The date of the trial inches closer, and every day that I can’t find Marco feels like another day that I’m drowning.
Finally, it’s the night before. I’m sitting on my couch, listening to the same punk rock record that I’ve been listening to since I was a mere eight years old.
I can’t explain it, but the clashing of the music makes me feel… settled, somehow.
Complete, in a way that I’ve never been able to before.
Eyes shut, I picture how the trial is going to go tomorrow. It’s just the beginning, a hearing to get everything going. But if Marco doesn’t show, it’s going to be clear that I lost him.
That he hasn’t been in my custody.
Which is going to get me fired. So fired, in fact, that I may have an investigation directed at me. Which would lead to the inevitable outcome of Seamus, and my entire team, finding out that I’m the bastard MacAntyre child.
Which would definitely lead to not only my arrest, but the arrest of my brother, and…
‘Your taste in music really needs to evolve.’
I shoot up off the couch.
Standing in front of me, darkening the doorway to my fucking kitchen, is Marco De Luca.
For a second I’m just struck by the presence that he has.
Marco isn’t just a person. I swear to God he’s like a force of nature. Standing in the doorway, backlit from my crap kitchen light, his dark gaze sears into me, like some kind of primal god of storms.
His hair is dark, but flecked in places with silver. I know he’s not old, exactly, but pushing toward forty, a solid decade older than I am. I like that he hasn’t done anything about the flecks of lightness there.
I like that he doesn’t seem to care.
I know, however, that the choice is probably intentional. Because everything about Marco is intentional. Even the outfit he has on, jet black pants and an equally black button-down shirt, must have been chosen because of its complete lack of remarkable.
Or, the ability that it gives him to blend into the shadows.
His face looks like it’s carved from marble. Tan skin, dark eyes beneath eyebrows that are more than a little severe, and a Roman nose all give him a very, very stern face.
However, his lips ruin the harshness of his other features. They’re unfairly plump, and they remind me of every sinful fantasy that I’ve ever had about him.
Some of those fantasies, though, aren’t just fantasies…
They’re memories.
I remember his lips, and how they curved over mine. How they demanded, with words and actions, that I open for him.
How they look wrapped around my nipple. How they feel, skating over my skin.
The tender touch of them before they hit the edge of the tattoo…
Fuck.
‘Marco,’ I say, finally standing to do something about the record that’s screeching at us still. I pull the needle off of the record, the slight scratch a jarring noise that sets my nerves on edge.
I tell myself that, anyway. And that it’s not the presence of Marco, crackling over my shoulder like a thundercloud.
‘I see you made it back just fine,’ I mutter.
I’m not sure why I’m trying to provoke him. He’s still just… standing there. Taking up space in the doorway to my kitchen.
Staring.
For a second, my mind goes straight to the fact that Marco De Luca isn’t exactly my friend.
After all, my brother kidnapped his sister. Tried to kidnap his niece. Killed one of his aunts.
His track record with the MacAntyre clan isn’t really stellar.
Something in me, though, doesn’t think that he’s here to hurt me.
He came back. The night before the trial.
If he didn’t want to show up for it…
He wouldn’t have.
‘Marco. Say something,’ I bark.
He shifts, moving forward. For a second I think he’s going to touch me, but then he brushes past me…to the stairs.
‘Marco,’ I whisper. I’m not sure if he can hear me.
I’m not sure I want him to.
The stairs creak under his weight. I listen to the familiar pattern of him going up to the little loft room, then hear him pause before the last step.
‘I was always going to come back.’
His voice is a low rumble. It’s cultured in a way that I never expect. Marco is, after all, a gangster.
He shouldn’t talk like he’s a fucking prince.
The stairs resume their squeaking, and I listen to him move around upstairs. I haven’t taken out any of his clothing or anything, since I wasn’t sure what to do with it.
Or were you hopeful that he would come back?
I slam the thought away, mentally trying to make sure that I don’t entertain anything so foolish as that thought.
Marco didn’t come back to resume the little charade we’d been living.
He came back for business. To keep his word.
He comes down the stairs again, and heads to the couch. Quietly, he pulls the couch bed out and begins to put sheets on it.
I watch him.
Finally, Marco turns to look at me. The silence between us is so thick, I can feel it pressing down on my ears, clogging my ability to hear anything.
Finally, he licks his lips, and I’m embarrassed at how quickly the gesture makes me blush.
‘You should go to bed. The hearing will be early,’ he grunts.
Then, clearly dismissing me, he turns.
I can take a fucking hint, and I have enough pride to keep myself from saying anything else.
I turn on my heel marching up the stairs. I may have a million questions right now, but I know one thing for sure.
Marco De Luca may have come back.
But he sure as hell didn’t come back for me.
The journey to Dublin for the hearing is so awkward. In order to preserve his status in witness protection, Marco will arrive at the hearing separately, but it’s my job to complete the hour drive and drop him off with Seamus at the meeting point. Then, I’ll park, go to the office and get into my official Interpol-sanctioned court attire, and meet them there. Marco’s identity will be preserved, and he’ll give anonymous testimony about the incident in Belarus, as well as the new developments of the explosion at a café in Amsterdam, to a panel of solicitors and judges.
We don’t speak on the way there.
And, the sound of the silence is absolutely killing me.
