by Sam Mariano
I pull myself back to the present and look at the door. I don’t expect it to be Rafe or Sin—Rafe wouldn’t knock, and if Sin did, he wouldn’t be gentle.
It’s Mia.
Adrian immediately steps forward. “What are you doing? You shouldn’t be in here.”
“I just wanted to check on Virginia,” she volunteers.
“No,” he says firmly, planting his hands on her shoulders and pushing her back. “You keep your nose out of this. We’re going home tomorrow morning. This is not our problem.”
Scowling up at him and grabbing onto the door as he tries to shove her back out into the hallway, she says, “I’m not going to get involved, I just want to see if she’s okay. She’s probably terrified. Don’t be a jerk, Adrian.”
“Go away,” he tells her. “Go swim in the pool or play with your babies. Go do something else.”
Planting a hand on her hip, she tells him, “No.”
“Why do you have to be a pain in my ass? You would never pull this shit with Mateo.”
Flashing him a playful smile, she says, “That’s why you’re my second husband, not my first.”
Adrian mutters and takes a step back, letting her back inside the bedroom. “Do not get close to her,” he says more firmly. “She knows your value; she could use you for leverage to get herself free.”
I shoot Adrian a mildly annoyed look as I wiggle back against the headboard. “I’m not going to hurt her. She’s never done anything to me, and she has babies. I’m also handcuffed, so unless I want to bear hug her, I can’t do much to her.”
“Yes, you could,” he argues.
“Maybe you could. I’m a waitress, not special ops. I assure you, I cannot do more than hug her with these cuffs on, and if Rafe saw me hugging Mia, I have a feeling it would drift into fantasy territory, not hostage negotiations.”
Completely disregarding Adrian’s orders not to get close to me, Mia comes over and sits down on the edge of Rafe’s bed, smiling faintly at me. “I’m glad to see you haven’t lost your humor.”
Shaking his head, Adrian draws out his gun, pulls back the hammer, and points it at me. My face freezes, but he’s merely warning me. “Touch her, and I’ll clean up Rafe’s mess for him.”
“Adrian,” Mia objects, looking at him with wide eyes.
“I don’t trust her,” he states.
“I won’t touch her,” I promise.
Sighing, Mia shakes her head and looks back at me. “I’m so sorry about this. I wasn’t trying to make things worse, I just wanted to see how you were doing. I thought maybe I could bring you something. Are you hungry? Thirsty? I could bring you a book to read, or maybe a robe to wear? They have you practically naked in here. I have a soft satin robe I could bring you. I brought it from home, but it’s clean, I haven’t worn it. Would you like me to get it for you?”
I shake my head, nodding my head at the cuffs. “I can’t get my hands in the sleeves, but thank you.”
“Nothing to eat?”
“I don’t really have much of an appetite right now,” I tell her.
She nods her understanding and we sit there quietly for a minute. Her gaze lingers on the bedding, and after a pause she asks, “So, you know a lot of things you shouldn’t, huh?”
There’s no point denying it, so I nod my head. “Yep.”
Her blue eyes meet mine with just a hint of wariness. “Do you know anything about my husband?”
“I know he doesn’t like tortilla chips,” I say, lightly. With a more reassuring smile, I shake my head. “Nothing I could use against him in a legal capacity. Don’t worry.”
The weight on her shoulders lightens some, but she still looks vaguely concerned. “Sometimes I struggle with certain aspects of this life. I wasn’t brought up in it or anything, I was just… I was normal. I don’t come from a cutthroat world. I don’t have it in me to be hard and ruthless. I always want to save people, and sometimes I’m wrong. Sometimes the people I want to save would destroy my family, destroy my whole life. Sometimes… sometimes I shouldn’t try to help. I’ve learned that. But it’s still hard.”
I can’t imagine why she would feel she owes me anything, but I tell her, “You don’t have to try to save me, Mia. Like Adrian said, I’m really not your problem.”
She nods a little sadly. “I know. I just can’t help it.”
She needs to help me. She needs to do something. There’s no point in both of us feeling shitty, so I throw her a task. “Actually, I am a little thirsty. Maybe you could bring me a cold bottle of water?”
