He switched back into dialect for a string of words I couldn’t translate, only feel. I pushed myself up on one elbow. His head tipped, like he’d felt it. He muttered something in Crow, then ended the call with a tap.
Silence rushed in after it. The kind that rang. He stood there a second. I watched his chest rise and fall, too slow for the kind of adrenaline I could feel rolling off him.
“Vince.”
His shoulders dropped a fraction. He turned.
“Hey.” He scrubbed a hand over his jaw, like he was trying to erase the last five minutes. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“You didn’t. Your angry Crow did.”
“Yeah.” His mouth twisted. “Apologies from my angry Crow, then.”
He came back to the bed, dropped his phone on the nightstand, and sat on the edge like he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to lie down anymore.
I watched his eyes flick to my legs, then drag back up to my face like it physically hurt him to look away.
“What happened?”
“Nothing that can be fixed from here.” He leaned back. “There’s a situation on the syndicate line. Rival crew started pushing through our shipments last night. Luca contained what he could, but?—”
He broke off, jaw tightening. The Crow word that came out next was quiet and vicious.
“—they poked the wrong fucking nest.”
I sat up properly and tugged the hem of his shirt down over my thighs.
“Is it bad?”
“The situation or the fact that they woke me up when I was finally in bed with my girl?”
“Both.”
He huffed, but it wasn’t a laugh. “The situation is… manageable. For now. But if I don’t go in, it won’t be. And once I go in, it’s going to eat the day. And the night.”
The words hit slow. I felt the meaning land before he finished talking.
“You have to go.”
“I have to go.” He stared up at the ceiling for a second, like he hated the sentence more every time he repeated it. “I’m sorry, baby. I thought I’d cleared this weekend. I did clear this weekend. Someone just decided they wanted to die today.”
Two weeks.
I got him two days every second week when the calendars lined up and nobody was bleeding. Forty-eight hours. I swallowed the little lump climbing up my throat.
“It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay.” His head snapped toward me. “You get two days. Every two weeks. That’s already bullshit. And now I’m cutting that in half because some idiot can’t read a border agreement?”
“It’s not you cutting it. It’s your job.”
“Iammy job. That’s the problem.”
He pushed up to his feet like he couldn’t stand still anymore, pacing toward the dresser and back in a tight line. The bandage on his side pulled with the movement. I winced just looking at it.
“You could say no,” I joked weakly. “Let the rival syndicate have Villain. I’m sure it’d be fine.”
He shot me a look over his shoulder that said even imagining that gave him hives.
