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“Worse.” And so, I keep typing.
I’ll clean my article up when I’m done. Edit it. Rearrange paragraphs so they flow better. But for right now, for my first draft, my only job is to purge my body of all the details.
“Wh-what do you mean worse?” Dana asks. “How could it beworse?”
“He’s stuck back in the first year she went missing. He remembers everything.” Tears prickle the backs of my eyes, tempting me to bring my hand up to swipe them clear. “He’s living it right now. And Savannah is threatening to tell him I’ve chosen the enemy over my sister.”
“But…” Her eyes flitter between mine. Terrified. Intrigued. Horrified. Morbidly curious. “Have you?”
“The Malones are not my enemy.”
I write how Tim abused his sons, and how not one of them took part in the acts of their father. I write how they’re not perfect—nobody is—but they’re not who they came from. They’re not the monsters others make them out to be.
“I’m not choosing them over my dad or my sister. But I am choosing them.” I lick my dry lips and continue pounding words from my keyboard. “They won’t want me when this is done, but I have to share the truth anyway.”
“Ms. Cannon…” Dana breathes. “You’re making yourself a target forbothsides of this war. This is New York, and people have been going missing since the beginning of organized crime. You could just slink away into obscurity and let them battle things out on their own…”
“No. I won’t.”
“But you will unite them! Two enemy families,three,” she corrects when I type Pastore’s part in all this, “andyouare the common denominator. Tell-all articles rarely work out well for the author.”
“But I’m not here for me. My sister is already dead, my father is suffering, and I’m a liar. A traitor. The least I can do before this is all over is warn the Malones and tell the world what really happens behind those closed doors.”
I type for hours. My bladder aching, and my hands shaking. I eat the food Dana plops down in front of me, and when everything seems to tilt on its axis, I test my sugars and medicate myself so I don’t end up in the same predicament I was in what seems to be a lifetime ago now.
Chances are, Felix will think that was a nasty ploy to weaken his defenses and draw his family into my web.
Shit. Maybe it was. I don’t know anymore where my anger ends and my regret begins.
Time marches on. I let my phone ring, and my email inbox fill. I let everything exist outside of me, and when I catch movement in the glare of my computer screen, I peek over my shoulder and realize New York City is crying.
She’s in mourning, too, as lightning illuminates the sky and rain drizzles along my windows.
“Ms. Cannon?” Dana stops by my door, her purse in hand and a coat draped over her arm. “I’m heading out for the day. But I wanted to check in that you’re?—”
“I’m fine.” I read over what I’ve written and edit out the extraneous words I don’t need. The repetition. The emotion, since, unlike the twatty Ms. Towers, I report facts, not gossip. “Is Edward still downstairs?”
“Yes. He’ll remain until you’re ready to leave for the day.”
“You can dismiss him on the way out.” I look up at my assistant’s sharp intake of air. “Don’t worry. I’m calling Felix for a ride.”
“Y-you’re calling…” The way she stumbles over her words would be cute, if not for the fact she’s villainized the man who captured my heart.
But then again, I did the same once upon a time.
“You’re calling Felix Malone? The, uh…mafiaFelix? The don whose mother has not been seen since she was in bed with a different Malone?”
I sit back in my chair and steeple my fingers, allowing myself a momentary break. “You’ve read my piece, Dana?”
“Yes.” She steps into my office, but she leans back against the door and analyzes me. “Yes, I read what you’ve written.”
“And you still think he’s the bad guy?”
“I think he’s a very powerful, very dangerous guy. Your feelings don’t change that.”
“Sure. But he’s selfless, too. And sweet. He’s kind. And he raised a child that wasn’t his, after witnessing the murder of that child’s mother. He did that while still being a child himself.”
“And the mother who was murdered… was your sister.”
