Page 99 of Violent Pawn

“Was that the truth?”

See, I’m not crazy. Van’s wondering the possibility too.

“I think so. He’s…well, you know.”

“Still?” Empathy edges Vanessa’s tone.

Still? What’s still?

“Sì. He’s been getting worse, and I…I don’t know how to help. It’s the worst bender he’s ever been on, to my knowledge. He’s sober for maybe a couple hours a day—if that. When I’m here, Elio checks on him, usually discovering him in some sort of mess or the other. He’s trashed his room so many times, we’ve given up having it cleaned or fixing the damage. He won’t talk to me. He refuses detox and rehab and even a private damn therapist—anyone actually qualified to help him. I…” Zeno’s sigh floats from the kitchen and right into my stomach, to the small place where guilt resides

Stupid. This is Nero’s doing. If he wants to drink himself to death over feeling at blame, over what he stole from me—good.

Except this time, the anger isn’t strong enough to push out a disturbing image of Nero passed out in bed, unshaven and probably not showering, alcohol bottles strewn all around.

“That’s why you’ve been going longer between visits?” Vanessa asks, tormenting me further. Or my torment lingers when I don’t budge from the spot and do the wise thing by escaping.

He grunts. “That and the missing shipment that has zero leads, no matter where we look. It’s frustrating, and he’s making my job harder. I’m trying to be there for him, but he doesn’t want me to be.”

“You can’t help someone who doesn’t want it.”

He’s silent for a beat before murmuring, “Would you give up on her if she was acting like that?”

Vanessa’s silent for five rough beats of my heart. I inch closer to the doorway, anticipating—grasping—for her response, curious to know the answer.

“I think I have given up,” she utters in a tone I’ve never heard from her before. “She’s been different since it happened. We’re all noticing it. For a while, I thought it was in my head, but Dimitri confirmed my feelings. Hell, even Lev notices, and you know how he can be sometimes. She’s…gone. Her spark has been snuffed out. I miss my friend, but she won’t talk to me either. She claims she’s fine. Although she’s not drinking herself to death like him, she’s working so much to distract herself that she’s halfway dead.”

My toes press down into the floorboards to keep me still, to not rush in there and spew a counterargument. She’s wrong. I haven’t been working myself to death. Working every day all day isn’t to death. I’m doing what the organization requires to keep the Bratva at full strength.

I’m not distracting myself.

“The show from tonight didn’t even exist a few weeks ago!” she continues, her voice rising. “You know how difficult it is for her manager to have gotten something that grand out in the world so soon? Once she got the idea for a last-minute performance, she insisted.”

“Did you ever figure out why she wanted one?”

She never even asked.

“No, but I have a strange suspicion it has to do with the man behind her entire mood.”

Wrong.

Correct, my inner voice adjusts my lie.

Zeno sighs again, and not wanting to hear anything further—with my stomach in knots, I slink away to my bedroom.

It takes me until two a.m. to fall asleep. Not because the performance didn’t tire me out, or because I’m restless.

No, it’s due to the phone gripped in my hand, the message I’ve typed and deleted so many times, my eyes are crossing.

Thank you.

If I was brave, I’d click Send. Gratitude doesn’t say forgiveness. It isn’t an opening to talk. It’s simply thanking him for his donation and the flowers.

But the fact he phoned it in anonymously and didn’t include a card with the bouquet says he didn’t want me to know. So I backspace the letters for a final time and make the keyboard disappear, which lowers the previous messages we’ve sent to one another, the latest being his long explanation.

I’ve read it so many times it’s imprinted into my mind. I’ve also taken screenshots of it that I’ve backed up, in case my phone combusts or something.

By 2:15, I toss the phone onto the charger, roll away from it, and put Nero back into the past where things hurt less.