Page 16 of Legacy
She shrugged her narrow shoulders, but the rejection on her face kind of hurt.
“You’re worth more than this, Carly.”
Her eyes flamed. “Never asked your opinion, Legacy. And Domino’s out front. I’m surprised you didn’t see him when you came in.”
Not saying another word, I backtracked my way outside.
Blinking in the sunlight, I raised a hand to shield my eyes.
“Legacy,” Domino’s voice boomed. And I turned to find him sitting on the bench to the left of me, a half-smoked cigarette dangling from his fingers.
“You wanted to talk to me?” My boots crunched gravel as I made my way to him.
“Yeah, take a seat.” He didn’t look at me. His eyes were on Duke and Conner. Conner was kneeling, dusting up the knees of his school trousers as he ran his hands over the amazing artwork of Duke's bike.
“Had a little visitor today, Legacy. You did a number on Tristan’s face. The Hunters are after blood.” He side eyed me, taking a long drag of his cigarette before crushing it under the toe of his boot. “Does he deserve it?”
“He deserved more,” I ground out. “Should have put him in the ground.”
“He did something to the kid?”
“No. Not like that. It’s Tony who liked them younger. If I thought for a second…” I shook my head.
“Yeah, I know. So if not the boy, who?” His eyes went back to watching. “His mother?”
“Kate is not his mum, but she raised him. That asshole Tristan…” I blew out a breath, clenching my hands in my lap.
“He got rough with her? Try it on with your woman? Explain it to me, Legacy, make me understand.”
“Kate’s not my woman.”
Domino's eyebrows shot up. “You want her to be, though.”
“I haven’t really spoken to her for ten years. She’s the wife of my best friend.”
Turning in his seat, Domino put the full weight of his grey eyes on me. “She’s your best friend's widow, Legacy. And from everything you’ve told me about Paul, he would want you both to be happy. Didn’t he always say he wanted you to look after her?”
I closed my eyes. “I think he meant to be there for her, not fuck her.”
“So you do want her?”
“Yeah.” It felt good to admit it to someone, even when I felt like the world's biggest asshole for wanting her. “Guess I’m a pretty crappy friend. I’ve been failing him for the last ten years.”
“You haven’t failed anyone. Not Emmet and not Paul. You gotta let that shit go. You are allowed to be happy, Legacy. And I think that girl could make you happy.” He pulled another smoke from a pack he fished from his pocket.
“The people I love die.”
“Your mum was sick, Legacy, and the others were tragedies. That’s three people. Not everyone. Your sister is alive and kicking. She’s happy.”
I nodded. He was right, of course. Elodie was happy. I missed her. Probably more now than the years we had spent hardly speaking. But she was off living her life with her rockstar and soon to be having a baby. Life had turned out wonderfully for El.
“Kate got hurt badly?”
Shaking myself, I turned back to him. “Bruised up, but that’s not the point.”
“He rape her?” Domino's temper was level, but I knew how he felt about rapists.
“She said it didn’t go that far.” Every word out of my mouth felt like poison. “Then we saw him and he mentioned tasting her on his fingers.” I fell silent.
