I obliged him. I let us live in this delusion where we could be a couple who went to sports games together, where he wasn’t wearing a mask and I wasn’t going to run.
“I don't know,” I said. “I think I like the idea of padded men in jerseys and tights running into each other as they chase a ball.”
Liam rolled his eyes. “I’ll try not to take offense at the ‘men in tights’ comment.”
Dio sopra, why did this have to feel so normal? Why did I want this nice moment to last? I was a sucker for it. Living from a beautiful place with the possibility of existing in a space where there was no threat of violence even though our lives were tainted by the darkness of the underworld, this felt like home.
“What else do you like to do besides sports?” I asked, sitting back. “What did you used to do before your accident?”
Liam let out a long breath. “I liked to fish, but that’s not because of the accident.” He twisted his own coffee between his fingers. “I just haven’t had the time with everything else going on.”
I almost laughed. I almost did. I couldn’t picture this big, murderous, bloodthirsty killer as an avid fisherman. It was too quiet of a pastime.
“You mean you sit there with a pole and coax the little fish to come bite your hook?” I blurted out, unable to contain my astonishment.
Liam shot me a look sideways. “It’s very relaxing, cailín.”
“Relaxing.” I tasted the word. “But it’s so slimy!”
“Slimy?”
I nodded. “Fish are gross, and don’t get me started on the worms!”
He snorted then, flashing me a mischievous grin. Per la miseria! He looked young. Innocent.Beautiful.
My heart bled.
“Maybe if we don’t have any more incidents, we could make plans to go Friday afternoon,” he offered.
By Friday afternoon, I would be gone. But this wasn’t a moment of reality. This was a dream of a future that never could be. “If I don’t have to touch anything, I’ll think about it.”
He responded, teasing me, baiting me to smile or laugh.
The sound of a stroller made me bite my lip. The daydream slipped away. My destiny crept forward on creaking wheels.
I’m coming, Luca.Just a few more hours until our inevitable reunion—and our terrifying race to escape Boston.
Chapter 47 – Liam
Here I thought we were making plans to go fishing, but my wife stopped mid-sentence, looked to the left, and then slowly swiveled her head to the right.
I cursed under my breath. Something was clearly bothering her. And who could blame her? Shooting somebody for the first time would leave a stain on anyone.
I felt something with her this morning that I hadn’t felt previously. When we had talked last night, we reached a point where our feelings were out in the open. We cared for one another, we admitted we were bonded. It was just the two of us, and I would kill to get back to that place.
That was why the thought of sitting at the office, working with construction details, or hell, even going and overseeing the books at our most profitable illegal gambling den, weren’t things that were going to hold my interest. I had to be with Gabriella.
But now, the missing pieces, the parts she kept secret, swarmed to the surface and threatened to swallow us whole.
She turned to me sharply, and her eyes brightened as she rapidly waved her hands about while talking.
“I think fishing on Friday sounds great,” she said. “You just tell me what you need, and I’ll get the supplies, and we’ll pick a spot. I’ll pack a picnic.”
A grand distraction technique.
“Gabriella.” I cut her off. “If you don’t want to go fishing, you don’t have to go fishing.”
Her shoulders sank. She chewed on her lip, just as a female walker passed with a buggy cart. I wouldn’t have noticed—because it wasn’t a threat, and my brain didn’t calculate the approach as such—if Gabriella hadn’t shifted her eyes to the side and then back to my face.
