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Love or revenge.
It’s like asking me to choose between my past and my future.One broke me. One completes me. They’re two sides of the same soul.I can’t forget the vow I made with my father, but I can’t forget the vow I made to her either.
Grayson’s right. I’m a conflicted bastard, through and through.
“Good meeting with you, Frankie.” He stands up and holds his hand out to me.
I drop my feet from the desk and rise to meet him, shaking it firmly. “Next time stay awhile. I’ll get Thiago to bake cookies.”
The corners of his mouth lift slightly as he lets go of my hand to slide his Beretta into the back waistband of his jeans. “I’ll be in touch before Sunday. Nice casino by the way.”
“All the better to take your money with.”
“All the better to clean Santiago’s money with.” He pauses in the doorway and runs his hand across his jaw again. “Semenov has her house surrounded with twenty more men, but tomorrow night, at around nine p.m., most of her security will be pulled away. Don’t ask me the details. Just be there. I can buy you an hour.”
My face doesn’t betray any emotion, even though the ground just shifted. “I thought this was a ‘no waves allowed’ zone.”
“Let’s just say I owe Aiden a favour. But stay out of sight. And don’t think about doing any spur-of-the-moment stupid shit like running off with Semenov’s wife. You know the penalty for that.”
Mywife. Not in name yet, but she’s only ever belonged to me.
I was the first and I’ll be the last.
“How the fuck are you going to pull all those men away from that house?”
“I said not to ask me about the details.”
A beat later, my office is empty again, and my mind is on sixty minutes of touch, taste, and Ada.
CHAPTER 23
ADA
Imay have won the battle, but I didn’t win the war.
When I wake the next morning, my knees are swollen and stiff. It’s the worst osteoarthritis flare I’ve had in ages, but after yesterday it could be worse. I could be lying in a hospital bed with a hole in my head, ordead like Guido Rossi.
I know Frankie killed him.
I’m so happy Frankie killed him.
Would I have had such macabre thoughts if O’Sullivan had never stolen me from my mother? If ‘normal’ had beenmynormal—with a steady job, a stable family, and a five-seater Volvo? Or does that well of dark water exist inside all of us, one that rises to the surface with every kick, every rape, every wrongdoing, until it’s an endless tide spilling over the edges.
Turning onto my side, I wince as the pain shoots through my body. I try to swing my legs out of bed, but I end up sinking back down into the mattress in defeat. With a heavy heart, I grab my phone and call around all my students’ parents to cancel off today’s classes. I hate doing it, but I have no choice. If I take it easy today, I should be well enough to continue tomorrow.
Downing a couple of strong anti-inflammatories, I wait for the relief to kick in. I didn’t close the curtains last night, and the sky outside is as blue as my melancholy.
This is what constant pain does. It’s a thief and a trickster. It robs you of the ability to find light in the darkest of places. Just when you think it’s subsiding, you move an inch, and it takes a mile. It’s a bad drug that hazes your memory when you’re crying out for every detail.
I remember him touching me, but not the moment it set fire to my skin. I remember his rich scent filling my lungs, but not how much it made my head spin.
Go away, pain. Just go.
Sliding my hand under my pillow, I pull out the crumpled betting slip. I hid it there to fill my head with his promises, like one of those hypnotherapist podcasts that works when you’re unconscious. The bloody fingerprints have darkened overnight, but the words are just as clear.
He never stopped wanting me.
He wants our son, too.