“Of course,” she says, standing and heading for the door. Glancing at me over her shoulder, she offers a little smile and says, “I’ll be right back.”
When she leaves, Adrian regards me with his wordless stare. I can’t read it, but I assume it’s distrustful.
“Don’t worry, I can’t fashion a bomb out of a water bottle,” I tell him. “I’m not 007.”
I mean, without reading instructions first, I can’t do that. No point telling him that part.
“Do not try to manipulate her,” he warns.
“I’m not trying to manipulate anyone,” I assure him. “I could tell she was distressed, and I thought doing me a small favor would make her feel better about not being able to do the bigger one. I’m not scheming. You can all relax. Rafe is persecuting an innocent, not an adversary.”
He doesn’t comment further, just levels me a look unfriendly enough to remind me he has no qualms about killing me, in case I forgot.
A few minutes later, Mia comes back with two bottles of water. She uncaps mine for me and hands it to me, then uncaps her own and takes a sip. We sit in a companionable silence for a couple minutes, then I hold out my water, since I don’t want to startle Adrian by reaching across the bed. Mia takes it, caps it, and puts it on the end table beside Rafe’s bed.
“Do you love him?” she asks me.
“Rafe? Yes.”
“Why did you hold onto evidence that might hurt him?”
“It wouldn’t—” I sigh, leaning back against the headboard. “I did that a lifetime ago. I didn’t do anything with it. If I wanted to take down Rafe and his family, I would have done it already. I may not have destroyed it like I should have, but that’s—I’m not perfect. I made a mistake. I’m a procrastinator. I’m not always the most decisive person in theory, I talk myself in circles in my head so it’s hard to commit to a decision when it’s still hypothetical, but when I have to act, I do. When I’m pushed, when I can’t delay anymore, I make the right choice. I would have never betrayed Rafe. He just… he wouldn’t trust me. Even before this. He never will now,” I finish quietly.
Curling her legs up on the bed behind her, she says, “Why don’t you tell me about him? Show me Rafe through your eyes. Tell me about your relationship.”
I don’t know what good that will do her, but it’s what I was doing before she came in anyway, so I get back to reliving the best of times—only this time, with a rapt audience.
34
Rafe
My glass is empty.
I grab the bottle like I’m angry at it and tip it, watching the rich liquid slosh into my glass. I wish I could pour it straight into my veins. I need to be epic levels of fucked up, and this is taking too damn long.
I put the bottle down and drag the glass closer.
Mateo is still holding his cup in his hand. Arching a dark eyebrow at me, he asks, “Not going to warm it up first?”
I inhale it, which is answer enough, but I slam the cup down and grab the bottle again. “Nope.”
Shaking his head, Mateo says, “Shouldn’t have let you open that bottle. You’re wasting it.”
“It’s mine to waste,” I point out, dumping some more amber liquid into my glass. “Don’t tell me you never wasted good alcohol after Beth.”
“I’ve wasted plenty of good alcohol in my time,” he admits. “Of course, I had Adrian around. Sometimes he’d switch decanters on me to save me from myself,” he says
wryly.
“Good ol’ Adrian,” I mutter, staring at the amber liquid in my glass.
Mateo watches me for a moment, then tells me, “Sometimes you miss what’s right in front of you, Rafe. I’ve overlooked enemies in my circle before, too. That’s why you surround yourself with the right people. Everybody misses something, but nobody misses everything. Enough vigilant eyes around, you’ll catch the important stuff.”
“I think I hate this job,” I tell him, shaking my head at the irony of it. I killed to have it, to prove a point, and now that I’ve made it, I have less of what actually matters in life than I had before. “This is a shitty fucking way to live. How do you trust anyone? How do you live your whole life seeing enemies everywhere you look?”
“That’s all I’ve ever known,” he says, shrugging, glancing down at the gleaming surface of my desk. “That’s the job, Rafe. You’ll settle into it and find your stride; you’ve just had a steep learning curve. Surround yourself with the right people and remain vigilant. Every corner of your life doesn’t have to be that way. Find yourself a good woman you can trust, someone who loves you and provides you with an escape from the ugliness of this life. You won’t have as many friends now that you’re at the top, so choose those closest to you very carefully. They say it’s lonely at the top for a reason. It is. You’ll have to get used to it.”
