Page 154 of Dark Romeo

I washed Eddie down before I climbed back into Eddie’s car and gunned it back onto the road.

The other can was marked gasoline. This car was going to make a pretty bonfire.

Sometimes, when I wasn’t thinking of Julianna, I replayed that night over in my head as I lay in bed staring at my ceiling.

I wasn’t going to lie to myself. I was glad Eddie was dead. One less rapist scumbag for the world. Did that make what I did justifiable? Did that make me a hand of justice in a way?

He was still someone’s son. Someone was going to miss him. Someone was going to mourn him.

“You are a good man, Roman.”

Julianna’s words taunted me. Haunted me. How could a bright angel see any light in me?

“Let me tell you what this good man did. I killed Eduardo Sanchez. I pointed the gun at his head and I pulled the trigger.”

Every day since I confessed to her I half-expected, half-hoped I’d be arrested. The knock on my door never came. Even with the way I left things, even after I deliberately caused her pain, she would not turn on me. I didn’t fucking deserve her. She was better off without me. Soon she would see that.

JULIANNA

____________

I didn’t tell anyone that the signature on Eddie Sanchez’s insurance policy was forged, not even Espo. I promised Rosa that I wouldn’t. That woman had been through enough. She had three young girls to look after and that insurance money would go a long way. I didn’t give a shit that it was the wrong thing for me to do, I would not tell. I would not take that money away from those girls.

A forged insurance policy. A million dollars. A dead husband. Was it possible that Eddie’s death had nothing to do with Roman?

Or did Roman have something to do with this mysterious policy?

My father had just left. I sat in an armchair by my living room window, staring out into the night. A fist rammed against the door.

Roman.

My heart rocketed into my throat. I smoothed down my hair as I hurried to the door and flung it open.

It wasn’t Roman. Everything alive in me sagged.

Nora didn’t wait for me to speak before she pushed past me into my apartment.

“Why don’t you come in then?” I muttered under my breath before shutting the door.

When I turned to face her, she had her arms crossed over her chest. “You’ve been walking around with that mopey look on your face for the last four weeks.”

After Roman left my apartment the night he broke my heart, Nora, like a bloodhound, had come over demanding to know details. I had made up some vague excuse, “our careers don’t match” as to why Roman and I ended our relationship.

She grabbed my cordless house phone and waved it at me. “Call him. Tell him you miss him.”

I wasn’t going to get her off my back unless I told her the truth. Or at least, some sort of semblance of truth. “Nora,” I said slowly, choosing my words carefully. If I revealed too much, the poor thing might have a heart attack. “Roman isn’t who you think he is.”

“I know exactly who Roman Tyrell is.”

I stared at her as my brain skipped like a scratch in a record. Nora couldn’t know know. If she knew she’d be yelling at me for putting myself in danger by associating with such a criminal.

She let out an exasperated sigh. “Roman Tyrell, youngest son of Giovanni Tyrell. Public enemy number one according to your father. Did I miss anything?”

“But…” I shook my head, trying to knock this new piece of information into place. “I don’t understand. You knew who he was all along? Aren’t you mad at me?”

Nora tilted her head. “Did I ever tell you about Pappy?” Pappy had been her husband of almost thirty years. He’d passed away the year before I had moved into this building. Nora and I had connected over our shared experience of deep loss. In the years I’d known her, she rarely spoke about him.

I shook my head.

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