Page 68 of Mafiosa
‘Yeah.’ Nic snapped his head up. ‘Stupid, right?’
‘What did Luca say?’
‘I guess he just can’t believe they all showed up at a high school. I mean, that’s so messed up.’
‘Yeah,’ I echoed.
‘Luca says there are no rules any more, no shred of honour left between our families, and if we don’t agree to a truce now, then we’re all going to suffer for it.’
It was too much to process. I could only hang on to one thought at once. ‘What happened to Zola Marino?’ I asked. ‘We left her unconscious in a hallway.’
‘She’s been taken into police custody,’ he said. ‘They’re calling her a lone shooter on the news.’
‘Will she talk?’
A mirthless smile. ‘Not a chance.’
‘Will she get bail?’
‘If Donata has anything to do with it. She’s got half of Chicago PD in her pocket.’ He pulled the towel away and lifted my hand to inspect it. ‘Tonight was a disaster.’
‘It won’t be like that next time.’
‘There might not be a next time, if they get their truce.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘We can’t cower, not now.’
‘Tell that to Valentino and Luca,’ Nic said, his tone clipped. ‘There’s no speaking to them when they get like this.’
‘I don’t want a truce, Nic.’
‘And you think I do?’ he said, incredulous. ‘We deserve revenge.Youdeserve revenge. Tonight was difficult, but youescaped. Donata ended up losing, not us.’ He rolled his eyes, frustration gathering in the corners of his puckered mouth. ‘I don’t know why Luca can’t see it like that.’
‘I’ll have a gun next time. We’ll be better prepared.’ I don’t know why I was fighting so hard. I suppose beneath the fear and the pain and the sudden realization of my own precarious mortality, there was a feeling of strength, of my own determination. I was strong. I had survived tonight. I had helped Luca. And I would survive again. We all would. ‘I’m not afraid, Nic. I’m not afraid of what they’ll do, and I’m not afraid of whatIcan do.’
He smiled at me, a slow curl of his lips. ‘See,’ he said. ‘Youarehardcore.’
He moved the cloth up my arm, brushing the inside of my elbow, his fingers inching around my wrist.
He slid his arm back down. Without meaning to, he was holding my hand, and my fingers were curled inside his. We were much closer than I realized. He was tracing small circles around the wound in my shoulder with his free hand, tenderly cleaning off the dregs of disinfectant and blood.
‘What are you doing?’ I was suddenly so unbearably tired.
He took his hand away, folding the cloth in his lap. ‘I’m proud of you, Soph,’ he said earnestly. ‘You were amazing tonight. A true Falcone.’
I smiled at him. ‘Thank you.’ The words slipped off my tongue, husky and far more intimate than I intended. ‘You smell like a forest.’
The corner of his lip flickered. ‘Looks like the pain meds are kicking in.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVENONE HUNDRED GRAVES
‘What unique brand of violent romanticism is this?’ I snapped my head up to find Millie standing in the doorway to my room. ‘Because I do not love it.’
‘It’s called friendship,’ I said, pulling back from Nic, realizing in a moment of fleeting clarity that perhaps it did look like something different, something I didn’t intend.
She strode into the room, her heels and dress still miraculously intact, the black fishtail trailing behind her. ‘I have now been fully debriefed and suitably threatened by Valentino as per your request, Mr Falcone, sir.’
‘I didn’t tell him to threaten you,’ Nic said. ‘I told him to calm you down. You were getting hysterical.’
