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Tears continued to stream down Lucy’s face, but she kept them silent as Minka took Niccolaio’s hand and led him to the balcony.
Silence nipped at my sanity as we waited for Asher to finish.
“I know you blame him.”
I kept my eyes on the door. “Niccolaio is the reason Vince is in this situation.”
“It’s not Niccolaio’s fault your families are at war. It started long before him.”
“Vince gave himself up to settle the blood debt. To remove the bounty from Niccolaio’s head.”
“Have you ever considered there’s more to it? Maybe ending the war benefits everyone he loves.”
She had a point, so I shut up. Lucy went in the room to see Vincent after Asher left. Ten minutes passed before I took my turn.
Alone in the room, I had the damnedest urge to call Ari here.
She’d been the distraction I’d needed for the past two weeks, and all I had left was the beat of my fingers against my thighs as I tried to prolong the conversation that needed to be had.
“You look like shit,” Uncle Vince drawled.
“Thank you. So do you.”
Yeah, tell the guy with cancer he looked like shit.
Clearly, he and Gio had raised me right.
“How’s the girl?”
“Elsa’s still the bitchiest bitch of the East. I don’t think that will change anytime soon. Or ever.”
“I meant the De Luca girl.”
“Oh. Her.” I didn’t know how he knew to ask about Ari, but I could either question it or give the dying man the answers to his questions. “She’s… something else. She’s been watching Tessie while I searched for you. Tessie likes her.”
My throat felt full as I realized he wouldn’t have an opportunity to say bye to Tessie.
“Do you like her?”
“What a convenient time to play matchmaker.”
“Evasion. That’s a yes.”
“She’s no Elsa.”
“Well, I didn’t think Elsa was a bitch either until her bitchiness throat punched me, and I had no choice but to pat her head and send her on her way.”
“Remember when I told you about Jupiter and Ganymede?”
“The moon and the planet. Always revolving around one another. Ariana De Luca is not my Ganymede.”
“No, she’s not. You’re her Ganymede.”
“No, we’re—”
“Stop fighting it. You have spent eight years lonely and miserable, penance you never deserved, and now you have an opportunity of happiness most don’t have”—an opportunity he didn’t have, I read between the lines—“and you’ll brush it aside over fear and pride. I knew you were stubborn, but I didn’t know you were foolish, too.”
Only he could speak to me like this. I’d volley back at Gio, ignore my mom, give Tessie a run for her money, and continue the back and forth banter with Ari.