“I trusted her. I trusted Virginia. I thought…” I shake my head, trailing off. She was my escape. She was my pocket of happy normalcy, the consistent one I could count on when everyone else in my life was questionable.
I don’t want to do this, that’s the problem. I know what I have to do. I know the score. She’s not just a witness, she’s a fucking super witness. Killing her is the only responsible thing to do. It’s the hard decision a boss has to make, to consider what’s best for his family, even if fucking hurts like hell.
Why did she have to lie to me? Why did she have to keep the fucking evidence? Why can’t she just be a simple fucking waitress?
“I’m done with women,” I decide, grabbing my glass and emptying that one, too. “Can’t trust ‘em,” I mutter. “Can’t trust anybody.”
Smiling with dry amusement, Mateo says, “The day you’re done with women is the day I’m done pissing people off. I’ll believe it when I see it.”
Speaking of women, there’s a light knock and the door and his scampers inside. She’s wearing a white sundress with bright orange flowers on it and heels that probably cost upwards of a thousand dollars. Her blond hair is pinned back on the sides, and her blue eyes go straight to her husband. A faint smile crosses her lips, like an instinct; she’s just so fucking happy to see him, she can’t help smiling.
I want that. I want to be loved the way she loves this bastard.
She walks right over, drapes an arm around his neck, and takes a seat on his lap like it’s the most natural thing in the world. He leans back in his chair, winding his free arm around her waist. “Are you ready for bed?”
Mia shakes her head, leaning in to brush her lips against his. “Not just yet.” Nodding at the glass in his hand, she points out, “You haven’t even finished your drink yet.”
He lifts the glass toward her. “Want a taste?”
Wrinkling up her nose, she shakes her head. “Gross. I only like the taste of your nasty alcohol if it’s leftover on your lips.”
“Mm, good answer,” he says, catching her around the back of her neck and pulling her in for a deeper kiss.
Sighing, I grab my glass and waste some more alcohol. Fucking happily married assholes.
I miss Virginia.
I’m pissed off at Virginia, but I fucking miss her.
Fuck.
When Mia and Mateo manage to separate, she clears her throat and addresses me. “Are you okay over there? You look… not completely okay.”
I’m in the mood to be an asshole, so I pat my empty thigh. “Why don’t you come have a seat over here and make me all better?”
Leveling me an unimpressed look, she says, “I don’t think so.”
“Not in the market for a third husband, huh?” I murmur, eyeing up my drink, then tipping it back and gulping it down.
“I’m not sure I can manage a whole harem of gangster husbands. Sorry,” she says dryly.
I shrug. “Worth a shot.”
“I have a significantly better idea though,” she tells me.
“What’s that?” I inquire.
Nodding toward the door of my study, she says, “You should go upstairs and let Virginia make you feel better.”
“Virginia betrayed me,” I murmur.
“No, she didn’t,” Mia says. “She could have, but she didn’t. She made a mistake keeping it a secret, that’s all. Sometimes people make mistakes, Rafe. Her heart was in the right place, and that’s what matters. Virginia never wanted to hurt you. That woman loves you. If anything, the fact that she turned her back on something she worked for so much of her life for you should prove that.”
“Now she says she turned her back on it,” I state. “Of course she says that now, Mia. I caught her red-handed. What else is she going to say?”
“Well, I believe her,” she insists.
“Of course you do. You think I’m a good man. You have questionable judgment.”
“I think you have it in you to be a good man, and I think you can prove it right now,” she tells me. “Virginia loves you, and if you love her back, you need to prove it. Do you know what she just spent our whole visit doing? Telling me how damn wonderful you are. You, the man she thinks is going to kill her for something that’s not even her fault. She can’t help if she remembers things. She can’t help if you were careless enough to say shit in front of her that you shouldn’t have. If she really had betrayed you, I would understand. I would. I’ve watched a woman I trusted stand over my husband with a gun pointed at his head, so yes, I get that sometimes you have to do the unpleasant thing, but this isn’t one of those times.”
