by Ella James
“I found something better,” I tell Max.
“What’s it cut with?”
I wiggle my brows, grinning as I tug my beanie up so he can see them. Niente, I almost say, but translate to the more recognizable Spanish. “Nada.”
“Seriously?”
I shrug. Then I lean in, touching his shoulder like we’re digging each other on our date—for any eyes that might be watching. I feel bad because he sort of jumps like it surprised him.
“Too much smooth moves?”
He snorts, and then he reaches up and rubs the shoulder. “Just go for the other side next time.”
“Mmkay.” I make a mental note that if Max and I have any other fake dates and I feel him up, it’s gotta be the right side. I’m not asking why. I know he got hurt before he came back stateside, but it’s not my business.
“I’ll stick to these rugged paws.” I grin as I hold my left hand out, and he laughs as he gives me his right one.
“This is fucking weird, Galante. You owe me.”
“Oh, c’mon. I’m a catch.”
“You’re that big fish that turns out to be a tree limb.”
I give a low hoot. “That’s some harsh shit, Romano.”
He gives me a grin I’ve heard slays all the dudes.
“You’ve got long eyelashes,” I notice. “Do the other dudes like that shit?”
He looks at the boat’s floor. “I don’t know.” He sounds defensive, and I realize maybe he’s embarrassed. Surely not, though.
I’m still holding his hand, so I turn it over like I’m reading his palm. “Ahh, damn.” There’s a burn scar on his palm that hurts to look at.
“Sensitive area,” I remark. I curl my hand into a fist atop his palm.
He rubs the scar with the fingers of his other hand. “Burn. Couldn’t feel it. Anyway, so…you want more specifics?”
“What I really want is a doorway to their files. “You know who’s got the goods? Who’s been doing most of this ‘detective’ work?” I clarify.
“Yeah, but…” He looks puzzled.
I give him a smug grin. “Just tell me whose computer you think they’re on. Or who’s got server access. Give me names for every possibility. I’ll take care of the rest.”
He gives a low whistle. “That’s some smooth shit, Houdini. We both know it’s not you, either, is it?”
“Do we know that, though?”
He sort of rolls his eyes. “Your brother’s damn near famous.”
“It’s not my brother.”
He snorts. “Anyway, I think the most damning stuff’s the shit about the pills. They know you’re getting them from a woman, Patrice—or you were.”
I nod slowly. That is fucking inconvenient. “How long have they been on this?”
“A long time, I think—like a year. They say you’re hard as hell to get a trace on.”
“Not that hard.” I smirk, and he snickers.
“I do have one question,” I say.
His brows arch.
“Do you know when they’re gonna take it to the D.A.?”
Max smiles, wolfish. “I heard soon. What does it matter, though? You got a time machine?”
“Fuck you, Romano.”
“You saying you want to?”
I lean in, and Max leans closer so our foreheads nearly touch.
“You think this looks romantic?” I ask.
“Central Park Lake—peak romantic.”
“Even on a cold-ass day?”
He leans back, adjusting his scarf as he does, so it covers the lower portion of his face. I do the same, just being careful. “So, you giving me those names or what?” I ask him.
“How’re you going to remember?”
I’ve got a burner phone in my coat pocket, but that thing’s keys suck and my hands are numb. I tap my forehead, and he frowns like he’s skeptical.
“Hit me.”
Max gives me four names, which I commit to memory. “Thanks, dude. You wanna head toward one of those hot chocolate stands and then split?”
“Yeah, you gotta get your own, though,” he says. “I’m going dairy free.”
“Fancy shit.”
“Says the motherfucker with six-hundred-dollar sneakers.”
I smile at my limited-edition kicks. “Says the shoe hound who wishes he had some.”
I pick up the oars, winking as I row, because I think I know a thank you gift for Sgt. Max Romano.
6
Elise
“Tags: Houdini. Risotto. Bulgur. Name: C. Madden. Date: November 21st, 2016. Summary—”
I pull my phone out of my jacket pocket, squinting at the bright light as my glove-clad fingers fumble at the screen. My pointer finger connects with the pause button, quieting the mechanized voice of the text-to-audio software we use at work, and I slip the phone back into my pocket.
