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I need to call Kristin and make sure she’s safe, but there’s someone else I’m desperate to see first. “Where’s Joey?”
“Joey?” Kat blinks at me, and the look on her face makes my stomach twist in knots. Or maybe that’s just the drugs they gave me. “Isn’t there someone else you should be concerned about?”
I frown, confused, but then I hear her voice. “Max?” Kristin says softly from the corner of the room, her face pale and her eyes red from crying. She rests her hands protectively over her bump.
“Kristin? Thank fuck you’re safe. But… Wait.What are you doing here?” My head throbs. What the fuck is going on?
“If it wasn’t for your girlfriend here, we wouldn’t have even known you were missing.” Kat’s voice drips with disdain, and my head pounds harder. Why do I feel like I’ve woken up in an alternate universe?
Hang on. What the fuck did she just say? “My girlfriend?”
“I’m sorry, Max. I didn’t know if I could trust them,” Kristin says.
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I suck in a deep breath that burns my lungs. This can’t be happening. “You told everyone you’re my girlfriend?” I ask, ignoring Kat’s fierce glare.
“Y-yeah,” my sister answers, her eyes wide and fearful. I guess she couldn’t have known why that would be such a big deal, but the thought that for even one second Joey believed… Fresh bile burns the back of my throat.
“Fuck, Kristin!” I push myself up and swing my legs off the edge of the bed.
Kat rushes over and tries to push me back down. “You should rest!”
“I need to speak to Joey,” I insist, yanking the blood pressure cuff from my arm. Jumping off the bed and onto the floor, I groan at the fiery agony that sears through my abdomen.
“Max. You just had surgery,” Kat says, sighing.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m sorry, Max,” Kristin sniffs.
“You have nothing to be sorry for, sweetheart,” Kat assures her, but I tune them both out because all I can think about is Joey and what she must think of me right now. How long have I been out of it? How many hours, minutes, seconds has my girl spent thinking that I’m the kind of piece of shit who’d do something like that?
I run out into the hallway, adrenaline coursing through me, making me stronger and more determined with each step. “Joey?” I shout as I head toward the den. “Joey!”
I see Dante first as he walks out of his study. “Keep your fucking voice down,” he orders.
“I need to see Joey. Where is she?”
“She doesn’t want to speak to you right now.”
“I don’t give a fuck. Where is she, Dante?”
Lorenzo steps up beside him, fastening the buttons of his suit jacket. They stand side by side—against me. I roll my head side to side, back and forth, prepared to go through the two of them to get to her if I must.
“She’s not interested, Max.”
Blood thunders in my ears. “Joey,” I yell louder. I know she’s here somewhere. She has to be.
Dante takes a step toward me. “I said keep your fucking voice down. My daughter is asleep,” he says with a snarl, teeth bared like he’s spoiling for a fight. I never thought I’d stand on this side of the infamous wall of Moretti rage, but I will take both him and Lorenzo down if they don’t let me see her. And if I can’t get through them, I will fucking die trying.
We glare at one another, none of us prepared to back down even a little. Each of us believing we’re right.
I sense her even before I hear her soft footsteps, and I’m filled with adrenaline and anguish when I look up to see her drifting down the staircase. Her bloodshot eyes make me wonder how many hours she spent crying.What the fuck have I done?
“Joey?” Her name comes out like a plea.
“Shouldn’t you be with yourgirlfriend?” She spits the last word like it’s poison on her tongue.
