Page 79 of Vendetta
I settled my hands in my lap and fell back from him, recognizing the losing battle I was fighting. ‘It shouldn’t be all or nothing.’
‘I know,’ he conceded, exasperated. ‘But what can I do?’
‘You could walk away.’
‘The only way to leave this way of life is in a coffin,’ he said with chilling finality.
Silence descended. Part of me understood. I wanted to cry for him and the future he was bound up in, but I didn’t. I was too numb, too afraid to consider the possibility that maybe Nic didn’twantto walk away from his way of life, that he enjoyed the feeling of punishing people, of watching them quiver and beg before him. I studied my cuticles while he studied me.
‘It’s suicide,’ I muttered.
Nic sat back and smiled, and for a second he looked like the teenager he was supposed to be. Happy and carefree, not dark and hardened. ‘My brothers and I, we have been training for this life since we could walk,’ he said. ‘We can read situations unlike anyone else. We can break a man’s neck ten different ways. We have the knowledge to infiltrate gangs and the skill to shoot their leader from one hundred feet away.’ He spoke like he was listing a set of everyday skills on his résumé, and not reeling off his special mob-related activities.
‘Do you have to answer to the boss of your family?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ Nic said slowly, as though he was starting to realize something. ‘We follow his instructions.’
‘Who is he?’
He shook his head like he was coming out of a daze. ‘Sophie,’ he said hesitantly, ‘I’ve already said far too much. I got carried away… I always seem to with you…’ He trailed off. ‘You could ruin me now.’
‘I won’t,’ I said automatically. I hadn’t even thought about it, but my heart already had an answer. Despite everything, I didn’t want to ruin him. He was already being ruined by thepeople around him. By his own family. If only he could see that, maybe I could get through to him.
‘I can’t say anything else,’ he said.
It didn’t matter; I already knew who the boss was.
How could their father have OK’d this when he was alive? My father saw me pretending to smoke a candy cigarette once and nearly grounded me over it. But Nic’s father probably bought him his first gun, taught him how to load it, how to aim it, how to kill with it. And now Felice? Surely he had a responsibility to look out for these boys, not use them to kill people.
I fell back against the couch, suddenly feeling exhausted. ‘You don’t have to say anything else,’ I said softly.
Nic sank down so that our eyes were level when he looked at me. ‘Are you frightened, Sophie?’
I did my best to ignore how close he was. ‘I don’t know.’
‘You didn’t run away.’
‘Not yet.’
His smile was a soft tug at the lips.
I was beginning to feel intoxicated again; dizzy with desire. ‘You do bad things,’ I reminded myself aloud, making the mistake of looking into his eyes. How many people had spent their last seconds on Earth looking into those eyes?
‘Only sometimes,’ he said quietly.
‘Do you have to be so casual about it?’
‘I don’t feel bad about what I do.’ He brushed his finger along my neck, and my spine started to tingle. How many necks had he broken with those fingers? ‘But I feel bad that you dislike this part of me, and this part is almost all of me, Sophie.’
‘But there’s so much kindness in you, Nic,’ I whispered.
‘Kindness for the right people.’ He watched my lips as hetrailed his finger beneath them. ‘For people like you.’
I felt a familiar rush in the air.Don’t get distracted. What were all those things I’d wanted to say? Suddenly I couldn’t remember a single one. ‘You shouldn’t break the law.’
He pulled my chin towards him and brushed his nose against mine. ‘I know,’ he hummed against my lips. His breath was as unsteady as mine. ‘Bella mia,’ he moaned softly into my mouth, and that was all it took to make my resolve implode.
This time, our kiss was deeper than before. Nic tangled his hands in my hair, pulling me into his body and moulding my shape to his. He dragged his mouth along my skin, intoxicating me with his kisses. ‘Staying away from you is too hard,’ he groaned into my neck. ‘I don’t want to be good any more.’
