Page 53 of Poisoned Promise
“Your lion.” The words turn sour on my tongue but the last thing I need is her looking too closely until I’ve wrapped up this mess and saved Dove.
Caterina needs to shift her focus elsewhere and until she does that, Dove’s life remains on the line.
Especially if Caterina realizes exactly who she is.
“Do you remember the night Nico died?” Her words are sudden and cold.
I nod curtly.
“Do you remember where you were when the news came?”
I swallow around the lump growing in my throat. “I was on the highway coming back from upstate when you called me and told me Nico’s body had been found. You’d sent me upstate to deal with some of the Irish and so I?—.”
“You weren’t here,” she murmurs, barely cloaking the accusation in her voice. “Do you ever wonder if Nico would still be alive if you hadn’tdelayedwith the Irish?”
My stomach knots like a fist is clutching at my organs. “Every day.”
“Everyone kept telling me he was assassinated by the Nightingale.” Her mouth twists. “A bullshit ghost story to try and make me feel better.”
The Nightingale.
I’ve not heard that name in years.
They were a ghost story.
Some claimed she was a woman all dressed in white, others claimed it was a man and some insisted that it was an organisation.
The people you called when regular threats just weren’t doing enough to make a point.
Assassins specializing in infiltrating Mafia circles.
I never believed any of it. The Nightingale was just an excuse to shift blame and act like each mysterious death was caused by an outside source rather than the rat who committed the crime.
“You know I never believed the Nightingale was real,” I say softly. “Someone murdered Nico.”
“And we never found that someone. Now my man is dead and I think they’re back because we never found the Nightingale either, did we?”
“No. We didn’t. But I never stopped looking at the pieces.” Nico’s murder. The slaughter of the Healy family. A crashed plane off the coast and a sudden war igniting between internal Russian families.
A lot happened within that horrific week, making it almost impossible to pick out what was related to which tragedy, but I never forgot.
“It was a terrible time,” Caterina murmurs. “A time when everyone looked suspicious. Everyone was out for their piece of the pie and the wolves closed in around me, eager to feast on the heart of a grieving mother.”
She walks forward and stops a foot away from me, then gazes up into my eyes while placing both her hands on my chest.
“You stuck with me through it all, Felix.”
“Of course I did.”
“You’ve stuck with me through a lot. You saved my life.”
“And you saved mine in turn.”
“Then why, if our foundation is so strong, do I find myself doubting you?” A cold edge enters her voice. “How is a case so fucking simple just impossible for you to clean up?”
Anger ignites within me and a smog clogs my chest, straining my next breath. It takes all my control to keep my face passive. Lifting my hands, I gently clasp her shoulders.
“Caterina. I know Tee was important to you. And I know how much pain you’re in at his loss. I swear to you that your pain is my pain and I will get to the bottom of this for you. I will bring the culprit before you and let you deal out the justice you desire. You just have to give me some time.”
