Page 103 of Tainted Love

Dante lowers his gun back down to his side and gives the old man a quick, understanding nod.

Chapter 35

Dante

When I wake up, she’s gone.

My senses tune automatically. I smell the jolting aroma of fresh coffee and cooked bacon. I hear my brother and sister tossing insults back and forth downstairs. It’s like I’ve been transported back in time to a world before the three of us became what we are now.

Lucy laughs. The sound carries over their teasing voices and I smile.

I throw on a shirt and pants before heading downstairs.

“Good morning!” Elijah calls as I enter the kitchen.

He sits next to Lucy with his medkit beside him, re-wrapping her wrist as he’s done about once a day since we came back home. Lucy doesn’t even flinch as he puts pressure along the purple bruise. Tough as nails. Always will be.

“Hey, big brother,” Lilah adds with a stiff yawn. She refills her coffee mug to the very top and takes her seat at the table across from them.

Lucy. Her brunette hair sits on top of her head in a loose ponytail and her cheeks fill with pink life as she gazes up at me.

“Hi,” she says, smiling.

Just two letters and my heart skips. I bend down to kiss her forehead and she leans into it, welcoming the soft embrace.

I gesture behind me as I sit down next to Lucy, making note of Elijah and Lilah’s black bags lying stacked near the front door. “Going somewhere?” I ask.

“We have a little business to tend to.” Elijah nods, laying the last of the bandage around Lucy’s little wrist.

“What kind of business?”

Lilah swallows a large gulp of her coffee. “Nothing to worry your pretty little head about—”

“Lilah—”

She laughs. “Seriously. It’s nothing. More than anything, we just want to give the two of you some privacy.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Lucy says. “This is your house more than it is mine.”

“We disagree,” Elijah says.

“And…” Lilah shrugs. “We need to take a little time for ourselves. Snake Eyes was a part of us for so long. Living off-mission feels… strange.”

I nod. “I know what you mean.”

“Maybe it is time to start over,” she says. “Build a new life somewhere.”

“Maybe it is,” I say.

I reach for Lucy, laying my hand on her shoulder. Her lips twitch as I run my thumb over her skin, and she looks at me with love.

Elijah reaches into his bag and pulls out a cellular phone. “We set up a secure line for all of us to keep in touch,” he says, sliding it across the table at me. “Just in case.”

“Exactly what everyone needs when easing into civilian life,” I joke.

He chuckles. “It’s an interesting transition.”

I take the phone and fight the urge to give them instructions. They stare across the table at me, expecting me to give them orders, but I keep quiet. My days of trying to control them are long over. I’m not even sure if I ever had them at all.

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