But my heart only seems to grow more and more broken, infected with a pain that refuses to ease.
Ryland and Theo, filled with the same sense of urgency I am, spend nearly every waking minute of every day searching for answers about what happened to Marcus. Ryland goes to see Dominic, which scares the fuck out of me despite their reassurances that no violence will erupt in this period of peace.
But Dominic continues to insist he has no idea who shot Carson or who might’ve taken Marcus.
Just that it wasn’t him.
“Do you believe him?” I ask in frustration after Ryland returns and gives us a run-down of his conversation with Dominic.
“I don’t fucking know.” He shakes his head, his hazel eyes hard. “His story didn’t change. And he claims he didn’t know about any third person working with Carson. Seemed really fucking pissed about it when I told him, actually.”
The three of us are gathered in Theo’s kitchen, which has become our de facto war room. It’s a big house with plenty of other rooms, but this seems to be the one we all gravitate toward no matter what. I’m still staying in the guest room upstairs. Clothes showed up in the closet one day—a variety of outfits in a style that matches my old clothes—and I know Theo or Ryland had them delivered.
Ryland is staying here too. I think he’s only been back to his own house once since we arrived here on the day the game ended, to get some of his own clothes and bring them here.
None of us seem to want to be far apart from each other.
I’ve called in sick to work the last several nights. The idea of going back to Duke’s and serving drinks to rowdy college students as if nothing is wrong makes my heart constrict painfully. I’ll have to figure something out long term, since I know Duke isn’t going to buy my excuses for too much longer. I’ve only called in sick once before since I started working there, and that was only for a single shift.
“Too bad we can’t fucking ask Carson. He got put in the ground yesterday,” Theo says, pulling me from my thoughts. “Police have ruled his death a homicide but have no suspects.”
I wonder how much of that is Luca’s influence. The fact that all that security footage was erased has to hamper the police’s investigation as much as it does our own, but it’s also pretty likely that he used whatever influence he has to nudge the cops toward back-burnering the case.
“Yeah. Dominic was at his funeral.” Ryland drums his fingers over the marble island. “He told me Gabriel and Michael were there too.”
“Two other players in the game,” Theo explains when he sees my confused look. “Both come from old mafia families.”
I blink. “So they spent seventy-two hours trying to kill him and each other, and then they went to his funeral?”
“Yeah. And they’ll probably be invited to…” Theo’s voice dies. His jaw tightens as he clears his throat and continues. “To Marcus’s wake.”
My stomach seems to drop out of my body. The room around me blurs a little, my vision going fuzzy around the edges as I press my palm against the countertop. “His… what?”
“The Constantines are having a wake for their son on Saturday,” Ryland says quietly.
My gaze flies to him, then back to Theo. I shake my head, the movement wild and desperate. “No. No, they can’t. We’re still looking for him. They can’
t—”
“We’ll keep looking, Ayla.” His hazel eyes burn with inner fire. “We won’t stop. But we can’t keep them from doing this. They’re his family. They get to call this shot.”
“On Saturday?” I repeat, feeling like I’m asking when a guillotine will fall.
He nods. “You don’t have to come with us. It—”
“No. I want to.”
It’s a lie. I don’t fucking want to. I’d rather eat glass than go to a wake for a man I’ve been praying isn’t dead. But there’s no way in hell I’m letting Theo and Ryland face it on their own. I can still remember the haunted look in Theo’s eyes when he told me that the prospect of losing Marcus felt worse than losing his own father. I can still see Ryland’s grief in the taut lines of his face and the tension he carries in every part of his body.
As wrecked as I am by Marcus’s disappearance, so are they.
And if they can face going to his wake, so can I.
I’ve never believed in fate or destiny. I still don’t think there was any kind of divine intervention that led my path to cross with theirs on that night two and a half years ago when I got shot.
But it doesn’t really matter what brought us together. Because these men are in my life now, in my heart in a way I never expected anyone to be. Our lives are forever entwined.
And I will never let any of them go.