Page 42 of A Breath of Life
Except, as much as I liked to believe I had all the answers, something told me I was wrong. This was more.
A niggling thought whispered,What if it was his father?What if Diem had finally had the confrontation of all confrontations and killed the man? He’d told me it would happen one day. Was that day here? Was it now? Were the police searching for him? Would they knock down our door and drag him away?
“Tallus?”
I blinked from my troubled thoughts and caught Diem’s eye. He remained by the bathroom door, one side of his face lit by the harsh light bleeding into the hallway, the other obscured by shadow.
“Yeah, D?”
He extended a hand. A silent invitation.
No matter how rocky our foundation, I would always go to him. This tortured, troubled man owned my heart. For all his flaws and despite his frustrating refusal to explain what the fuck was going on inside him most days, he was a good man who loved me in the only way he knew how.
11
Diem
Tallus slept against my chest, his hair brushing the underside of my chin, one arm secured tightly around my waist as though he feared I might escape. Echo snored on my other side, her warm body pressed snugly against my leg. I wasn’t sure whether either of them had slept the previous night. The former tore the city apart, trying to find me. The latter barked and howled for hours, either from her own distress or sensing mine from a distance.
The sun hung low in the sky as the dinner hour approached, but both the dog and my boyfriend were out cold less than ten minutes after we lay down.
Despite my exhaustion, I couldn’t join them. A tsunami raged under my skin, and my head raced as I replayed everything that had happened in the past twenty-four hours. The initial attack. The strange room with even stranger men. Being tied to a chair.
The conversation.
The threat.
The demands.
I’d woken in the same alley, under the same fire escape, in the exact same spot as we’d found the dying man on that fateful night we’d first come in contact with the card. A coincidence? Not likely.
His name was Clarence.
Clarence, whom I had to find.
Clarence, whose last name I never learned.
Clarence, who had a target on his head by some guy named Ace because he broke a deal or some shit.
Echo’s persistent licking had revived me a few hours ago, and I’d peeled myself off the ground, disoriented and confused but with a sense of lingering fury. My muddled brain had taken a second to identify its cause. Recalling my captivity, I had spun, intent on putting my fist through a wall but stopped short when the memory of six fucking weeks in a cast resurfaced. Instead, I’d bummed a couple of cigarettes from some guy at a bus stop and stumbled home, body vibrating and with fear knotting my intestines.
Would I find Tallus hurt or gone? What about Nana? The urge to race to the nursing home and check on her was almost too much to bear, but the Consigliere’s warning sang in my ears on repeat.
“You will not go to the nursing home. You will not call there, and you will not send anyone in your stead.”
Every painful step to the apartment, I remained alert for a tail, but if anyone followed, I didn’t see them, and I was skilled at spotting stalkers.
I discovered the leather pouch and its treasure nestled in a pocket, along with my cell phone—which had been powered down—and a slip of paper with a phone number. Switching on the device, a steady stream of frantic messages and voicemails from Tallus filled the screen. All had been sent throughout the night.
Dismissing them, I inputted the phone number under the nameAssholeand saved it to my favorites for easier access. I didn’t know if the Consigliere or his boss or the Bishop would respond if I had questions—and I had so many fucking questions—but losing the number could mean Nana’s life.
Or Tallus’s.
Seven days.
Nausea roiled my gut. I’d had to stop several times on my journey home to lean against a building, bile climbing my throat.
Not once did I consider what I might say to Tallus about my absence or injuries.
