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“Okay?” Daphne said coolly and took a step back. “You know, if we brought Zoe back, all this would go away.”
“And if the cops did their fucking job, they’d see there was no way that Luca did what he’s been accused of, but here we are.”
She scoffed. “If you told me what you know, I could help.”
“Or I could handle it myself and leave you to whatever it is you do to fill your time.” Daphne’s mouth opened, but I cut off whatever she was about to say. “Look, I appreciate what you’re trying to do here, but there’s no way I’m working with the cops. I’m sure you can appreciate that.” I started toward the store.
“You’re making a mistake!” She called after us.
“And you’re not a very good cop,” I said with a wave of my hand.
Frankie laughed, and I cut my eyes to him. “Can you believe that? Asking me to do her job for her?” I politely smiled at a mom and her kid as we went through the automatic doors.
Frankie grabbed a basket and handed it to me. “You get your snacks, and I’ll grab the tampons.”
We split up, and I raided the snack aisle, grabbing the staples for a relaxing night in. As I picked out a bottle of wine that Luca would turn his nose up to, Frankie rounded the corner, holding a big box of my preferred tampons.
When he dropped them in the basket, he eyed my bounty. “Got what you need?”
“Yep. Let’s go.”
An hour later, I was curled up on the couch, ready to watch nineties romcoms and veg out, when the burner phone rang.
“Luca?”
“Hey. What are you doing?”
“Getting ready to watch a movie and space out.”
He chuckled and sighed. “That sounds nice.”
I sat up and set the box of candy I was holding down. “You sound tired. Everything okay?”
“Just ready to be home with you. Tell me about your day.”
“Tootsie put Malcolm in the hospital, and now Ashley’s pissed. I can’t say I blame her. Seeing the person you love most in the world lying in a hospital bed is horrible.” I picked at the loose string on the quilt covering my lap as I confronted what was really bothering me. “I might’ve lost the last person not related to me who was on my side.” Rolling my eyes, I fell back into the couch. “And how fucking selfish do I sound?”
“It’ll be okay. You’ll help her through it.”
“Yeah. If she’ll let me.”
“She will. I have a feeling this won’t be the last time Malcolm gets into a scrape doing his job.”
“I hate that I’ve pulled her into all of . . . this.” Tommy walked past the window, making his rounds. When had I stopped jumping at their shadows? When had I memorized their security schedules?
“Baby, Malcolm has been in the game a lot longer than you’ve been with me. Ashley was always going to see some of this. Beating yourself up isn’t helping anything. Just be there for her and help her while Malcolm’s healing.”
I pursed my lips to keep from arguing. Luca would never allow me to take the blame for anything. It wasn’t in his DNA.
“A certain FBI agent followed me to the grocery store.”
“Oh, yeah?” Luca sounded surprised. Daphne Dukas was a source of both amusement and annoyance for him. She was always five steps behind but bold enough to come in, guns blazing.
“Please make sure you’re being careful. Cy is gunning for you.”
Luca let out a humorless laugh. “What’s new?”
“Luca—”
