“Both failed miserably,” I interjected. He really laughed then, and I was relieved to see it. I hated to see that face of his creased and aged with worry. No one his age should ever look like that. “And what else?”
“That…that I couldn’t have any contact with anyone…”
“And?”
I saw when he remembered it, because he flushed just as prettily as he had the first time I said it. “That I, uh. Belonged to you until the job was done.”
“And is the job done?”
“No.”
“Then you’re still mine, kid.”
He swallowed and looked across the room, almost as though he was afraid to look at me when he asked his next question. “What exactly do you mean by that? That I’m yours?”
I was glad in part for the painkillers then, because my heart started beating fast, and it was too near the hole running through me for comfort. “Bax,” I said, and had to stop. “Bax, please. Look at me.” He turned on the bed, his face serious, and he looked at me. “I’m not a man who—who ever really understood love. Loyalty, yes. Commitment. But romantic love was one luxury I could never afford. So I—I’m not sure if that’s…” I broke off. I couldn’t read his face.
“Go on,” he said.
“I’m not sure what it’s supposed to feel like,” I struggled on. “But if it’s even a tenth of what I feel about you, then I can understand why people do such crazy things for it. I never got that before. I never…” I let out a sad laugh. “I never understood Luca before. Why he did the things he did for Finch. I think maybe now I…I do.”
It had to be the worst declaration of the heart that anyone had ever given, but when I finished, Bax leaned in gently and kissed me.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “I love you, too.”
“Are you sure?” It slipped out before I could stop it.
He grinned. “Yeah,” he said, and then shrugged. “Pretty sure, you know. Oh, myGod,” he added, and kissed me again, “Yes, I love you. It was one of the worst fucking moments of my life when you collapsed on the sidewalk, bleeding everywhere. And I’ve had some shitty moments, let me tell you. I knew it through and through when I was sitting there praying that you’d just—juststop bleeding—” He was shaking now, the smile gone, and I wanted it back.
“Hey,” I said, “take off your clothes.”
“What?”
“Take off your clothes and get in the damn bed.”
“We can’t fuck,” he said bluntly, and I laughed until he did as well.
“I don’t want to fuck you,” I assured him. “Well—I do. But right now, I just…”
“The Monster of the Morellis wants tocuddle?” I’d accept any amount of teasing as long as it kept Bax smiling and happy, and not thinking about running around Central Park looking to mete out justice on his ex-mentor.
“He does,” I said. “Even the Monster of the Morellis needs cuddling sometimes.” And soon enough, Bax was naked and lying next to me, one careful arm around my middle. When I was sure he was there with me, and definitely not going anywhere, I said: “Tomorrow. Or the next day.”
“Hm?” He looked up into my face.
“Tomorrow, or the next day, when I can stand up for more than ten minutes, we make a plan. And we carry it out. But we do it together. Understand?”
He nodded. “I understand.”
We lay in silence for a little while, and I was on the verge of dozing off when he spoke again. “It must have been hard for you when Tino seemed okay with Luca D’Amato.”
I was not used to speaking about my feelings in the way Bax was prompting me to do, and my initial reaction was to deny it, to push away those memories, or to pretend sleep. So it surprised me when I simply answered him. “I think Tino had realized by then. Finch, I mean. I think he knew about Finch and that he was gay and that changed his mind, or his perspective, anyway.”
“That happens a lot. People are opposed to something until they have personal experience with it. So I wouldn’t be surprised if what you say is true. But still, it must have been hard for you to watch Tino accept Finch and Luca so completely that he married them off, while you…”
I wanted to stop him. I didn’t want to think about Giorgio Benetti again. But I’d spent my life running away from that memory, I saw now. And somehow, too, I knew that if I wanted to stop seeing red sheets every time I made love to Bax, I had to face it. Talking about Tino was the first step.
“It was one of the hardest days of my life, going into that wedding between Luca and Finch,” I said slowly. “I didn’t know yet, you see, about Tino’s plan. None of us did.Ithought, and I believe that Luca thought this too, that Tino was planning to use them as an example. Setting them up as a target. He could be cruel, Tino. Cruel in a quiet way that was not necessarily violent, but could undo a man from the inside out. It was one of the ways he maintained control.”
