He looked away and then back again. “I didn’twantto think it. I wanted it to be someone else. I hoped it was the cartels.”
“Did you believe him about killing Greco?” Angelo asked suddenly. “Ordidhe do it on his father’s orders?”
Jack screwed up his face. “Who knows why Julian does anything? The guy’s fucking crazy.”
“He’s not crazy,” I said. “He’d be a lot easier to deal with if he were.”
“You know, you’re right,” Jack said thoughtfully. “He’s more like…like a cat, bringing in dead things as presents and leaving them on the bed.” He shifted in his seat, turning to look at me full in the face. “As far as this latest offering of his goes, I’ll clean up after him. Make sure that FBI hoodie Greco was wearing never gets into the hands of anyone who might wanna check it for DNA, if you catch my drift.”
“Thank you,” I said, and I meant it. The last thing I needed was yetanotherfalse murder charge laid on me, and that hoodie was probably covered in my hair. “But I still think you should get out while you can, Jack.”
He nodded. “Yep. I should wash my hands of all this and bolt, like I did from Vegas. That would be the smart move. But it never sat right with me. I should’ve stuck around there. I should’ve…hell, there’s lots of things Ishouldhave done and didn’t. This time, I’m going to.”
“Loyalty first, whatever the cost?” I asked him.
He gave me a slow smile. “You know, you’re alright for a Fed. Yeah, Flynn. Whatever the cost, I’ll stick around. They’ll probably hate me even more for it, but there’s shit I’ve done here that I’ve gotta make up for.”
Angelo spoke then, sounding distant. “That’s admirable and honorable, Jacopo. But don’t make the mistake of thinking Julian Castellani is not responsible for his actions. If you’re determined to stay in this city, you need to remember he’s a dangerous man. Be careful around him.”
Jack huffed a laugh. “He’s not the only one who’s dangerous. Don’t worry; I’ll watch my six.”
Angelo put out his hand and Jack shook it. “Good luck. I mean that. And if you ever change your mind—”
“—or need any help from us,” I added quickly.
“—just put out the word. I’m not sure where we’ll be, but we’ll come if you call for us.”
Angelo was already unlocking the motel room door when I turned to raise a hand in farewell to Jack, and then dropped my bag to jog back over to the car. “Hey,” I said, sticking my head in through the window. “That thing Julian wears—how long has he had it?”
“No idea,” Jack said with a grimace.
“And who has the key?”
He shrugged. “How the fuck should I know?”
“But if you had to guess?”
“If I had to guess?” Jack looked past me, nodding at Angelo. “I’d say Julian was keeping that key himself to give to your boyfriend over there. Hey, now—” He put his hands up. “You asked, Flynn. Can’t blame me if you don’t like the answer.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
“You really have no idea where we’ll be?” I asked Angelo later, as we packed wearily. We needed to talk through the day, air out all that frustration, but we were both just too tired. I’d taken a shower and I was dressed only in underwear now as I sorted through the clean and not-so-clean clothes in my bag. We’d have to hit a laundromat soon.
Angelo came up behind me where I was folding shirts, and rubbed me between the shoulder blades. “We’ll be with each other, obviously. But as to which city, or even which country, who knows?”
It was time to mention the Big Apple in the room, I decided. “New York?”
Angelo walked away from me. He said softly, “I’m sorry, Bax. I know you grew up there, but I can’t go back. Especially not after tonight. My God, I should have killed that man. I should have—” He broke off.
I approached him slowly, carefully, and put my arms around him from behind. He stiffened for a moment, but then relaxed into me with a soft sigh, rubbing my forearms. “Castellani, you mean?” I hugged him tighter. “You think you should have killed him?”
His hand clenched on my wrist and his voice turned brittle. “For what he’s done to his own child. Yes. I should have ended him then and there.”
I understood it, even if I was glad he hadn’t done it. From the time a very young Angelo Messina had entered Don Tino Morelli’s house, he’d been trained as a killer. Ciro Castellani seemed to have taken their relationship as a model for his own with his second son. It was natural that Angelo might feel sorry for Julian Castellani. Even a strange kinship. But…
“You tried to kill Julian, rather than his father,” I pointed out.
“A warning,” he said. “That was all. A warning to Julian to stay the hell away from you. To think I let you walk off with him the other night—”
