Page 254 of Merciless Daddy

Sal leaned away just enough to see my face. His hands remained on me. His forehead pressed against mine.

“I know, little one,” he said.

His voice cracked.

“I know.”

Behind him, Tonio moved to Serafina. Donatella lowered her pistol. The alarms continued screaming. Suppressant drifted around the bodies and broken shelves.

None of it reached me.

Sal kissed my forehead.

Then my temple.

Then the skin above the mark the gun had left beneath my jaw.

His hands still shook.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“No.”

“I should have—”

“No.” I caught his face. Forced him to look at me. “Do not turn what he did into your failure.”

Pain moved through his eyes.

I knew that pain. It was mine too. The old habit of finding a way to make another person’s cruelty into a debt we owed.

Donatella brushed dust from her sleeve.

“You’re welcome,” she said.

I looked at her over Sal’s shoulder.

“I still hate you.”

“That’s fair.”

Her red lipstick had survived. I found that offensive.

Tonio reached us and put one broad hand against the back of my head.

“You scared ten years off my life.”

“You looked old already.”

His mouth broke into a fierce smile.

“There she is.”

Then he pulled me against him and Sal both, turning the embrace into something crowded and ridiculous. His shoulder was bleeding. Sal swore at him. Tonio ignored it.

Serafina remained beside Gianni’s body.

I looked at her.