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“I’m gonna go to the scene.” I watch my feet as we climb. But my lips curl up. “What do you reckon happened with Pastore?”
He shrugs as we move from the first flight of stairs and head onto the second. “I’m the cop, Mayet. I’m the last one Felix will call to confess a murder. We’re brothers,” he adds with a chuckle, “but he’s not an idiot.”
“You think he went after Christabelle?”
“I think if he did, he willfully signed his own death certificate. Emilio Pastore’s been making dumb moves for the better part of eighteen months. Pissing the wrong people off. Creating enemies where there never needed to be any. Felix was told to cool it with Pastore and leave the guy alone. But if he came after Christabelle, then I’d say it was open season, no matter what the boss said about keeping the peace in New York.”
We crest the second level and continue on, though the thud-thud-thud of a basketball hitting the floor above us declares Cato Malone is home. He’s barely eighteen. The youngest of five, and the wildest, even when considering he was raised by Felix.
And Felix, we’ve already established, is unhinged at the best of times.
“I’d kill a man for coming after you,” Archer murmurs. “Felix isn’t gonna be shy about doing the same for Christabelle.”
“You’re home!” Cato bounds to the fourth floor landing the way a child might jump out while playing a game of peekaboo. Like the other four Malone brothers, he has dark hair, long limbs, broad shoulders, and a smile that beckons a woman to her death. These men come from murderous stock, but their secret weapon is the charisma they ooze.
It’s diabolical, really, how utterly charming they all are. Even when they’re not trying to be.
“Arch!” He explodes, bursting with excitement to share the news I guess everyone else was made aware of. “Pastore has bit it.”
“Felix did it?” He leads me up the last flight and makes a wide berth so the youngest Malone can’t touch me as we pass. “I heard. What happened?”
Cato follows us to our apartment door, too close, I practically feel his breath on the back of my neck. “Pastore attacked Christabelle. Christabelle recorded the whole incident, I think, so Lix got to hear it, play-by-play. Pastore was gonna hurt her more, but Lix turned up and grabbed the guy. He asked Cordoza for permission,” he adds, entirely too dramatically, “he asked him, Arch! For permission to deal with the guy. I guess Cordoza said it was cool. Because Lix and Micah took him back to the hut, made it hurt, made it last a while, and now Emilio’s swimming with the fish.”
“And Christabelle?” I follow Archer across the threshold of our apartment, but I stop again and turn back, while behind me, Archer tosses our dinner on the counter. She was my patient once. My responsibility to keep alive. “Is she okay?”
“Okay?” Cato laughs, setting his hands on the doorframe and grinning like a giddy fool. “Doc, she helped him! You heal people, so I guess that’s kinda special too. But Lix chose a chick who is the exact right amount of insane to keep him entertained. Imagine that,” he’s younger than me by a decade, but easily tall enough to look over my shoulder and meet his brother’s gaze, “falling in love with a killer.”
“Right?” Archer reaches over me and places his hand on the door, then looping his free arm around my stomach, he tugs me back. “That’s wild. Now go to the bar and have some dinner. Doctor Mayet and I want some alone time.”
“Wait—” Cato’s eyes widen when he realizes he’s been cast out for the next couple of hours. “Arch!”
“You’ll be fine.” He swings the door shut and grins when it slams and rattles in the frame. Then releasing me, he grabs my hand instead and leads me toward the living room. “Imagine falling in love with a killer, Minnnnka. Wouldn’t that be crazy?”
“Seems the Malones have a type.” And since it appears we’re at a point in our marriage that my less-law-abiding activities can be joked about, I follow him all the way to the couch and plop down when he presses his hands to my shoulders and pushes. “I wonder what kind of woman Micah will fall in love with?” I sit back when Archer releases me and close my eyes. Though I still see him in my mind, crossing our tiny apartment and tugging the fridge open in search of my meds.
Middle shelf, where the temperature is least likely to fluctuate.
“You chose me,” I mumble, “and Felix chose Debbie.”
“Christabelle,” he chuckles, audibly reaching up to the container we keep on top of the fridge. That’s where I store my tourniquet. My alcohol wipes. Syringes. “Her name is Christabelle, not Debbie. And Micah isn’t likely to fall in love with anyone.”
“Sure he is.” I’m already sleepy. It’s not yet seven, but the apartment slowly fills with the delicious scent of burgers and fried sweet potatoes. My husband is well-educated on my medical needs now, and I have nowhere else to be. So I melt into the couch and sigh. “Cato’s in love with himself. Tim is in love with Aubs. Just because Micah is the quietest of five doesn’t make him a eunuch.”
“He’s interested in women,” Archer sniggers, his voice coming closer as he brings our supplies to the couch. “He has no issue spending time with them. Here.” He places a warm plate on my lap, waiting as my eyes open and stop on his forest-green stare. “You eat. Let me take care of you.”
“The old me would rankle at that sentence.” But I peel the foil from my dinner and draw a long breath in until delicious scents fill my lungs. “The new me accepts help.”
“Growth.” He leans over the couch and drops a kiss on my forehead. Some could say it’s just a kiss. A press of his lips to my skin. But what it really is, is a man checking to make sure I’m healthy. No fever. No worries. “And don’t make assumptions about my brothers just because Lix and I decided we like someone enough to keep them around.”
I pick up a fry and bite off the end. “Tim likes Aubs.”
“And Tim doesn’t touch her.” Heading back to the kitchen, he flips the taps on and pumps soap into his hands. “He loves her enough to stay far, far away. Maybe our father is dead now, Mayet, but those kinds of lessons are tough to forget.”
“Your father is dead,” I agree, speaking around my food. “He can no longer hurt any of you. Which is why,” I twist on the couch to find my husband on the other side of the kitchen counter, “I suspect Tim is finally thawing out a little. It’s taken him a few months to accept the old man is gone. A little more time to accept Felix isn’t gonna pick up where his father left off. What was, not so long ago, five estranged brothers, is now a group of men who have each other’s backs.”
“Not me.” He switches the tap off and dries his hands on a clean towel. “I have no one’s back except yours and mine. The rest of them can burn.”
“Liar.” I straighten on the couch and rest my head back. I’m too tired to do much more. “You went to New York when they needed you. You moved Cato into our home because he needs you. And when Felix called, worried about Debbie, where were you?”
