Chapter Twenty #2
Swatting my chest, she climbs off my lap to sit beside me as if it’s completely normal to have post-coital pillow talk in a pool of blood next to a mutilated body.
I worry she’s about to analyze what we just did and how it somehow circles around to Freud and his fucked-up, incestuous bullshit, when she arches an eyebrow and hits me with, “How did Paulie find my father? I never gave you the address of Marvin Hooper’s Bushkill cabin. ”
A little random, but nothing about today has been normal.
“After you kicked me out of the house, I put a tracker on your father’s car.”
She gives me a slow blink. “Do you have a tracker on me?”
I hesitate at first, but then decide, screw it . Why lie now? We just fucked like primates in a dead man’s blood. She’s not exactly on high moral ground herself. “Diamonds may be a girl’s best friend, Doc, but time wear is a criminal’s peace of mind.”
It takes a moment, but then, she slowly looks down at the watch on her wrist. The one I wrapped around it that last night in my father’s basement.
“That’s why you gave it to me. You were sending me back to Providence with a tracker.
” She lifts her head and slides her glasses off her face.
I try not to notice the bloody fingerprints on the lenses.
“Leo didn’t have to tell you I was in Hackensack. You already knew.”
“I did.”
She rests her forearms on her knees, her glasses dangling from her fingers. “Are you ever going to let me into your inner circle? ”
The words are layered with such sadness it feels like my heart is being ripped out of my chest. Not by what she said, but the unspoken words behind it.
Anton knows everything about me.
Sera knows everything about me.
And my wife knows nothing.
“What more does she have to prove?” A voice inside whispers.
“You need to talk to her before you push so hard she doesn’t come back,” I hear Sera warn.
I clench my fists. I’ve lost too many people because of silence. I won’t lose Becca.
“You were right,” I say, the pressure in my chest making it feel like it’s being crushed in a vise. “My distance the last few days had nothing to do with you. Well, it did, but in more of a chain reaction kind of…” Cursing, I pinch the bridge of my nose.
She lays a hand on my arm. “You don’t have to?—”
“Yes, I do.” I stand and pull my jeans up, not bothering with the button.
Blood kicks up like a crimson rain puddle as I pace the warehouse.
“We have more in common than you know, Doc. Both of our fathers’ actions got our mothers killed.
We were both there when it happened.” I pause, my teeth grinding. “And we both blamed ourselves for it.”
She says nothing, letting the confession erupt like a pressurized volcano.
“But it goes deeper than that. My mother died in a car accident meant for my father. When it happened, the car ignited, and my mom was trapped. Anton tried to get her out. He was frantic.” I shake my head, everything making so much more sense now .
“But time was running out, so she pulled rank and ordered him to pull me to safety.” I glance sideways, afraid I’ll find pity on her face, or even worse, tears.
However, there’s nothing but calm understanding.
“That’s why fire has always consumed you,” she says softly. “You watched your mother burn to death. It changed you. You never wanted to feel that powerless again, so you decided you’d be behind the match, instead of in front of it.”
A philosophy that served me well until a pushy psychiatrist turned my world inside out.
“I had no control over my mother’s crash or the fire … just like yours.” Losing my mother was devastating. Losing Victoria crushed me. But almost losing Becca? There’s no coming back from that. “If I could turn back time, I’d walk out of your office that first day and let you live a peaceful life.”
Becca tosses her glasses aside and climbs to her feet. “Why?”
“Why?” My hollow laugh echoes throughout the warehouse. “Look where you are, Becca. Every bad thing that’s happened to you in the last three months has my name written on it and underlined in fucking red.”
The tattered remains of her leggings sway like confetti as she strides toward me and lays her hand on my cheek. “Everything good that’s happened has your name on it, too. Fire isn’t your enemy, Gianni. It’s who you are. It’s who we are. It’s our story.”
I stare at her. “Christ, you mean that, don’t you?”
“Every word.”
I cover her hand with mine, soothed by the feel of her caged against my skin. “I’ll never deserve you, Becca. But I promise there’s not a man alive who’ll love you the way I love you. I’ll spend the rest of my life proving that to you.”
It’s only then she allows herself a visceral reaction. A sharp exhale draws her shoulders forward, fighting the shine filling her eyes. “Love doesn’t keep receipts, Gianni. You deserve all I have and more.” A smile spreads across her face. “This is where the guy usually kisses the girl.”
I smile back. “We’re Marchesis, Doc. We make our own rules.”
But I’ll be damned if I’ll pass up the invitation, so I claim her lips with a slow, intimate kiss that clashes with all the death and destruction around us, while somehow still making perfect sense.
Just like us.
I toss the chains in a garbage bag along with the cleaver, the acrid smell of benzene coming off what’s left of Liam, burning my nostrils. “Let’s go, Doc.”
Becca comes down the stairs barefooted, in a long black button-up shirt that makes me want to take risks I know better than to take. She stops by the door and holds up the garbage bag in her hand. “What should I do with this?”
“Just throw it anywhere on the floor.” I’m not thrilled with the idea of her walking around half naked, but it can’t be helped. Anton never restocked the upstairs, and since driving around in ripped, blood-soaked clothes isn’t an option, we have to work with what’s on hand.
She drops the bag at her feet. “I know I’m new at this whole murder thing, but aren’t we supposed to clean the crime scene and hide the body?”
“Normally, yes. But I told you I had a surprise for you, remember?”
Her expression hardens. “I don’t want to hurt anybody else, Gianni. That guy deserved to die for what he did to my dad, and I’m not sorry. But I refuse to kill to prove a point.”
I’m beside her before the last word leaves her mouth.
“My judgment falls on the shoulders of those who deserve it, never the innocent.” Taking her hand, I guide her out the door, my blood pumping.
When we’re a suitable distance away, I pull a Zippo lighter from my pocket.
“Fire returns to the earth, that which should’ve never had life.
You’ve been its victim. Now feel what it’s like to be its vessel.
” Flipping the top, I flick the spark wheel and toss it to the ground.
The trail of gas I poured out the door ignites. Becca watches as it licks a fiery trail toward its destination, then with a whispered whoosh, the Chop House goes up in a wall of flames.
“It’s beautiful,” she whispers.
I glance to the side and find her biting her bottom lip, her cheeks flushed. Hand in hand, I lead my wife toward the car, the card between my fingers fluttering to the ground.
If they thought I was dangerous before, they haven’t seen anything yet…
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned…
And a man in love.