30. Paige
The front door keypad chimes. How is Damiano back already?
Shit . Crap. Dammit.
He walks into the living room. “Hey, angel. I didn’t think you’d still be up.” His face lights up, his Adam’s apple rising as he smiles. Lips parting. He looks genuinely and thoroughly happy to see me.
Until his eyes drop down to the pet carrier and the cardboard box filled with my plants that are sitting in the middle of the room.
The smile falls from his face.
His shoulders stiffen. “You going somewhere, Paige?”
I shrug, avoiding eye contact.
He tosses his phone onto the table. Unholsters his gun and places it there, too. Takes off his knife, drops it onto the table.
He stares at the carrier for a long minute, his mouth closed, jaw clenched. He finally looks at me. “What’s going on?”
“You changed your clothes. While you were out. That’s not what you were wearing when you left.” I can tell he showered too.
He lets out a long, slow breath of air.
“What do you want me to say? I’m not going to lie to you. You know who I am. You know what I do. You know what that means.”
I shrug. “It means you were out killing people.”
He pulls his lips in, eyes closed. Pretty sure he’s thinking before he speaks.
Dom tips his head back, lets out a long, loud breath. “Don’t do this, Paige.”
“What else am I supposed to do?”
He doesn’t answer. He just looks at me. Searches my eyes.
“You knew this about me. Gina told you about my role in the Famiglia, and you asked me to deny it and I didn’t. I told you it was true.”
“I didn’t understand what it meant until tonight.”
“How could you not understand what ‘hurting and killing people’ meant?” He looks so confused, his brow furrowed. “There are guns and knives and explosives all the fuck over my apartment.”
I wrap my arms around myself and shrug my shoulder, talking down to the floor. “I didn’t want it to be true.”
Dom walks over and rubs my arms. “Sit with me. Let’s talk about this.” He kisses my forehead, lingering there.
I swallow hard. “My mind is made up.”
“But you waited for me. You’re still here. You want to give us a chance to figure this out, yeah?”
I turn away. I can’t meet his eyes right now. I shake my head, just a little.
Dom takes his hands off me, steps back, taking away his warmth. “Then why are you still here?”
I hesitate before answering. “I can’t find Romeo.” I swallow hard. “And I can’t find the keys to Jolene.” I look up at him.
His upper lip twitches as he folds his arms across his chest. “ That’s why you’re still here? You weren’t waiting to talk to me? You weren’t waiting to see if we could figure something out?”
I shake my head. I know that’s shitty, but it’s true.
“You weren’t even going to say goodbye?” Damiano’s lips close.
I shrug.
He nods slightly, shifts his jaw. “Fine.”
He disappears into the front hallway and comes back with my car keys. Tosses them to me kind of hard. I barely manage to catch them.
“Thank you.” I use my polite and mature voice. We can be adults about this. “Can you please help me find Romeo?”
Damiano goes into the kitchen and gets himself a glass of water. “Romeo probably senses you’re all stressed out and needs time to calm down. Why don’t you come back later?”
I make full eye contact for this. “I don’t need time to calm down, and I’m not coming back, Dom.”
“Well.” He stares at me a full thirty seconds, nods slightly. “Then looks like you’re shit out of rabbit.”
And there we go.
I’ve got nothing left to say, so I just huff, then continue looking for Romeo. Under the couch, behind the chair. In the closet, even though the door was closed. I’ve already been looking for two hours.
Damiano is leaning against the kitchen door frame, watching me. Not helping, just watching.
“Can you just do that clicky mouth thing so he comes running to you?”
“Romeo is happy here. Why would you take that away?”
I stare at him long and hard. And blink.
“I mean it, Paige. Romeo isn’t trying to go with you.”
I roll my eyes. “He doesn’t understand what’s happening. He doesn’t know I’m leaving.”
“You sure about that?” Damiano motions toward the pet carrier sitting in the middle of the room.
I ignore him. I have no clue whether rabbits see a pet carrier and know that it means they’re going somewhere like a cat does. I click with my tongue against my teeth, trying to do it the way Damiano does. No dice. “Maybe he’s trapped in a closet or stuck somewhere?”
“Maybe Romeo’s hiding from you on purpose.”
“Why would he hide from me?” I look in the corner behind a built-in planter where Damiano set up a whole litter box area for Romeo that he’s actually been really great about using, although I did notice him eating some of the hay he’s supposed to be using for the bathroom.
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe Romeo did the math. Figured the odds of surviving increases by staying here. The rabbit stays here, and it’s one less rock on that shelf of yours.”
It’s like a punch in the gut.
I do everything I can to save the little critters. Sometimes I’m not enough, and he’s throwing that in my face. I stare at him, my mouth open. “Would you just call my damn rabbit so I can leave?”
Damiano stares at me.
I stare back.
Damiano mouth-clicks two times.
Romeo cannonballs out from under the couch that I checked twice , practically climbing up Damiano’s leg.
Damiano scoops him up.
Finally, I can get out of here. I pick up the pet carrier and unlock it. I take a step toward Damiano.
He walks around me to the refrigerator and takes out a celery stalk. Feeds it to Romeo, tiny green bits falling to the floor. The only sound in the room as Damiano stares at me is Romeo’s crunch-crunch-crunch-crunch.
Damiano takes a step away from me. Away from the pet carrier.
“Where are you going? Give me my rabbit.”
“No. And Romeo’s a stupid name. She’s called Ginger now.” He walks toward his bedroom.
“You can’t. . . rename my rabbit. And Romeo is a boy.”
“ This rabbit is not male.”
What? “Of course he is.”
He shakes his head vehemently. He seems absolutely sure about this.
I thought I was sure that Romeo was a boy.
“Whatever. Male, female. It doesn’t matter. It’s my rabbit.”
Damiano slams the bedroom door closed in my face.
“I’ll call the police. I mean it, Dom.”
He opens the door a few inches. “Go ahead. Call the police. Give them my full name when you do. Ask them to send Lieutenant Baker.” He throws me a chin lift. “He and I can have a nice long chat all about your illegal animal rehabilitation operation.”
Huh? He wouldn’t.
“Operating without a license.” He shakes his head, tsk-tsking.
I stare at him, completely unable to form words, my mouth opening and closing.
He lifts Romeo higher, giving him— her? —a kiss on the top of his head, between his ears. Pretty sure I can hear Romeo purring.
Damiano takes a long breath. “Paige. If you want to stay and figure this shit out, go unpack then come talk to me.” He reaches out, tracing his finger up my arm. The familiar warmth of his touch zings up my spine.
But there’s nothing to figure out. I slowly shake my head.
He pulls his hand away. “Then leave already.”
“Give me my rabbit and I’ll go.”
“Just get out.” He slams the bedroom door, twists the lock.