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“Patience.”
Sybil grumbles something about me being “too damn enigmatic” before we fall into a comfortable silence. She studies the world flashing past us, and I study her in short glimpses now and then. I enjoy simply driving like this with her. It reminds me of driving with her then.
Finally, after over an hour has passed, she sits up more and looks at me in surprise. “Are we going…back there?”
“Yes.”
“But…why?” She arches an eyebrow. “You’re just hankering for a trip down memory lane or something?”
“Or something.”
“You don’t strike me as the sentimental type nowadays, Mister Chatterbox.”
I look at Sybil pointedly. “But I did then. Didn’t I?”
She considers me and looks back at the road. “Yeah. You did then.”
Finally, I pull over, off to the side of the road. We’re much further down than the spot I found her four years ago, but closer to the small inn where we’d experienced so much bliss before the heartache. I don’t move to get out, and neither does Sybil. She’s staring out the window the way I am, and I wonder if she sees the same memory I do.
Rain pouring from dark skies. Dangerous roads streaking by, ending with the sight of a stranded woman. An angel face with eyes far from innocent and a smile that chased the clouds away.
And the brokenness. That same challenge in her face.
We’re quiet for longer than I can guess until she finally breathes out, “I haven’t come back here, you know. It looks exactly the same—except for the perfect weather, I mean. I wonder if I could still find those skid marks from going off the road.”
I ask a question I’ve wondered about for four years. “Was it intentional? Going off the road?”
Her answer matters because it will tell me just how much of that day was fake on her end. I know the Gattos put her up to it. That she was used by them to ruin my family. I simply don’t know how much she knew about it at the time. It matters to me how much she knew.
Because if she knew everything, she knew about my brother. About the plan to kill him.
Sybil looks away, squeezing her hands together. “No. Yes. Kind of.” Then she sighs and turns back at me. “They told me where to be and when. And they told me your name and that I was supposed to be a damsel in distress because you’d….”
“Help.” I feel a burst of anger in my chest. Screw past me for being so soft. The Gattos took notice and utilized it. I won’t make that mistake again. “They knew I would help you.”
She swallows and nods. “That’s all they said. I mean it. I was too terrified to ask questions, and they were already threatening my family and… I just didn’t want them exploiting Angela, so I did it. I planned on faking car problems in front of the inn, but I was crying, and the roads were slick, and I slid off the road. It wasn’t anything really damaging, nothing that would’ve hurt me—but you know that. It really was stuck in all that mud, and I really did need help. I wasn’t faking that.”
“Then what did you fake?” I demand, reaching out to capture her chin with my fingers. This is the real question I’ve agonized over for years. Looking into her face will tell me if she’s lying. “What was real, Sybil? Was any of it?”
“You know it was.” Her gaze is even and fiery. She looks indignant and sexy and too much like she did then—like my damning angel. “How could I fake that? The first time I saw you, Nico, you scared me. But not because I knew what you were. Because I could see what you weren’t. You were nothing like the other mobsters I’d met. And I expected you to lie to me about your name or your life, but…you were completely honest. So gentlemanly and upright andreal. I didn’t give you anything less. I didn’t fake anything that day. I just…”
Her face falls, and moisture springs to her eyes. Now her voice is a whisper. “I just should have asked them more questions. I knew something was going on, I just didn’t want to reallyknow.But I needed to. If I had just asked—”
I can’t help myself. I lean forward and stop her next words with a kiss. “If you had, they would have made you regret it.”
“I was pathetic. A coward.”
“You were frightened,” I amend, reaching up to brush her hair back. “I could see it in your eyes. But I could also see there was a fight in you, just as there is now. No one would call you a coward.”
She laughs shakily and pulls back, wiping a tear off her cheek. Her voice breaks. “Angela would have. She never got the chance, but sometimes I still feel like I can hear her.”
I study her for a moment. The hurt in her face pains me. If only I could take it away completely. But losing my brother—and my mother—has taught me that some things are in our souls. They can’t be removed or forgotten.
Sometimes my anger feels just as impossibly rooted. Even now, it flickers in my stomach, ravenous to avenge Sybil now, too.
“I can’t imagine losing a twin,” I say softly, taking her hand. “Give me names, Sybil, and you can pick where we bury the Gattofigli di puttana.”
She gives me a sharp look. “Funny how your nickname has suited you both times we’ve met. You’re such a paradox. You might be The Undertaker now, but don’t you ever miss being the Boy Scout?”