I look left and right—discreetly, of course—in case someone is watching. But no one is. I’m not that important.
The next few minutes walking west on pre-dawn East Seventy-Second Street are spent belly breathing. I’m wearing studded trainers that won’t slip on ice, so all I have to pay attention to are the white clouds my breaths make against the cityscape. They disappear in wispy tendrils in the charcoal sky. As I approach Fifth Avenue, tiny flurries start to fall.
I pull my beanie over my ears and pop the collar on my thin, black fleece. The snow is fine. I’ve been running this same trek through Central Park for I don’t know how long. I guess four years, when I moved from SoHo, where I lived with Dani and Ree, to the Park Avenue condo I inherited when Mom passed. It was hers before she married my dad, purchased for her by her parents.
I blow a breath out, focus on the here and now. It’s New Year’s Day. In five days, I’ll be sworn in. Then I’ll really be the D.A. Soon, circumstances will force me to listen to the files I copied off my work server and onto my computer’s drive, and then had funneled through the text-to-voice software.
I know a lot of what’s in the files, but I haven’t read or listened to them from this vantage point. When something comes through the system and is tagged Houdini, I copy it onto my drive and copy that onto a disc for backup. I’m almost positive he’s got someone in our office—because I noticed recently that some of what I’ve got on my drive has been conveniently scrubbed from the office’s server.
A few years back, when I first decided to look at Luca’s file, I started browsing all the active mafia stuff—to throw off anyone who might look at my digital footprint—and I think that’s what led to my assignment on the Armenian task force. My predecessor D.A., Christopher Rutherford, thought my time pouring over mafia casework meant I was interested in that kind of prosecution.
I wonder what he’d think if he knew the truth.
My favorite stretching spot is coming up: a little bench near a condo complex’s revolving doorway, where there’s always a doorman posted. On weekends and holidays, when I do a street run instead of my usual home gym gig, I stretch before leaving my place, but I like to do a few things right before I start down Fifth Avenue on the first leg of my run.
I push the bottom of my shoe sole up against the bench’s leg, stretching my calf, and then I do the other one. I’m wearing second gen AirPods, but they’re on the setting that cuts out all the white noise, so I can hear what’s going on around me. I listen carefully as I stretch my hamstrings. Ever since my detailing ended, I’ve become more cautious about being out in the dark. I have a can of pepper spray clipped to my pants, but I’ve been thinking of taking up cycling. Although if someone wanted to take me out, I assume they could manage even with me on a bike.
Stop that, I tell myself firmly. Nothing is going to happen to you.
The doorman waves as I slip my iPhone into its arm band. I wave back, start my smart watch, and set off, soothed by the rhythm of traffic and the uniquely Manhattan scent of exhaust, coffee, and fresh snow falling on the oil-blotched asphalt.
I don’t give Luca permission to enter my
brain, but he lurks as I run. I see him in the crowd that night back in November, clapping with his lips curved into a smile. Luca. Sometimes it seems impossible that he was really there.
And why was he? Ree thinks it was a play to my emotions, for when, inevitably, a case involving him or one of his people crosses my desk. When I saw Dani on Christmas night, she had a completely different theory. She thinks he wanted to see me win.
“I think he still loves you,” she’d slurred, half asleep in my lap. She said something that my brain has circled back to: “It’s like Romeo and Juliet…except the outside forces won.”
Does Dani not remember Romeo and Juliet? It’s not as if they “won.” I know she used to like lit class, so I figure she must have had way too much to drink before we found each other at that party and slipped into a sitting room to chat. There’s something going on with her lately, but I’m not sure what.
Snow starts falling faster as I follow the slick sidewalk into Central Park. Small flakes cling to my eyelashes. I pull my neck gaiter over the bridge of my nose and lengthen my strides, appreciating how my shoe soles grip the icy surface of East Drive.