Marco is invading all of my other senses. I swear that I can feel the electricity of his presence on my skin. I can smell him, and it just puts me back to our last night together. The sight of him out of the corner of my eye makes me want to just turn and stare, narrow Irish roads be damned.
Finally, about five minutes before the drop off, I can’t take it anymore.
‘Marco. Talk to me.’
He shifts, wincing like my words have some kind of physical impact on him. The silence stretches, endless and twisting.
Finally, he huffs. ‘I have nothing to say to you, Roisin.’
I’ve always been annoyed by the fact that he won’t use my nickname.
But now, I just miss the way he used to say my name. Like a benediction.
Now, he says it like a curse.
‘Marco, you-‘
‘We’re here,’ he interrupts.
That we are.
I put the car in park, looking down as Marco unbuckles his seat.
He doesn’t look back.
The door opens, my shit car groaning as Marco shifts. I blink, my eyes unexpectedly hot as I look out after him.
I wait for him to say something. Anything.
The door slams instead.
Blinking back tears that I didn’t know were there, I put the car in drive and head to the office.
By the time I get there, I’ve mostly composed myself. My heart rate is somewhat normal, and I don’t feel the need to explode into a basket case of tears anymore.
At least, I don’t think so.
I park in my assigned spot, then take the back staircase to the main entrance. Once there, I scan my badge, pressing against the gate as I wait for it to open…
The electronic beep of denial greets me instead.
I frown, scanning my badge again. The light, which always lights up green to allow me access, flashes.
Red.
I blink.
‘Ms. Kennedy?’
Colin, the security agent who supervises the door, is coming over. I shoot him a smile and wave my badge at him.
‘Hey Col. For some reason my badge doesn’t seem to work…’
My voice trails off as I see the look in his eyes.
‘I need you to come with me,’ he says, his voice solemn.
It’s the seriousness that makes me flinch.
Silently, my heart in my throat, I follow Colin.
Straight into one of the interrogation rooms.
I’ve been sitting at the table, sweating, for what feels like an hour before I finally hear the door click open.
I look up, my palms sweating, as Seamus enters the room.
‘Seamus,’ I breathe. ‘What the hell is going on?’
His face is drawn, making my heart sink.
‘When were you going to tell us that you were related to Kieran MacAntyre?’
Fuck.
I pale. ‘Seamus, I…’
‘Stop. Just stop,’ he says, holding up a hand. ‘I’m going to need you to start from the beginning, Ro. Tell me everything.’
I hesitate.
The part of me that’s a trained law enforcement official wants to trust him. I want to tell him everything, just like he’s asking me to do.
But the other part of me, who grew up among hardened criminals, is a little more concerned. I wouldn’t say that alarms are going off with Seamus, exactly, but something is sketchy about this situation.
I take a deep breath, and settle for everything except the fact that I’m selling information to my brother.
‘My mother was William MacAntyre’s mistress,’ I say. ‘I’m younger than my twin brothers, and she managed to keep me hidden from him until I was ten years old. When I was ten, William found out about me and… decided that I would live with him and Kieran,’ I say.
Seamus is staring at me.
Gulping, I continue. ‘She disappeared, Seamus. Gone. I knew she wasn’t dead because my father would get drunk and… he would get drunk and wonder where she was.’
Seamus gives me a look, but I’m not going to give him more than that. Detailing how my father used to beat the hell out of me, blaming me for having my mother’s face, isn’t something I want to go into right now.
Instead, I hold my head up high. ‘I ran away as soon as I passed my graduation. Took the exam for the academy the next day. By the time Kieran and William knew I was gone, I was safely at Interpol.’
What I don’t tell him is how, years later, Kieran broke into my apartment in Dublin. How he showed me exactly how cruel he could be, and then showed me the picture of my mother.
My mother, who I joined Interpol to find.
My mother, who Kieran somehow knew was alive. Knew her location.
And I didn’t.
He told me he’d kill her.
Unless I started reporting to him, as well as my boss.
Seamus sighs and slaps a file down. ‘For your honesty, Ro,’ he says softly.
Greedily, I grab the file and rip it open.
Reading it, my jaw drops. I look up at Seamus.
‘I didn’t do this.’
He nods. ‘I know.‘
I shut the file. ‘Seamus. I swear. I didn’t orchestrate that attack…’
‘I know, Ro.’
I shut my mouth and push the file back.
Seamus sighs. ‘At about six o’clock this morning, this email came across our desk. It was mine and one other higher up, and I knew the second that I saw it, it was bullshit. I figured that you might be related to Kieran, but I didn’t know how.’
I nod.
‘For you to have put together that attack, you would have had to have been in two places at once. Because we also have a record of you here. Photo evidence here.’
I tap the file. ‘But there’s someone who looks like me here too…’
‘I know, Ro. You’re being framed.’
The word rocks me. ‘Framed?’
Seamus nods, and I sit back in my seat.
‘But how…’
‘My guess is an enemy of your brother.’
My eyes widen. ‘How do they know I’m related to him?’
‘That, I think, is something we need to find out. Who else knows that you’re a MacAntyre?’
If I could take away my ability to emote, right then and there, I would.
Because the second Seamus sees my face, he sighs. He leans down and picks up the radio.
‘Bring De Luca in.’