Mateo leans forward and puts his drink down, gently caressing Mia’s face and turning her back in his direction. “Sweetheart, what did I say about intervening in business matters?”
Her tone is much softer, much less bossy when aimed at him than it was when she was just telling me off. “Mateo, he’s making a mistake. She’s not a rat. Can’t he test her like you tested me? I mean, not the same way. But surely there’s something less drastic that can be done.”
“Rafe doesn’t administer tests, he solves problems, and it’s not your business,” he informs her, tugging her down for a kiss to take out any sting his words might have caused.
“He might not find someone like her again,” Mia insists, looking back at me. “You’re hurt right now, so maybe you’re not thinking clearly. But so is she, and you’re not even giving her a chance. Love is a two-way street, Rafe. Sometimes circumstances arise that test that love, and it’s up to us to decide whether it lives or dies. You can choose hatred, and you can assume she would have betrayed you, and you can kill her. That won’t make you happy.”
“This isn’t about chasing happiness, Mia. It’s a matter of safety. Of security.”
“Do you love her?” she asks simply, like nothing I’ve said matters.
Sighing heavily, I tell her, “That’s frankly irrelevant at this point.”
“I don’t think it is. Anyway, you didn’t let me finish. Instead of choosing hatred, you can choose love.”
“Love is a feeling, not a choice. Go sing Kumbaya in the woods with some hippies if you want to hang out with people who buy that shit,” I mutter.
“No,” she says firmly. “Don’t tell me I don’t know love. I know love like you assholes know mob politics. Believe me when I tell you, love is a choice. It’s a choice you make over and over again. You say it’s not a choice because it isn’t always the easy thing to do, and you don’t want to pull someone else’s heavy load. You call it strength, but it’s fear. You dismiss real love and call it weakness because it’s not something you can
understand in your stingy, egotistical heart, but that doesn’t make you right. It makes you sad and lonely, and you blame everyone else, but it’s your own damn fault. You life won’t change until you start making different choices, Rafe. Until you let love in.”
Some of what she’s saying lands in a logical place. I even agree with some of it. I do appreciate emotionally strong women, women who love with the unrelenting strength of a warrior, but I guess I don’t enforce the same requirements on myself. Virginia has offered me her love on countless occasions, even knowing I might crush her, and despite the abundance of her love, I couldn’t even commit to a relationship. I asked her for vulnerability, but I kept her at a comfortable distance.
Mia is still riled up, and she doesn’t know I agree with her in any capacity, so she keeps lecturing me. “Sometimes love requires forgiveness. Do you really think Virginia has never had to forgive you? I know who you are, I know that’s not even possible. She has made that choice for you, probably more times than you can even imagine. Have you ever had to forgive her before?”
No. She’s pretty fucking perfect—evidence-gathering rat business aside.
I must have shaken my head, I can’t remember, but Mia nods like I did. “See? So now it’s your turn. I’m sure in the long haul, you’ll require much more forgiveness than she ever will, but you have to be willing to bend once in a while, to fight for her when she really needs it. You’re a fool if you kill the love she has for you, Rafe. A hopeless fool.”
I let her words marinate for a moment, then I glance up at her. “I told her I was going to kill her, Mia.”
“She knows who you are,” Mia says, shaking her head like that’s not a dealbreaker. “Clearly Virginia doesn’t hold grudges, or she wouldn’t have been with you in the first place after watching you whore around right in front of her for years.”
“That’s true,” I allow.
“She is hurt, but she still loves you. I bet you anything that woman loves you so much, you could ask her forgiveness before pulling the trigger, and she’d give it to you. Virginia has a good heart, and it belongs to you. She is not a rat. She is not a traitor. She has what it takes to love you, and she does not deserve to die because you’re afraid of what she might do with information she cannot help storing in her mind. There’s always another way, Rafe, it’s just less convenient. Isn’t she worth a little inconvenience? She thinks you are. Her life is in your hands. Be merciful with the woman you love. You don’t have to be merciful with the rest of the world, but for her… Find another way.”
