"They don't sleep here."
My brow furrows. "How do you know?"
"I just know," he says. "I can tell by looking at it."
Before I can ask him any more, the curtain in the living room moves. The door yanks open, my mother appearing, eyes wide.
She looks frantic.
"Karissa," she shouts, her voice high-pitched, full of panic. "Oh God. Get away from him, sweetie."
I blink a few times, caught off guard, as Naz slips his arms around me, pulling me flush against him. One arm encircles my waist as his other settles along my chest, his hand drifting up, resting at the base of my throat. He's holding me protectively, my armor against the brutal outside world, but my mother sees it differently.
She lets out a panicked noise as she rushes forward, descending the small porch steps and wavering in the yard.
"It's okay," I say. "It's fine, Mom."
"Please let her go," she pleads, ignoring me, her focus on Naz. "I'm begging you. Let her go, Vitale."
My blood runs cold when she says his name... his last name... the name those people use for him. This isn't right. She doesn't know him. They don't know each other. They can't.
"I'm not going to hurt her, Carmela, but I'm not letting her go."
My knees nearly give out on me. He called her Carmela. If not for Naz's strong hold, I would hit the ground. I turn my head, seeing Naz's serious expression, his eyes as dark as the night around us.
"Naz," I whisper. "What's going on?"
"What's going on is your mother isn't happy to see you near me."
"Why?" I ask, my voice trembling. "Who are you?"
"You know who I am," he says. "The question you should be asking is who are they."
"Mom," I call out. "Mom, what's happening? How do you know Naz?"
She doesn't look at me, but I know she hears my words. Her alarm grows when I call him Naz. She pleads with him more. "Please, she's my daughter... my little girl. She's been through enough. Don't do this to her."
"I've done nothing to her," Naz says, his hand shifting higher, tightening around my throat. I gasp as he leans down, kissing my temple. "Nothing she hasn't wanted me to do."
My mother's on the verge of hyperventilating. "Just let her go and let's talk about this. I'll give you whatever you want, whatever it is. Take me, but leave her alone. Please, I'm begging you. I'll do anything."
Naz loosens his hold, and I breathe deeply, disoriented. "Johnny here?"
"No."
"Bet he went out the back door when he saw me, didn't he?" My mother doesn't respond to that question, which seems answer enough for Naz. He laughs bitterly. "Once a coward, always a coward."
"Tell me what I can do," she says. "Just... whatever it is. Just tell me."
"You know what I want. You stay out of my way, and I won't hurt you, Carmela. It's as simple as that. I don't want to hurt you-for her sake, I hope I don't have to. But nothing's going to stop me from getting what I want."
"I understand," she says, taking another step toward us. "Just let Karissa go. Please."
"I can't do that," Naz says. My mother makes an unnatural noise at his refusal. I'm too stunned to react. One of Naz's arms lets go of me as he reaches for the car door. "Get in."
My eyes widen as I look at him. "What?"
His eyes meet mine. "Get in the car."
The voice in the back of my head screams for me to pull away from him, to run to my mother, but his troubled expression is enough to make my feet move toward the car.
I slide into the passenger seat, and he slams the door, standing there for a moment longer.
He loves me, I remind myself. There's no reason to be afraid.
But this isn't my Naz, the Naz I fell in love with, and Ignazio Vitale scares the hell out of me.
Through the window, I can hear my mother pleading with him some more, his voice casual as he shrugs off her concerns.
My heart is in my throat, my stomach queasy when Naz gets in. He says nothing, starting the car and speeding away. He never looks at me, never addresses me during the drive. His hand no longer tries to hold mine. Things are so tense I think I might explode. It all keeps playing in my mind in a loop, their words, and his actions, everything that happened today playing over and over again.
I'm not sure what to think about any of it.
We get to the house, and I wrap my arms around my chest as I stand in the living room, trying to combat the swell of nausea as reality slams into me. "I don't understand."
Naz loosens his tie. "What don't you understand, Karissa?"
"Any of it."
He's quiet for a moment as he takes off his coat. "I told you one day get him."
"What? Who?"
"The man who stole my life from me."
My eyes widen as that sinks in. "It was him? My father?"
"Johnny Rita and I were practically family. He was my best friend. And that meant nothing to him. He murdered my wife and kid right in front of me."
"Did you know?" I whisper. "Did you know it was me all along?"
His expression offers no apologies. I think I'm going to be sick. I shove past him, running for the kitchen, and fall to my knees in front of the trashcan, losing whatever's in my stomach. Naz follows, pausing in the doorway behind me.
"You knew," I say, my vision blurred. "You used me all along just to try to find my father... just so you can kill him!"
"That's not true," he says. "I knew who you were, Karissa, but I didn't use you so I could kill him. It was never my intention to kill Johnny. I said I wanted to make him pay."
"How?"
"He killed my family," Naz says. "So I was going to kill his."
Oh God.
I lose it again, heaving until my body has nothing else to give. I hear Naz approach, feel his hand pressing against my back. Trembling, I cower away, scurrying across the floor and pressing my back against the cabinets as I pull my knees up to my chest, trying to slink away. I stare at him, horrified.
He was planning to kill me.
Oh God, he's going to kill me.
"You promised," I cry. "You promised you wouldn't hurt me."
He crouches down in front of me. "And I'm not going to. I can't lie to you, Karissa. I've never lied to you."
I scoff.
His expression hardens. "Name one time I lied to you."
"You lied about everything!"
"No, everything I've told you was true. Just because I didn't tell you all of it doesn't mean I lied. Everyone has secrets."
"I don't."
"You did," he says. "I was your secret. We keep the darkest parts of us to ourselves until we think others are ready to see them. Sometimes that never happens, but I knew it tonight... knew it was time for you to see me."
"See you? You're a monster!"
"I am," he admits, "but don't pretend to be surprised. You knew that about me all along."
"I didn't."
"Ah, I don't lie to you, so at least give me the same respect in return," he says. "The pieces were all there from the beginning, every single one of them. Just because you refused to put them together, to look at the big picture, doesn't mean you didn't know what it was. I told you I wasn't a good man. I told you I never would be. That's reality, sweetheart, and you still asked me to stay." He reaches for me, grazing the back of his hand along my cheek and down my neck, across my chest. "You handed over your body so willingly, like it already belonged to me."
I smack his hand away, the loud crack echoing through the silent kitchen as I try to move further away from him. "There's something wrong with you."
"There's a lot wrong with me," he says. "Has been ever since your father aimed a shotgun at my chest and pulled the trigger."
"Why?" The word is barely audible as tears spill over from the corner of my eyes. "Why did he do it? Why would he?"
"Revenge."
"Why?" I ask again. "What did you do to him?"
"Nothing," he says. "It wasn't me he wanted vengeance against. He did it to get back at my wife's father."
"Her father?"
He nods. "Ray."
I blink rapidly. I can only stare at him in shock.
His wife was Raymond Angelo's daughter?
"I was caught in the middle, condemned to die at the hands of someone close to me, someone who was supposed to love me. God spared me, but you see, nobody would've spared you, not when I was done with you, so you're lucky... you're fucking lucky... I fell in love with you."