My Best Friend Is Broken (My Mobster #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter one

Nicky

Then

“You are a dufus,” Liam said.

“Dufus?” I retorted. “What kind of stupid word is that?”

Liam grinned, flashing perfect white teeth. His eyes looked gray in the darkness of our secret spot beneath the overpass, but I knew they were blue. The bluest eyes of anyone I had ever seen.

“A stupid word for a stupid man.”

I fought a blush and was glad it was winter and our after-college drinks were after sunset. I was eighteen, and being called a man still felt exciting and new. I liked it. Especially when Liam did it. Even if it was while calling me stupid.

“You don’t even need to go to college,” said Liam, explaining why I was stupid when I hadn’t even asked him to.

He took a swig from his beer bottle. “You can join the mafia.”

I rolled my eyes. “Not all Italian families are in the mafia.”

“No,” he agreed easily. “But yours are.”

“Only Uncle Vinnie,” I protested.

Liam shook his head at me as if I were a lost cause. As he moved through the exaggerated gesture, his face was illuminated briefly by a streak of streetlight, throwing all the definition of his cheekbones and jawline into stark display.

His new haircut suited him. At first, I had thought it was too short. Almost so short you couldn’t see how blond it was. But then I realized how it showed off his features and didn’t distract from his face.

It was a good haircut.

“He could get you in?”

I blinked, and it took me a moment to remember Liam was talking about Uncle Vinnie and the mafia.

“Yeah,” I said as casually as I could while I brought my beer bottle to my lips. I tried so very hard to be cool, but I’d never be as cool as Liam. I didn’t understand why he deigned to hang out with me.

“So do it!” exclaimed Liam. “Get out of this shithole. Make something of yourself. Don’t be a loser, Nicky.”

Nobody but Liam called me Nicky. I didn’t want to let them. It was Liam’s name for me, no one else’s.

I took another swig of the warm beer. “And what are you going to do?”

Liam sighed dramatically and leaned back on the cold concrete. Propping himself up on his elbows, and surveying the murky river and the brittle weeds as if they were his kingdom.

“Coast on my good looks and winning personality.”

I snorted even though I believed every word. Liam was easily the most handsome boy in our year, and everyone loved him. The teachers even fawned over him despite the fact that he never did any work.

“Actor. Rapper. I don’t know yet, but I’m going to be somebody,” he said, and it sounded like a vow.

It was the truth. I could see it. Liam burned far too brightly for a rundown housing estate in inner-city London. He was going to get out. Do great things. Hopefully, he would allow me to be part of his entourage of lackeys. It was the only thing I wanted from life.

“Somebody’s toyboy, more like,” I teased, because I was eighteen, and eighteen-year-old boys don’t express their feelings.

Liam laughed and his eyes sparkled. “Maybe you’ll be mine. No homo.”

“No homo? That’s definitely homo, bro,” I retorted as quick as lightning.

Liam sat up. He leaned over and ruffled my hair. “You’d know.”

I chuckled and shoved him off. I wasn’t gay, and neither was he, but we teased each other about it often. We were both confident enough to take it. Besides, I knew Liam wouldn’t care if I was gay. He’d still be my friend.

When we were in year nine, Liam told everyone that Callum Stevenson was sound, and just like that, overnight, everyone stopped bullying the poor kid.

“You coming to the pub later?” he said.

“Nah, I’ve got to help my mum finish unpacking.”

Liam took another swig of his beer. A big one this time. His head tipped all the way back, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. He finished and stared at the sluggish river.

“Your new place is more of a shithole than your last one.”

“Like your place is the Ritz.”

He shrugged. “It’s not my place. It is my bitch of a stepmom’s. When I get my own place, it is going to be sweet.”

I didn’t doubt it. I couldn’t wait to see it. I’d move right in with him if he’d let me.

“I’m freezing my ass off,” Liam suddenly declared as he got to his feet. “And it’s about to piss down.”

I looked up at him and quickly scrambled to a standing position. I was freezing too. My fingers had gone numb. But it was worth it to hang out with Liam. I would have happily sat under the underpass with him all night.

He clasped my shoulder in a strong, manly grip. “See you Monday.”

I nodded.

“Unless you want to come over on Sunday?” he asked.

My nods turned frantic and jerky. “Um… maybe!” I blurted. I wanted that more than anything, but nobody could ever know. I wanted everyone to think I was cool, especially Liam.

Liam grinned, eyes bright in the dark. “Alright, let me know, Nicky.”

“Alright, dufus,” I said as I ruffled his hair while he pretended to try to duck away.

He grinned at me one last time, and then he was gone.

It was early the next morning when Amy pounded on the front door. Mum answered and then yelled up the stairs for me to come down.

I could hear Amy crying, so I ran downstairs in my boxers. She was our neighbor now, and I was glad she could run to us for safety.

“Have you heard?” she sobbed as soon as she saw me.

The look in her eyes was something I had never seen before, in anybody. I knew right away she wasn’t here because of a burst pipe or an escaped dog, or because her mom was having another episode.

My heart sank, and my blood ran cold. I shook my head.

“There has been a terrible accident,” she wailed.

Mum pulled her into a hug. Amy cried while I stood frozen in dread. I’d known Amy since the first day of school. She was in the same year as Liam and me. We knew all the same people. Gotten up to all sorts together. Amy was tough. I had never seen her like this. Not even when her granddad died.

Eventually she pulled away from Mum.

“Sam, Liam and Olivia were in Sam’s car. I don’t know what must of happened, Sam must have got too drunk or something, because Liam was driving.”

My heart stopped. I felt it. It beat one last time and then simply froze. Silent and motionless in my chest.

Dimly, I was aware that Sam was her boyfriend and Olivia was her best friend. But selfishly, at that moment, there was only one name I was waiting to hear about. One name only that I cared for.

“They were coming to pick me up after my shift,” she said through hiccupping sobs.

I had a strange desire to run back upstairs. To hide under the covers in my bedroom, where everything was safe and normal. I didn’t want to hear what she was going to say. At the same time, I also wanted to shake her and yell at her to get on with it.

“Sam is in hospital.”

And?

“Olivia is dead.”

Oh fuck, that’s awful, but what about Liam? He is still alive, isn’t he? He has to be. Liam is indestructible. Liam is forever. Nothing could ever dim Liam’s light.

“Liam has been arrested.”