A little.
Life was harsh and reality was even worse.
But just accepting it didn’t mean I had to like it.
I was also pretty sure that the conflicting ideals and the way Frankie turned my entire life upside down might cause me to lose my mind at a point in the near future.
I tried to walk with tiny steps to his kitchen where the back door and his garage were located, but I still beat him inside and had to wait for him when he made it into his home.
He came in looking as if nothing was amiss, carrying a brown paper sack with both hands. It had a green logo on the side, but I couldn’t make out the writing.
My gaze started at the top of his head and worked its way down past his shoulders, to his ribs, over his suit jacket until finally I gave up at his knees. He didn’t have a speck of blood on him. At least none that I saw, but I wasn’t new to this reality. Just because I couldn’t see the blood didn’t mean it wasn’t there. It also didn’t mean there weren’t two dead bodies shoved in the trunk of his car. When it came to loving someone in the mob, you had to be up for anything.
And did I really just say loving someone in the mob? No, my excitement at him returning in one piece must have been making me emotional.
Frankie set the grocery sack on the counter and began removing items. He placed each one, starting with a loaf of wheat bread, on the marble counter to his side.
“Did you go shopping?” I asked as each item that came from the bag was less threatening than the last.
I kept expecting him to pull out a weapon or a finger—something as evidence of his dirty deeds that morning—but each item was less and less exciting. At least until the bag of frozen Brussels sprouts landed on the counter with a thud. Those were the most terrifying thing in his arsenal.
Frankie didn’t miss a beat with my question as he continued unloading his items. “I said I had errands. Plural.”
I didn’t remember the distinction in what he said that morning, so I chose not to argue the question of why he did his own grocery shopping. It was not the craziest thing I had experienced with Frankie Zanetti over the last few days.
The itch to throw myself at his feet and demand answers about who his friend Ridge captured and what he did to them clawed at me, but I refused to play my hand so early. A weird wedge had driven between Frankie and me after he left that morning, and I didn’t want to expose myself to him in such a way yet. Times like these required finesse.
I waited for him to be forthcoming with the details, but when he wasn’t, I eventually had to ask. “Did you keep your promise?” I demanded, expecting him to figure out what promise I meant.
He turned to me, letting me see the vulnerability in his eyes and his expression when he spoke. “Of course I did, Shiloh. I will always keep a promise when it involves you.”
I used the same chin jerk I’d seen him use more than once, expecting that to be the end of the conversation, but Frankie pulled his phone from the pocket of his suit and with a few quick movements held it out to show me the screen.
The image was nowhere near what I expected from Frankie, but still ghastly. A hand covered my mouth to stop my sudden intake of breath as I roamed over the details of the image.
I braced for impact and then peeked.
It wasn’t two men lying in cold blood. Instead two of my cousin’s men—Jason, who joined the crew about three years ago, and a man I never met but younger in years—were tied together wearing nothing but their boxers as they leaned up against a red brick building. Their eyes were closed, but they had no marks marring their skin. They looked peaceful.
“They’re alive?” I asked, just to be sure.
Frankie switched to a different picture of the two men in a similar position but with their eyes staring at the camera. Their jaws were tight with embarrassment and they glowered at whoever snapped their photo. Probably more than likely aware of the photographer’s intent.
“Where are they?” I asked, and Frankie paused before he answered. I threw my hands up in dismay. “It’s not like I’m going to rescue them or anything.”
He heard honesty in my voice and probably realized I couldn’t leave his home, which allowed him to answer.
“We left them at the train station outside of town on the border of Clearwater.”
A smile tipped up my lips, but I pivoted it into a frown, not wanting Frankie to see me laughing even privately about how mad Jason would be over the slight. He’d never been caught by anyone in the past, and in the last few years people had taken to calling him Twinkle Toes since he could move in and out of places so quietly. Whoever caught him had to be good.
“But they’re tied up and alone.”
Frankie took back his phone and slipped it into his pocket, looking at me as if I’d said something obvious. Which I had. “That is not my problem.”
He turned back to his groceries, putting a few items in the fridge and those disgusting Brussels sprouts in the freezer. I wanted to argue, but I’d already pressed my luck with Frankie over the last two days. It didn’t seem like a smart decision to keep going. I supposed somebody would run across them eventually and help untie them.
“Thank you,” I whispered to Frankie’s back, not sure if he heard it with the closing of the fridge door.