There’s a snowy cut-through to the running path around the reservoir. It’s narrower than East Drive, shaded by thick trees in some spots. I want that now—the insulation. Let the snow muffle my feelings. I hit the path at a sprint, and the trees swallow me up. The reservoir’s surface looks milky white under powdery patches of snow, working on becoming wholly frozen. I try to pretend I’m in some far-away land…someplace where it’s only me, none of life’s problems. Wind tosses snow around the path ahead of me.
Still, he dances through my mind. Adult Luca in his adult suit, half brand new and half the oldest thing I know. And he was there for me. He was looking up at me. I remember how my eyes just…picked him. Then I saw his face and couldn’t ever look away.
I realize I don’t want his case on my docket. I want him to disappear into an alternate universe where I won’t have to see him ever again.
That’s my dirty secret: I still ache.
I tuck a strand of hair into my beanie, ratcheting up my pace until my quads burn. Studded trainers for the win.
I’m unstoppable, I tell myself—and I believe me. I’ve had more than double Becca’s years on this earth. In her honor, I’ve taught myself to be strong. Who cares if a case relating to him passes through my office? Even if he came that night to watch me…even if I still remember that look on his face after I slapped him in the elevator—and sometimes I see that wide-eyed, shocked face in my nightmares—the fact remains that we’re both full-grown adults now. He’s a stranger. That he’s also a mob don isn’t really relevant at all.
In a week, I’ll take an oath to uphold the law, to hold the citizens of New York City to its tenets in all honesty and fairness. I can do that. I can do that well.
I run faster, needing it to hurt. Everything is soft and white, a winter kingdom, and I’m not the monster’s prey; I am the fucking queen. I veer onto Bridle Path and find a little trail that’s nice and snow-packed, moving northward, toward the Ravine.
As I run through glittering trees, I think of Jace, my pretend fiancé—who’ll become my husband if need be. I think of Dani, who kidnapped me from my house last Saturday night and set up a wine sampling for us in her kitchen. I think of Ree, who took nine months off from her job as an investment analyst at JP Morgan-Chase to run my campaign—and did it like a boss. I think of my dad, who moved into a one-room condo in a modest building where he and his friends play blackjack on the rooftop every Friday. He told me last time we talked that he had a date with someone he met at the post office. The post office!
I tell myself that life is magical.
I’ve got the Foo Fighters bumping in my EarPods when they die. I’m not good at changing their settings, so I hit something that triggers the white noise feature, and then I can’t turn it off. I can still sort of hear my footfall, hard and rhythmic, as my snow cleats beat the ground. A cloud of fog rolls over my path, unfurling in tendrils between the sparkling, leafless trees.
Something like excitement kicks in my chest—at the journey coming my way soon. Serving as D.A. will be both challenging and interesting. It’s a public service, in a sense. My mind flits back to Luca, but I push those thoughts away. I slow a notch and get some deeper breaths. I’m almost to the Pool. In a minute, I’ll run past a lemonade stand, shuttered at this time but permanently stationed there beside two long, iron benches.
Making lemonade from lemons…
I picture the tiny glass of lemonade tattooed near my ankle. That’s what I’m thinking about when the rhythm changes. I’m so hypnotized by the swirling snow and my footfall, rocked gently by endorphins, that it takes me a moment to realize there are steps beside mine.
No, not beside me.
Someone is behind me.
Deep breaths, Elise. There are other runners. I’ve already passed a guy wearing bright orange and some hottie with a lip ring. I slow my pace, letting the person pass. And Luca moves into my frame of vision.
Such a shock. It moves through me like a shot of some drug—even as my legs keep pumping. Luca is beside me, running right here with me.
My eyes move over him, and then again. My body throbs as my head buzzes. He’s got scruff. His face is wider, harder, older…but his eyes, his brows, his mouth—they’re the same.
I don’t plan to stop. I notice a sensation like I can’t breathe, and then I’m jogging in place, gulping cold air.
He stares at me.
I gape at him.
“Hi there,” he says softly.
