especially because she warned me not to do it. Mom didn’t want me to go to the police, but I went. It was stupid. I thought they could help me find my cousin’s body, get some justice.” Styx goes silent for a moment. “I know the mob’s responsible for my grandfather and uncles. But my little cousin, she had nothing to do with anything. They took her because they don’t have souls.” He brings his hand up to his chest and lays his palm flat against his heart. “She was just a baby, four years old. I was the man of the family. The last Morano heir, but they tookher.”
“You think you should have been taken instead?” I hesitate to place my hand on top of his, but he reaches for it and intertwines are fingers.
His silence answers for him, and it causes that little seed of sentiment to nestle in my heart. For someone who had imagined him time and time again, I had never once believed he was kind. My heart wasn’t prepared for this. “It’s not your fault, Styx.”
“Maybe, but I think everyone knew it should have been me. Some people resented me for it.”
He was just a kid too. “Maybe that’s just your heart thinking that because you feel guilty.”
“I left and no one but my mother missed me. Rosinha vanished, people round here put roses out to dry in her memory.”
“Rosinha?” I ask. “I never heard that.”
“It’s a sweet nickname for Rosa… She was the first petal. Innocent like a rose bud who had no time to bloom.”
That’s exactly what his mom would say, word for word.
Till this day, some businesses have a dried up rose petal on the wall to remember her. Some people have more than one. It’s a tradition to honor the lost, the ones who don’t have a body to bury.
“At least she doesn’t fit the profile of the other missing people. Not many children,” I offer in comfort, though I don’t think victimology helps. This kind of hurt goes deep into the veins.
“True.” He bobs his head. “
“She may still be out there. Lost.”
“Yeah… who knows.” For a long time after that, at least five minutes, he’s lost in thought.
Because his silence irks me, I change the subject back to something two-sided. “Why didn’t your mom just reach out to your dad and save the money?”
“No one justreaches outto my father.” Styx chuckles, but he’s dead serious. “Dad is known for hiding, and he never sticks around anywhere. I tracked down his key people and used my mom’s name to get to him.”
“Oh.” That doesn’t bode well for me. People in hiding rarely do it because they’re good Samaritans.
