Page 58 of Auctioned to the Mafia Don
Maybe because children should smile easily. Maybe because Heath doesn't. Maybe because Alice had spent the last years of her life trapped with Leon O’Reilly, and her son learned how to become a wall before he learned how to feel safe inside a room.
I spend the day pretending I am not watching for Stefano and failing less as the hours pass.
The children help. Erin talks constantly. Attention. Answers. More juice. Help with a braid. A story about Alice. Another story. A promise I cannot make and make anyway by not refusing fast enough.
Heath needs nothing.
Which means Heath needs more.
I learn that quickly.
He doesn't ask for food, but eats if a plate is left near him and no one comments. He doesn't ask where the bathroom is, but remembers every turn the first time Omar shows him. He doesn't ask whether the guards outside are there to keep people in or out, but he watches them whenever the door opens. He doesn't ask whether Leon knows where they are until late afternoon, when Erin is asleep against a pillow on the couch and Omar has stepped into the hall to answer a call.
“Does he?” Heath asks.
I look up from the book Erin abandoned in my lap. “Does who what?”
He is by the window again, staring through the glass at the lawn below. His reflection looks pale and small against all that expensive green. “Does Dad know where we are?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if he did, the house would feel different.”
That pulls his gaze to me. “Different how?”
“Louder. Tighter. Men like Omar would look more annoyed.”
“Omar always looks annoyed.”
“More annoyed than usual.”
He considers that.
Then, “Would Stefano tell us?”
I do not answer fast enough.
Heath notices.
I close the book. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t trust him.”
“No.”
“But you’re helping him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Because I made a deal with a monster.
Because your father is worse.
Because Stefano kissed me like he could burn every lie out of my mouth, and for one awful second, I let him.
