Page 79 of By Blade, I Love
Cristo.
He headed to an empty grave with a plain tombstone, a black coffin next to the hole. “What do you think?”
Bumps formed on my arms, and even though it was sunny and the middle of the day, I felt ice-cold. The threat was unmistakable, and I stared at him in silence because I lost whatever courage I had left.
“I thought you might like a pink coffin, but they didn’t have any.”
Cristo.
“Black okay?”
I could only imagine how ghost-white my face looked.
When he grinned, I could tell he was enjoying this. “I’m gonna call your husband now. He would never miss his wife’s funeral.”
22
FRANCESCA
Icarus sat on the tombstone of the person who was still alive.
I stood ten feet away, looking at the men camped out around us with guns who would shoot me if I tried to run. It suddenly turned overcast as a cloud bank covered the sun, and the bright grass darkened in the shade. A beautiful summer day had suddenly plunged into a darker season.
My heartbeat was erratic as I stood there, knowing Wolfe would drive like hell to get to me.
I almost didn’t want him to come because I didn’t know how the hell he was going to get me out of this.
I finally heard a car in the distance, and when I turned, I saw his dark-gray Range Rover blow past the gate and up the road at fifty kilometers an hour before he slammed on the brakes and skidded to a halt.
I started to move toward him.
“Nope.” Icarus clicked his tongue several times. “You stay right there.”
Wolfe jumped out of the car, but instead of looking at me, his eyes were reserved for Icarus. The men were of equal height, and while Icarus was bigger, Wolfe had rage on his side I wouldn’t dare provoke.
He stopped several feet from Icarus.
Icarus hopped off the headstone and faced Wolfe. “How does that saying go?” he asked. “Oh, my hands are tied.” He brought his wrists together and shrugged.
“She has nothing to do with this. She’s not even in the powder business.”
“Yes, but I warned you. Inicelyasked you to leave Cosa Nostra and join our ranks. You said no. Inicelyasked you to surrender. You said no. You’ve been a pain in my fucking ass, Wolfe. And now here we are, at the funeral of a beautiful woman who should have lived a long life and had lots of babies and cooked lots of dinners.”
Wolfe took a step forward. “She has nothing to do with this.”
Icarus stepped away and approached the empty grave reserved for me. “I’ve got a priest waiting in the house. He’s ready to give her last rites once we bury her.”
“What the fuck do you want? Be a man and just fucking say it.”
“What doIwant?” he asked as he moved his hand to his chest, and he walked back to Wolfe. “I don’t want any of this. But when I told my lord that you denied my offer, this is what he commanded me to do.”
“And you don’t have to do it.”
“I already stuck out my neck for you once. I won’t do it again.”
“Look, I’ll leave Sicily forever. I won’t stand in your way?—”
“And if you’d offered this sooner, I probably would have taken that offer.” He raised his hands before he dropped them. “But here we are.” He glanced at the sky as he furrowed his eyebrows. “And it looks like it might rain. In August…how odd.”
