Vendetta(95)

He studied me — the bruising on my face and the lopsided way I was holding myself, my hands clutched beneath my ribs. He shut his eyes, there was a sharp intake of breath, and I swore both our hearts cracked just a little in that moment.

“I’m sorry,” he said, opening his eyes again.

I couldn’t tell him it was OK. It was a million miles away from being OK. But I offered him something small: a soft, watery smile for the boy who had kissed me like I had never been kissed before. He had goodness in him, even if it was buried far beneath the codes he lived his life by.

I stood back from Nic and he brushed by me, taking his place beside Luca in the car. He reached out for my hand and I gave it to him. He held it carefully, like it was made of porcelain, and traced the red marks on my wrist with his thumb. Then he lifted it to his lips and kissed it. “Riguardati,” he murmured against my skin.

And then the Falcone brothers were gone from me, and I was doubled over on the ground, crying so hard I could barely breathe.





The more I cried, the more I thought about everything that had happened, and slowly, my resolve grew steadier than all the pain swimming inside me. If all the Falcones did was put people in the ground, then how could they know the benefits of second chances and what they can do for someone? How much good were they doing by ripping the potential out of a man before he could find the good in himself?

Luca and Nic might not have had a choice about killing Jack, but I did. I didn’t know his number to call him — never mind that my phone was presently in the possession of thug-in-training C.J. — but I knew where they were going, I had a weapon, and I had money to get there. If I abandoned my uncle now, I would never forgive myself, and I would never think of Nic with anything other than contempt. I had made a promise to my father to look after Jack, and if his brother died like this I knew he would never recover. He was barely hanging on already.

But there was still time, I could still do something. I could stand between Nic and my uncle, I could stop him from killing him. I might not have been able to convince Luca, but I knew Nic would listen to me. He wouldn’t devastate my family so completely, not after everything we had shared with each other.

I picked myself up and did my best to clean my face, wiping the blood from my chin and pulling my hair around my eyes to hide the bruising. I forced my body to straighten, walked into the service station, and broke the fifty-dollar bill so that I’d have one measly quarter to call a cab. I waited in the service station bathroom until it arrived, studying my reflection. I pulled my matted hair back from my face and stifled a horrified gasp. Deep bruises pooled out from under my swollen eyes. The bridge of my nose was crooked, and my cheeks and chin were red-raw from where I had scrubbed the blood away. I gripped the sides of the sink as the pain in my ribs surged. A few weeks ago, my biggest problem was the stifling July humidity. How had it come to this?

Somewhere along the way, there had been a gross misunderstanding. Everything had spiraled out of control. I couldn’t just think about the drugs or the money or the dark parts of my uncle’s soul without thinking about the good parts of him, too — the parts I knew existed. My uncle was not the one-dimensional villain the Falcones thought he was — how could they make allowances for themselves and not him? It wasn’t right. Even if I couldn’t convince them of that before it was too late, I still had to try.

Twenty minutes later, and to the bewilderment of the cab driver, I got out at a vacant lot on the outskirts of Old Hegewisch. Along the periphery, plastic bags floated like ghosts over sideways shopping carts. The old auto warehouse was halfway across the lot; it was a huge, faceless structure, its cracked concrete walls stained with rust and pigeon crap. On either side, shipping containers were precariously stacked like giant LEGOs, orange, beige, and blue. Along the top, a worn sign reading GREENE’S AUTO SUPPLIES swung precariously from its final screw. I walked briskly toward it, feeling less scared than I should have been. I was running entirely on adrenaline now, and I could feel my pulse in my fingertips.

I walked along a row of corrugated steel containers until I found an alley barely wider than a car. It was pitch-black and completely hidden from the entrance to the parking lot. At the end of the alley, I turned right and found two of the Falcones’ SUVs, parked and empty. So Luca and Nic were here already, but who had come in the other car? It was obvious why they had chosen the spot. It gave them a secret entrance and an immediate upper hand for when Jack arrived.

At the back of the warehouse, a small door was hidden behind several stacks of wooden crates. It was partially ajar. The lock had been broken, but I doubted its necessity — the door itself was already crumbling at the edges, and probably could have been kicked in by a child.