Inferno(104)

‘Gino,’ I remembered. ‘They shot Gino.’

Nic’s expression darkened. ‘He’s in hospital. He’s hanging in there.’

‘Oh.’ I nodded, the barest trace of relief rising inside me. A small mercy. ‘Good.’

‘They’ll pay for that too,’ he said, his voice hard.

I looked at him – at every part of him, really, wholly – for the first time. I looked past the cheekbones, the searing eyes and the gentle curve of his lips. I had seen his body come alive, his fingers constricting around throats, his hand wielding a knife, his actions charged with murderous intent.

His T-shirt was creased slightly above his waistline. Even now, in times of mourning, he carried a loaded gun. He was an assassin – he had killed before and he would kill again and he wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. Nic was raw, heart-thudding passion personified, and he couldn’t measure it out for certain parts of his life and deny the others. He cared about me, sure, but he cared about other things, too. And they were darker, violent things that made up who he really was at his core. He had dumped Sara Marino in the lake. He had carved words of warning into her skin. And here he was, glittering in the duskiness – an angel sprung from hell.

Yes, I would say something to him; I would say the only thing pushing against my brain. I would say the thing that needed to be said.

The words came out clear and loud. ‘You hesitated.’

‘What?’

‘You didn’t drop your gun.’

‘What are you talking about?’

Carefully, I extracted the memory from That Night. ‘In the diner, when you and Luca came in through the back door, you both raised your guns. I looked inside the barrel of yours as you aimed it with full confidence at my head.’

Comprehension moved through Nic’s features, relaxing them. ‘But I wouldn’t have shot you.’

‘My head was in the way.’

‘My aim is very good.’

‘That’s the wrong answer.’

‘What’s the right answer?’

‘The fact that you don’t know says it all.’

‘I’m a good shot,’ he protested.

I glared at him. ‘I’d like to be alone now.’

‘What?’

‘You’ve seen me. I’m clearly alive. I am not communicating with any “fucking Marinos” as you call them. I am putting food in my mouth and consuming water regularly. You can go home now.’

‘But I want to help you, Sophie. This isn’t good—’

‘Nic.’ I sighed. ‘There’s nothing you can do for me.’

‘I love you,’ he said, pleadingly.

The words hit me right in the chest. He had never said that to me before, and now here it was, laid bare, in the lowest moment of my life. There was nothing but truth between us – the cold, hard truth, and those three little words that suddenly felt so huge. I had wanted to hear that for as long as I could remember. I had wanted someone to look at me the way he was looking at me just then. But now that I had it … it felt hollow. It felt wrong. And I knew, deep in my gut, that I wasn’t in love with him. I never had been. I’d been infatuated with the idea of love, and at a time when I had so little of it in my life, he had waltzed right through my defences and become that idea. I didn’t know what or who he really was beneath that.

‘You don’t know me,’ I said quietly. ‘Not really, not properly. Our whole time together has been about trying to make it work against all these crazy odds. It’s been about obstacles, not about each other.’

‘I know what I feel,’ he said resolutely.

A little broken part of me wanted to laugh. ‘You couldn’t even look at me when you heard I was a Marino.’

‘I was caught off guard,’ he protested.

‘When you love someone, you don’t lie to them. You don’t point a gun at their head. And you don’t turn your back on them when they’re at their most vulnerable.’ I swallowed hard. ‘That’s not love.’

He shook his head.

‘I think you love the idea of me,’ I whispered. Saying the words out loud hurt, but there was a tinge of relief in it too, as if the twisted fairy tale I’d been trying to make work was over, and I was OK. I had stopped trying to change him, trying to change myself to fit with him. ‘But we’re not right for each other, are we? We end up lying to each other, hurting each other.’

Nic ground his knuckles against the doorframe. ‘I told you. I would never hurt you.’

‘There’s more than one way to hurt someone.’

‘Yeah.’ His face twisted, from confusion to something else that I couldn’t place. ‘There is.’