He doesn’t waste his breath saying goodbye to me, just ends the call and leaves me sitting here a mess of confusion, my world turned upside down.
Carly sits up, watching my face with concern. “Vince, baby, what’s wrong? Who was that?”
I can’t even speak. I drop my phone somewhere in the couch cushions. I shake my head, climbing off her and wandering across the living room.
He knows where I am.
He knows my phone number.
He knows about Carly.
Someone is watching us, even now.
Carly comes up behind me, wrapping her arms around me and hugging my back. “Vince, what’s wrong?”
“He found me.”
Part
Three
Chapter Eighteen
Vince
“Look, I’m no happier about this than you are. Stop looking at me like that.”
I stare at the back of Alec’s head, nursing the ulcer that’s been growing in my gut since I got the phone call yesterday.
I can’t believe I’m doing this. I didn’t want to. When I hung up the phone, when I recovered my senses, I went straight to Carly’s closet and started grabbing clothes, throwing them in a suitcase. We could run. Throw a bag together, abandon the Easter wreath, and leave. Go somewhere else, somewhere he wouldn’t find me. We could cross the border this time.
Carly pointed out that there was no way in hell any of that could happen. Not only because he already has eyes on me who would just report back to me, but because she wasn’t about to leave Laurel alone in Chicago with Mateo knowing who Carly is. All he’d have to do to get to me then would be grab Laurel. Also, we would never make it to the border, so there wouldn’t even be time for that.
In short, Carly made me fly to Chicago. She forced me onto the plane, tried to reassure me everything would be all right while we were in the air, then dragged my ass to the car Mateo sent for us.
Alec is driving. Bastard. Didn’t even send Adrian, like he wants me to know I’m not an Adrian-level threat. I want to punch him in the face, and I haven’t even been back in Chicago a whole hour.
“You been to Flavor, Carly?” Alec asks, since I’m not very talkative. “Nice restaurant. Good food.”
Even in my cocoon of paralyzing hatred, I can’t help noticing my friendly girlfriend is not friendly to Alec.
Her tone is curt and she turns her head to look out the window at the city as we pass. “Nope.”
Alec gives up trying to talk to either one of us and just drives. I have been to Flavor though. Most recently, when I had to drive there to pick up Mia because Mateo got her drunk on wine and Sal was worried about letting him drive her home.
Sal.
Carly’s link to Sal floats back to my mind. Will we see him? It’s fucking Easter weekend. I don’t know how long funeral arrangements are going to take on Easter weekend. I wish we could just cremate the asshole, take the urn, and fly back on a red eye tonight.
He doesn’t deserve a burial anyway.
I know Mateo won’t let me get away with that, though. He couldn’t give a single fuck less about our fathers, but they each get their proper burials anyway, then we file them away as ancient history and go on as if they’d never lived.
Only they did, and the legacies of their destruction live on in us.
“I can’t do this.”
Carly’s head turns in my direction and she places a comforting hand on my knee. “It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not. I need to get out of this fucking car. This is a mistake. We can’t….”
“You have to get your inheritance,” Alec tells me.
“I don’t give a fuck about my inheritance,” I tell him. “Stop the car and let me out.”
“Vince.” Carly takes my hand, squeezing it and meeting my gaze, her blue eyes full of support. “It’s going to be fine.”
“It’s not going to be fine. I can’t see….” I fail to finish that sentence. I don’t even know how to finish it. I don’t know which one I’m dreading seeing more—him, or her.
Her blue eyes dim. She keeps holding my hand, but I can see she’s not entirely sure how to fill in that blank either.
“I don’t want to do this. I don’t care who makes the arrangements, I don’t want to.”
“There’s no one else,” she points out. “Would you make Cherie do it?”
“Mateo could’ve done it,” I state, looking out the window. “He’s going to wreck everything. He didn’t bring me here to plan a funeral; he brought me here to wreck my fucking life—again.”
“At least you’ll get some delicious ham out of it,” Alec quips.
I glare at him in the front seat. “Do I seem fucking amused to you, Alec?”
“Just trying to lighten the mood. This chauffeuring around unwilling passengers gig is a real drag. Don’t know how Adrian manages.”