Everything in me goes very still.
CHAPTER 28
GO AWAY
Matteo
Cat cracks the door and goes still, eyes cutting over me, then past me like she’s measuring the shadows. I keep my hands up, empty, palms out at shoulder height.
“I’m alone,” I whisper, scared to spook her.
“This isnotlying low.” She should slam the door, and I fully expect her to. Instead, she holds it half-open like a shield she doesn’t quite trust. “You’re supposed to be dead, damn it.” Her voice is flat, and a little breathless.
“Best compliment I’ve had all week.”
“Funny.” She edges the door tighter, bare foot wedged against the jamb. “What do you want, Rossi?”
“Sixty seconds,” I reply. My mouth tips before I can stop it, because there’s a ghost of a dance between us that just won’t die. “To talk.”
“Talking hasn’t gone great for us.”
Rain ticks off the porch light and runs off my hood. Her gaze snags on my face, on the bruise caused by the tile I smackedinto when she flicked me off like a switch, and something lingers there. Maybe guilt or anger, or a little of both.
“Did you send Donal the photo too?” I ask.
“Why do you care?”
“Because it buys you time,” I whisper, swallowing what else I could say. “And because I like you alive.”
The porch light buzzes. Waves thud the shore like they can argue the coastline into moving. I hear her breathing go shallow.
“Go away.” It comes off a little softer than she probably means it. “Please.”
“If you want me gone, I’ll go.” I tip my chin toward the dunes. “Just not far.”
“You’re tailing me.”
“Following the weather report.” I shrug. “There’s a storm coming.”
“You were never good at staying where I wanted you to.”
Ouch. That one stings. “You’re right. Even though you never put me anywhere I really wanted to leave.”
It lands between us too hot to touch. I keep my hands up. There’s no second shadow, no backup because if I brought any, I knew she’d vanish between heartbeats. She studies me like she knows that too.
“How did you find me?”
I lift a shoulder, not ready to divulge my tracker just yet. “I guess it’s a bad habit. I just know which direction you’ll run. I figured you wouldn’t go to a typical safehouse since it’s where your brother would end up too. Then I got to thinking about that summer…”
She chews on my words, then blurts, almost defensively, “I called Noel. That’s how I ended up here. But she’s not in town.”
Relief punches through me faster than I can hide it. “Good. Fewer witnesses if you slam the door on my foot.”
Cat smiles. Almost. She flattens her lips at the last second as if remembering what we are to each other now. She starts to push the door, but I don’t move. The porch light hums again, and I see her clock the fine tremor in my fingers that the concussion she likely gave me left behind. She presses her palm, quickly, to a spot beneath her collarbone through the sweatshirt. It’s just a touch, like bracing for something. I fix my eyes on her face and nowhere else.
“I’ll give you sixty seconds.” She crosses her arms over her chest and glares up at me. “Not a step inside though.”
I nod and obey, like it costs me a kidney. “I’m assuming you were eavesdropping and misheard me at the safehouse and that’s why you bolted,” I start. “I was telling Leo I’d hold here until he arrived. He’s been my personal bodyguard since I was a kid. I’ve known him forever. I trust him. I didn’t tell Ale I was with you, and it wasn’t a trap.”
