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"He talks about you… all the time."
My chest feels tight thinking about Killian. Ciro would tell me for months that he barely ate. The months of him hiding in his office. The hours he would spend every day on the water with his boat looking for my body.
He never came back to the mainland and would send Ciro back and forth instead. I was glad when I heard that part because it meant he wasn't looking for me here. It meant I could be free, even if I lived with Niro in poverty like everyone else.
I look at Niro playing with the toy droid, trying to get it fixed with his new set of tools, and lower my voice. "Still?" I ask. "I thought he would have gotten over it by now. He could have kept his relationship with Blair. I'm sure having me gone made her happy. I know how much he cared about her and the others. He made sure to tell me how much everything meant to him."
"Lillith. He has never been the same since. He hardly talks to anyone. Even me. He's…different."
"So am I. I'm not giving up my son." I shake my head. "I'm not giving him away so he can raise Niro and then just kill me off anyway." My bottom lip trembles because I love Niro with every fiber of my being. "I wouldn't change any of it if it meant losing him."
Ciro wraps his arms around me. "I know, Lillith," he says. He tilts his head, pressing a kiss on my forehead. I rest my cheek on his chest, breathing in his manly scent.
Ciro has taken care of Niro and me the best he can. When he found out I was pregnant, he was there. Every step. He held my hand when the doctor helped me deliver Niro in this tiny room. He has always been there for us.
I look up into his brown eyes. "Thank you. For everything. For saving me. For saving us."
I know he’s had to lie to his best friend all this time. It must have been hard keeping Niro and me a secret for so long.
"I would do anything for you and Niro. I wish I could do more. Give you guys more."
I lean back in his arms and smile. "You're too good to me."
His eyes caress my face, and I take the time to see the smile he always has for me. His hair has gotten darker since I first met him. It has turned a dark blond color. He always wears different colognes, so I can lean close and smell the one he's wearing, getting ready to tease him.
"Do you like this one?"
I snicker. "Where'd you rip this one off from?"
The corner of his mouth lifts in a crooked grin. "From a guy I know. Do you like this one?" I stand on my toes and lean close, smelling his neck. The scent is spicy and manly. I kind of liked Killian's, but I don’t think that smell could ever be replicated. It's unique and all him. He dips his head and whispers, "I told him this picky friend I had was sensitive to smell."
I laugh because when I was pregnant, so many repugnant smells in the mainland would make me throw up everything I ate. Ciro would try to find me perfume and cologne to calm my stomach. There wasn't much to choose from, so I had to go with lab-created scents he could find.
"Picky, huh."
"Yeah, picky and gorgeous." I blush.
"Did you tell him how much of a pain in the ass you are?"
"Am I really?"
Holding up my index finger and thumb close together, leaving a tiny space, I tell him, "Just a little."
He laughs and slides my hair behind my ear, and there's that look again. He tries to peel back my layers with his eyes to figure out how I feel deep inside. I have been so focused on raising Niro the best I can and don't have time to feel or talk about the past. Like everyone else in the city, I worry about surviving the present and hoping for a brighter future.
"When's the next race?" I ask.
I need to make money. The arena is where you can make fast cash in one night. It's enough to keep us afloat for a month.
Ciro releases his arms around me and turns to see Niro playing with his droid. "I can give you money, Lillith. You don't have to race."
I get in front of him and meet his eyes. "I can't keep taking money from you, Ciro. You have done enough for me all these years. You have a place of your own you need to pay. You have been wanting to buy parts for your car."
"All that can wait, Lillith. You're more important to me than a stupid place I hardly stay in and a car I will hardly drive working with Kill."
"I won't let you. I'm going to race."
Ciro took me to the arena and showed me what really goes on down there. Motorcycle racing. I remember the day Killian took me there for the first time. The speed at which they were traveling was like a lightning bolt, making the ground shake as they zoomed past me. It took me a year to learn to ride, but I learned and am pretty good at it. When it means your next meal, you start figuring out how to go faster and faster until you're the best.
