Bax hesitated before speaking, but I gestured him on. “I don’t doubt it when you say that Tino did great things, even that he loved you and wanted the best for you. But I suspect that, most of the time, Tino Morelli worked toward his own good first.”
I had to let that one sit for a long time before my emotions receded and could really think it through. It was harder than I could have imagined to hear something like that about the man I’d loved since I was twelve years old, the man I’d worshipped my whole life. There was even a small part of me that wanted to punish Bax for such disrespect, and that was what shook me the most.
I would not allow Tino Morelli’s ghost to poison my love for Bax.
“Maybe you’re right,” I said eventually. “I will always be grateful to him, because he’s made me who I am. But…maybe Tino wasn’t quite the guy that I’ve painted him as over the years in my own head.”
“Well,” Bax said, “hewasa Mob Boss, after all. You don’t get to that level without breaking a few lives along the way.”
I gave a huff of agreement, but my mind had already moved on, unwilling to stay in such a painful place for too long. That pain would take some getting used to, and in the meantime, we had other worries. “You know,” I said slowly, “I think you might be right about Villiers.”
“What about him?”
“It was strange that he brought up Benetti like that, out of the blue. He claims he wants justice—perhaps he thinks I should face justice for what I did to Benetti.”
Bax thought it over. “Maybe,” he said. “It seemed more personal, though. Don’t you think? Hereallyhates you. In fact, my first idea, which I told Finch, was to get a message to him that you were going to be somewhere. Bait him with the possibility he could get you alone—”
“To kill me? Clever.” I meant it, too. “But not clever to go running off towards Central Park just because you think he’s in there.”
“Well, I see thatnow,” he said crossly.
“Tomorrow,” I said again. “Or the next day. We’ll figure something out. Until then, can we just…lie here?”
“Yeah,” Bax said softly. “Until then, let’s do that.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Baxter
It took longer than tomorrow or the next day before Angelo was really well enough to even get out of bed, but I’d learned my lesson. If I tried to go off and do something dumb, he was going to stop me. One way or the other, he would stop me—even if it meant putting himself at risk, too.
So I didn’t do anything dumb. For maybe the first time in my life, I did exactly what I was told. We mostly stayed in the bedroom together, but one time when he was asleep through the dinner hour, I went down to the kitchen again, where Finch and Luca were eating together. “Sorry,” I said, backing away. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“Come join us,” Finch said easily. “I owe you an apology, anyway. Sorry for selling you out. Wine? Luca, get him some wine.”
“No, thanks,” I said, but I took a seat with them, and grabbed a slice of pizza. It was late, and Luca looked tired. “And I’m glad you sold me out, for what it’s worth.”
“How is Angelo?” Luca asked politely. “I’ve been worried about him.”
“I…think he’ll be okay.”
Luca nodded, but he looked thoughtful.
“Honestly, though, I don’t know,” I heard myself saying. “He was hurt so badly…”
“But the tailor stitched him up, right?” Finch asked breezily, and unapologetically grabbed the last slice of pizza.
It wasn’t the gunshot I’d been referring to, but I didn’t want to talk out of school. Angelo’s psychic wounds were his own to manage, to deal with how he saw fit.
And Tino Morelli, after all, had had equally complex relationships with the two men I was sitting with at the table.
Physically, Angelo had recovered enough within several days to be able to move around the house with no assistance. He let me help him dress, but he didn’t like it. And he let me suck his dick most mornings, which he definitelydidlike, although I refused to let him return the favor. “When you’re really and truly better,” I told him. “Give it time.”
I was growing antsy, though. There had been no more killings in Central Park, but I knew that Villiers was still out there, still gunning for us. He’d been in the hospital thanks to Angelo’s knife-throwing skills, but he’d recovered much quicker, enough to give an interview on his release about the redoubled efforts of the task force. Angelo and I were still the top news item most nights, and the Morelli lawyer, Carlo Bianchi, had given more than one statement to the press claiming that we were innocent until proven guilty, and that everything would be sorted out in a court of law.
“There’s not going to be any justice, is there?” I asked Angelo one afternoon. We were in the kitchen, watching the TV news over lunch. “I mean, even if Villiers goes down for this—you and I, we’re not going to be able to go back to the lives we had. Are we?”
Angelo said nothing, but he reached across the table to put his hand on mine. “Justice in a court of law? Of course not. But there are other ways to find justice, kid.” He turned off the TV and then sat back in his chair. “It’s time.”
