AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I know,” he said. “ButIwill.”
Touché.
“He started making plays I thought were mistakes,” Cole said. “Until I realized they weren’t. It was subtle at first, little things that didn’t seem to matter in the grand scheme but that later turned out to be important. Moves on a chessboard no one could seebuthim.”
She thought about the plan to disrupt the preparations made by Fiore and Anastos. She couldn't speak to any of the other bosses, but if Primo had been in Damian’s position, the plan would have been all reckless force — shock and awe with no purpose other than to demonstrate hispower.
Like the fire at the Franklin Streetshelter.
“It made you respect him,”shesaid.
Cole seemed to think about it. “Before I met Damian, I was just a street thug like everyone else in my circle,” he said. “I begged, borrowed, and stole to get what I need. What I wanted. If someone said no, I beat the shit out of them until theysaidyes.”
She smiled a little. “Probably effective a lot ofthetime.”
He nodded. “But Damian showed me another way. He saw things in me I didn’t know were there, and because he saw them, I started to seethemtoo.”
“He changed you,”shesaid.
Colenodded.
“I know the feeling,”shesaid.
He sat up a little straighter, like he’d caught himself saying more than he’d intended and planned to rectify themistake.
“Anyway, we started working together, developed a strategy for building an off-the-books operation using the same strategies businesses use to increase market share and revenue.” He shook his head, like he couldn’t believe the words coming out of hismouth.
“And it worked,”shesaid.
“You couldsaythat.”
“You feel like you owe him,”shesaid.
He met her eyes. “If it wan’t for Damian I’d still be serving drinks in that shitty little dive bar, kicking the shit out of people and getting the shit kicked out of me to get by. So yeah, you could say Iowehim.”
She nodded. “He respects you,” she said. “I can see it in his face, in the way hetrustsyou.”
Cole studied her. “He respects you too,” he said. “Trustsyou.”
She smiled. “I guess that means we’re kind of stuck with eachother,huh?”
She thought she caught the faintest of smiles at the corners of his mouth but it happened so fast she couldn’t be sure. He’d given her an anesthetized version of his life before Damian — she had a feeling it was a lot messier than he’d let on — but he’d already told her more than shedeserved.
She pushed back from the table, picked up his empty coffee cup, and headed for thekitchen.
“Aria?”
She turnedaround. “Yeah?”
“Hurt him and I’ll kill you myself,”hesaid.
She met his eyes before resuming her path to the kitchen. “Ditto.”
