Page 98 of Salvatore

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Salvatore

I keep my eyes ahead, toward the door and away from Donnie. She’s sitting at her vanity, putting on her makeup like she isn’t too fucked up to focus, like she isn’t so wrecked her hand doesn’t shake. Two lines. That’s how much she already snorted.

That door leads out to her living room. The next leads me out of her apartment. The minute Vin steps through, I’m out and on my way back to my brothers. But, I’m sure as shit not back to anyone else.

Twolines, I repeat in my head. But it’s been two months since I last saw Aedry, last held her, last touched her. I sent her a dog. That’s right, a black Lab puppy. It was supposed to be something to make her smile, knowing how much she loved the last dog she owned.

I never intended it to be a goodbye gift, but that’s what it became. It took everything in me not to see her. I ignored her texts, her calls, her pleas, until she finally stopped reaching out. That didn’t mean I wouldn’t give my life to hear her voice.

When the breeder called me to say the puppy was ready, I couldn’t bring myself to tell him I didn’t want it or give up one last opportunity to show Aedry I love her. I had him send the dog to Aedry’s parents’ home, something sweet to give someone sweeter, and maybe something to show her how sorry I am.

She called Gianno and Apollo to let them know she received the dog and to tell them she loved them. She also told them that she wasn’t coming back. Apollo . . . God damnit. He broke down, losing his shit like he was losing our mother again. But, it’s what he did when she disconnected that I can’t get past.

He charged out of his room, nailing me square in the face. “What did you do?” he demanded when I shoved him to the floor. Vicious tears streamed down his face. “What the hell did you do, Sal?”

When I eased off him, he just lay there, releasing his grief as Gianno lowered to his side. Gianno . . . you can say he was pissed, meeting my eyes with enough hate to rip my insides out. I could tell he wanted to lash out, take a swing, destroy some shit. Hell, he still does. Apollo, too, based on how they’re behaving?getting in fights, mouthing off.

Their hearts are broken. They don’t realize mine is, too.

“What will it take for you to kill?” Donnie asks, yanking me back to reality where my head should be and away from the memories that haunt me.

My stare fixes blankly on the door. I don’t answer, knowing she’s trying to bait me.

She laughs in that way she does when she’s high. It’s not her real laugh, the one I used to hear when we were kids. The one she used to mean. No, that real laugh is dead, just like she feels on the inside. I can relate, seeing how part of me died when I walked out on Aedry.

Shit.

“I know you haven’t killed. Vin’s told me you always leave it for someone else.” She stares at her reflection, like she’s someplace else. “He says, ‘Sal will make pussies bleed, but he’s too much of a pussy to make them stop breathing.’ You know what I think?” she doesn’t wait for me to answer. “That killing means you’re finally his, and what’s left of your soul is gone.”

I push off the wall, not bothering to argue. She’s right. She’s smart. But like me, Vin’s ruined her.

On her vanity, between her sixty-dollar lipsticks and hundred-dollar perfumes, lie small empty vials of blow. Tina, the new girl Vin’s been keeping on the side, isn’t into this shit. At least not now. I know, because I’ve started watching her. I give it another month, maybe less, and Donnie’s out.

Donnie’s a friend. But I can’t help her like she needs me to. That doesn’t mean I don’t care what happens. “You need to get out of this,” I tell her.

She laughs again when I loom over her. But while she’s playing it off like she’s in control, I know she’s not and I don’t stay quiet. “You’re beautiful, Donnie,” I say. “You’re young and you still have a chance. Get out and have the life you’re meant to.”

The tears that follow give away everything she’s trying to hide. “Where will I go? And who will I go to? You?” She reaches out, huffing when she cups my groin and I wrench away from her. “No. This belongs to someone else, doesn’t it?”

Her stare returns to the mirror like she can see something beyond it. All that’s there is the shell she’s allowed herself to become, the one she paints in pretty colors, hoping Vin will still want to stroke it.

“You haven’t touched another woman since Aedry, have you?” she asks. “You haven’t let Vin’s whores blow you or get you off.”

No. I haven’t. That doesn’t mean I answer.

I edge from her reach. Donnie’s been asking about Aedry and I haven’t told her shit. But she knows I’m not over her and that I never will be.

“Did you love her?” she asks, her voice a shadow of what it once was. A tear streams down her face, cutting a line in all that makeup caking her skin. “Did you want to make babies with her? Did you see yourself growing old with her?being buried in the same damn grave as her?”

Again, I don’t respond, her words slicing me like razor blades. Everything she said is everything I wanted with Aedry, everything that’s tearing me up when I think of her. Two months of not waking up with her beside me?of not seeing that smile that made me whole?it’s a wonder I can still function.

That emptiness I feel deepens which each breath I take. I know Donnie’s messed up and wants to mess me up with her. I put it back on her. Unlike me, Donnie still has a chance.

“Leave, Donnie. Sell everything you have and get the hell out of here. I’ll give you some bills?enough to start fresh. But you have to leave. You hear me? You have to get out of this.”

Anger finds its way into her tone as another tear falls. “You tell me to go. You tell me to leave. But you won’t go yourself, because he won’t let you. No,” she says. “He won’t. He may not need me. But he sure as hell needs you. Doesn’t he, Salvatore?”

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