Tears sting my eyes—tears of shock. “Mr. Galante.”
“Madam D.A.”
“That’s not my name.” I dart off, gaining speed with each stride. I fly over cobblestones and under icy branches, past streetlamps and benches and the shuttered lemonade stand. But I can’t outrun him.
“I know your name.” It’s a low growl.
I run harder, but he’s like a shadow. I don’t even hear him breathing. I’m panting now, can’t get enough air. I slow my pace and whirl to find him looking stricken, all blue eyes and troubled brows and that mouth. He used to come with me on top of him when I would bite that mouth.
“What do you want?”
“What do you have?” he asks, quiet as the snow.
I have nothing—nothing for him—so I push myself still harder, gaining speed again as I approach the white sheet of the Lake. I’m aware of his presence beside me. Sturdy, heavy. My body feels like something thawing—cold and hot and stricken.
“I don’t have anything for you.” I’m dizzy. I’m aware of my watch beeping for some time before I slow to a jog.
What the heck? I push at the screen. It’s a smart watch, and it’s never done this. My eyes are too blurry to read the screen. I blink twice and…it’s a small, black heart. The heart is flashing—because my heart is beating too fast!
This has got to be a joke.
I rub my thumb over the screen and press my fingertip against the icon. Then he’s standing close enough so I can feel his heat. He takes my wrist in his hands—big hands, cool and careful. A second later, the sound stops.
I open my eyes, not realizing I’d closed them until that second. I open my eyes to find his on me. “Okay?” Soft and rough. It’s so Luca—the deep voice and everything about the way he asks that question, with concern that’s cloaked in something quiet and somber.
“I’m perfectly fine.” I jerk the watch off of my wrist, close my shaking fist around it. I look at his face—for just a second. Something in me widens, like an aperture; light floods in. Such thick scruff on his face. There’s a scar by his mouth, little crow’s feet by his glass-blue eyes.
My mother’s word—the word is “dreamboat”—flits through my mind, and I feel a stinging shot of panic-rage.
I take off running again, transparent as you please, and now I’m mortified. I’m horrified and sick and desperate, desperate for�
��I don’t know. I want to outrun him. Every time I look over, his eyes are on me.
“Why are you here, Luca Galante?”
As we both run, his gaze touches the ground. “I don’t know.” Now he pulls ahead of me. He’s running faster. I strain slightly to match his pace.
I can hear him breathing, feel his faint heat. I can smell him. Each time our eyes lock, my pulse surges. I can’t stand to look at his face, so I take in his bare arms: strong, thick wrists, his elegant hands. Who lets him run without a long-sleeved shirt on?
Our eyes catch again. I find his face is somber.
What do you have to say to me now? What the hell are you doing?
I can barely breathe, would never ask those questions. I look at the ground, and suddenly I’m feeling nothing. I should ask about the victory rally. I should tell him there’s a glass of lemonade inked into my skin—in memoriam of unbroken girls.
When we’re near Tavern on the Green, he says, “I’m gonna do something in just a second. Don’t worry—it won’t hurt. Just wanna cover all our bases.”
Chills prickle my forearms, but there’s no time for concern. It happens fast: his hands on my shoulders, throwing me off balance as he spins me, cushioning my fall as my back collides with the trunk of a cold tree. He’s so close I feel his breath as his hand delves beneath my beanie. He makes a gentle fist in my hair.
“Look at me,” he orders. I blink at him. “Slap my face.”
“What?” I’m falling through his pupils.
“I want you to slap me.”
I do—and it’s so hard, his cheek reflects my palm’s shape in bright pink. Luca reels back. He laughs, a hoarse puff of sound, and presses his hand over the mark. Then he turns around and keeps on running.
7
Elise
Two Weeks Later
“Finis!” I clap the folder shut.
Dani’s brown eyes blink a few times. “I…” She makes a pretty “o” with her mouth. “That’s— I just…” She shakes her head slowly, pulling the tie from her silky black hair as she does, so it cascades over her shoulders.
