Page 66 of Knocked Up by my Best Friend's Brothers

“You didn’t want to tell us about Perry-Sage either, and you were driven off the fucking road. How much longer do you intend to keep up this one-woman act of yours? Until someone actually gets hurt? Or killed again?”

He realizes it as soon as he said it. I can see it in his wide eyes.

And he can see it on my face.

The hurt.

“I didn’t mean it like that. Brett’s death wasn’t your fault.” Cassius tries to mend what he just broke, but I’m too restless, too ashamed.

I get to my feet and walk out of the hospital room, shaking and holding back tears, determined to get away from all of this, one way or another. Deep down, Cassius is right.

Nathan comes after me. “Christa, wait.”

“No, no. He’s right. Had I been braver, had I done more, maybe Brett would still be alive.”

“It’s not like that, and Cass knows it, too. He’s just… He’s mad, Christa. This whole time, we’ve been nothing but honest and open and willing to take risks to be with you,” Nathan says. “While I can understand many, if not all of your decisions, Cassius and River are different. But they always come around. You need to give them time, just like they gave you time when you asked for it.”

I stop in the middle of the hallway, tears stinging my eyes as I look up at him. “I don’t want to lose you.”

“I don’t want that either. Cass is right, though. You can’t do this alone. Not anymore.”

“It’ll put you all in danger. No matter how I look at it, someone is going to get hurt. Or killed again, like Cassius said.”

“Let us decide the extent of our involvement, Christa. You know this is more than just a fling for us. You can feel it,” he moves closer, hands settling on my hips.

I’m too weak and tired to push him away. I don’t want to push him away. His comfort is one of the few things I’ve got left to hold onto in an increasingly darker world. “I feel it.”

“I know where I want this to end. It doesn’t end with you walking away or worse. None of us will get hurt or worse. Sure, people might not understand what we’ve got. It’ll be challenging to make it work. But we can make it work as long as we stick together. As long as we trust each other.”

“Nate, I do trust you. It’s the Mancinis I don’t trust.”

“Whatever game they’re playing here, they’re doing this to hurt you, to make you fear your own shadow. It’s a mind fuck. And it’s probably because they don’t know if you have some kind ofautomated mechanism in place.”

“Mechanism?”

Nathan gives me a wry smile. “Have you asked yourself yet why they’re still coming after you?”

“I’m a loose end.”

“You’ve been a quiet loose end.”

“Yeah, but they still tracked me down here. There’s no guarantee my exit was as clean as I’d hoped. I was always aware that the past might come knocking, sooner or later.”

Nathan puts an arm around my shoulders and gently guides me down the hallway. Hospital staff whiz past us, going on with their jobs and their emergencies while I try to think of how I’m going to survive what’s coming.

“They’re poking and prodding because they want to see what you’ll do once you become aware that they’re coming for you,” Nathan says. “Which is why we need to think long and hard about how we’re going to react.”

“We are?”

“Yes. In the meantime, however, I’m going to take you back to your Aunt Mary’s place. I’ll talk to Cass and River. We’ll have a proper sit-down and process everything.”

I give him a curious look. “Okay. Thank you.”

“We’ll work things out. One way or another, we’re going to get you your life back.”

That sounds nice.

So nice, in facts, that it floods my heart with hope. But hope is a fickle and dangerous thing to feel when one of America’s most notorious crime families is gunning for me. Nathan does make a compelling argument, and whether I’m willing to admit it or not, I do feel safer when they’re around, when they’re aware of the dangers around me.

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