“I’ve been around,” she said, closing up. She hunched over her drink and glanced at me. “Didn’t think you’d care.”
“You’re the one that left me,” I said softly.
She let out a breath. “I don’t want to have this argument.”
I shrugged and let it go. I knew how this went, and it wasn’t worth the effort. She’d never admit that she was wrong, no matter how hard I pushed, and I’d never admit how badly it hurt when she disappeared.
Not worth getting into it.
“All right then,” I said, sipping my whiskey. “How about you tell me how you ended up in Ronan’s back room?”
She chewed on her lip, probably thinking up some story. Something happened to her in the last two years, something that hardened her, and I wanted to peel away all those layers to get at the girl I used to know.
The girl I used to spend all my time with before I joined the family. The girl I wanted to marry.
She was still in there. I saw her in all those little gestures: the way she touched her hair when she was anxious, how her lips pushed together, the little shrug she did, her laugh, her teeth, her eyes. It was all Irene, but it wasn’t Irene. She’d changed, and I didn’t know how or why.
I’d changed too. Two years in the Valentino family and I was already moving up the ranks, especially since the new Don took over. Lots of the old guard had retired and moved on, making space for the young guys to take control. There was opportunity now, and I wanted to grab hold of as much power as I possibly could.
That was why my place was so barren. All my money went back into the crew, back to my guys. I wanted them well paid and enthusiastic. I wanted to make sure I could trust them.
So I lived on a lot less than I otherwise could have.
“Ronan and I had a disagreement,” Irene finally said, not looking at me.
“That’s putting it mildly,” I said, leaning toward her. I reached out to touch her swollen lip but she swatted my hand away.
“He’s not exactly the gentle type,” she said, and cocked her head, glaring at me. “Something you know a lot about, don’t you?”
I laughed and took another drink to cover my frustration. She wasn’t wrong about that—I was a killer for the Valentino family, which meant I got my hands dirty. I took care of the trash, the dreck, the dirt and the mud of the city. I did what the family wanted me to do, and for that they rewarded me and my crew handsomely. I was making something of myself, earning a place in the family, building a name for myself.
I was doing it with death. But I was still doing it.
“Might be something I know about,” I said, and forced myself to grin at her. “So what did you do to land you in that room?”
“I stole from him,” she said.
I snorted. “No shit. Seriously?”
“Seriously,” she said, not smiling. “It’s been a rough few days, okay? Do you have some place I can crash?” She glanced toward the couch.
“You can have my bed,” I said. “But we’re not done with this conversation. What did you take from him?”
“Money,” she said and threw the drink back. “He wasn’t happy about it.” She stood and drifted into the living room.
I stared at her, at the long, lean line of her legs and hips, at the way she shoved her hands into her back pockets. She hesitated in front of a framed picture above the TV, one of the very few decorations I had in the place.
“Recognize it?” I asked, and drifted over to stand behind her.
It was a generic black and white landscape. Long, sloping hill, pine trees, mountain in the distance. Apparently, some dead guy named Ansel Adams took the picture, whoever that was.
Back in the day though, that picture had hung in her bedroom. She’d look at it and sometimes talk about how she wanted to escape and live in that valley. We’d have long fantasies where we discussed building a cabin and living off the land. We were city kids and didn’t know how to light a fire to save our lives, but it was fun to pretend for a while at least.
“Of course I do,” she said. “You took it?”
“Found my own copy,” I said. “Your old man threw all your shit out.”
“Sounds right,” she said, slumping in on herself again, shutting down. “Look, I’m exhausted and my face hurts. Can I just crash?”
“I still want to know what you’ve been doing all this time,” I said.
She didn’t meet my eye. “Maybe I’ll tell you someday.”
“Maybe in the morning,” I said.
“I’ve got to get back,” she said.
“No,” I said softly. “I think you need to stay here for a while.”