“Are you saying I’m special?”

  I’m joking but he stares down at me with hard eyes. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  He looks so sexy staring down at me like that; I can’t stop myself from leaning up and kissing him. I kiss him hard, pressing my lips against his so that our teeth click together. He reaches down and grabs my leg. Passion ignites, flares throughout me. My cheeks get warm, my pussy warmer. Perhaps I would fall into it if the memory of what happened last time we fell into it was not a bruising lump on my head. I pull away.

  Dante glances at the door. “I guess we don’t wanna put on a show.”

  “Definitely not,” I say. “You were saying …”

  He laughs gruffly. “I was hoping that kiss had made you forget. I guess I’m not as magic-lipped as I thought I was.”

  “Magic-lipped. It seems you have a way with words, Dante.”

  “I fluked. Don’t expect that kind of poetic shit regularly.”

  I prod him in the belly. “Talk to me,” I say softly.

  “I don’t know what there is to say. It was lung cancer, but she didn’t smoke a day in her life. My father was already dead. When I was four he caught a bullet in a gunfight and went down and never got up again; that’s always how my brother explained it to me. I’d ask where Daddy was and he’d say he fell down and he was never getting up.”

  “That’s mean,” I whisper.

  “No,” Dante says firmly. “It was right of him to give it to me straight. The time for being soft was over. So my momma got lung cancer having never smoked a day in her life. She was a bit of a fitness freak, actually. She had the exercise bike and the sit-up machine and a big pile of equipment in the garage. She’d sometimes drag the equipment onto the driveway and make a gym for herself. Once the cancer started on her, she didn’t last long. Five months and she was dead. I remember holding her hand as she went, and she was talking to me about her exercise equipment—at a time like that! She smiled and said it seemed like a dream that she was ever able to do one hundred sit-ups.” He pauses. His voice is choked.

  I kiss the place just under his eye. I think I taste tears, but I’m not sure.

  “She died then.” He shrugs. “I saw it coming but it still hit me like a gunshot.” He winces, as though saying the word gunshot reminds him of the one in his leg. “She was a good woman, and she’s dead. I wish I could say something more meaningful than that, but I don’t know if there’s anything more to say.”

  I try not to cry. He’s not talking about my mother. But I can’t help it. I think of Mom laid up in bed, the machines beeping as the life is stolen from her, clawing at the blankets and demanding to know where her daughter is. Cancer breeds dark thoughts, and the darkest of all is that I promised myself as soon as Mom was diagnosed that I would be there when she died. I want to expect the best, but my time with Clint robbed me of unwavering optimism. I would be there … But now I won’t, I reflect as the tears pour out of me.

  “It’s okay,” Dante says, wiping the tears from my cheeks with his hand. “Just because my mom …”

  “I have to be there,” I sob. “I can’t stand the idea of being in this disgusting place when Mom is dying all alone.”

  “You won’t,” he says. “You’re getting out of here. I swear I’ll make that happen.”

  For the next hour or so we’re quiet, lying in each other’s arms, listening to the distant footsteps outside our prison cell. A couple of men talk in mumbled tones in the hallway.

  “You mentioned a brother,” I say, breaking a silence. “Where is he?”

  He was stroking my hair; now his hand freezes. He makes a fist and lets out air through clenched teeth.

  “What is it?” I ask, looking up at him.

  His jaw is clenched, his temples pulsing. It’s like he’s trying to hold closed a door which has immense pressure on the other side. “My brother,” he whispers. He stands up, clicking his neck from side to side and rolling his arms in his shoulders. “My brother,” he repeats. “That’s a can of worms, Selena. I don’t know if you wanna open them.”

  I stand up. Pins and needles make my left leg weak. I stumble, grip the wall. Dante rushes forward and catches me. “My knight in shining armor.” I grin up at him.

  He grins back, though it looks as if it takes him some effort. “If you say so, ma’am.”

  “You don’t have to tell me about your brother,” I say. “But you do have to let me change that.” I point to his bandage. Blood drips down his leg.

  “Fair enough.”

  He sits down. I tear the fabric of my jeans. “Thank God for cheap denim.” Then I remove the fabric he tied and carefully make a folded bandage of the denim. I use a thin strip of denim to secure the bandage in place. “How’s the pain?”

  “It’s okay,” he says. “I’ve felt worse, and I’ll feel worse again.”

  “You don’t have to be so tough,” I say.

  “That’s where you’re wrong. A man in my position—that’s all he can be.” He wraps a piece of my hair around his finger. “My brother was getting out of the life. Hell, he was damn near out when the shit went down. We had a crazy argument about it. I almost shot him. Almost shot my own brother.” He tells me about the day he found his brother packing up his stuff, about how he fired a shot into the air. “And I thought that was it, you know? I thought he was gone now and I’d hear from him in a few months and learn that he’d set up a life in Maine or somewhere like that, somewhere with seasons and picket fences. But then I get a call from Brose—the flowery bastard who calls himself the Gentleman—and he says he’s got my brother as his prisoner. Says I need to pay a ransom. So I take the ransom money to the clubhouse—alone, like I was asked—and we meet in the parking lot. Me, Markus, Brose, and about ten of his men. They’ve all got guns, but I don’t.”

  He pauses.

  “What?” I ask.

  He takes breath. “Just never talked about this before.”

  “It’s okay.” I rub his hand. “You don’t have to—”

  “I want to,” he interrupts. “I feel better. Less weighed down. I think I have to finish.”

  I wait. For several minutes we sit in silence. Then he says, “I dropped the bag on the ground and Markus stepped forward. And that would’ve been it. Markus could leave, and I’d go to war with the Wraiths. But what you’ve gotta understand about Markus is that he’s a devil when he gets angry. And he is—was—pissed. I keep saying is, like he’s still around, and …” He rubs his head. “I’m tired.”

  I kiss him on the cheek. I can tell this is taking a toll on him. I can tell just from this moment that he’s never shared anything even close to this with another person before. I feel privileged and moved. Again I wish we were someplace else without the sword hanging over our heads.

  “He was angry, really damn angry at being taken by Brose. So as he was walking to me he turned around and punched Brose across the face. He punched him over and over, split his eye, split his lip, damn near split his skull. I jumped on the nearest man. When Markus got to fighting, I got to fighting; that was just the way it worked. But there were more of them and it didn’t take them long to overpower us. Brose’s men pushed Markus to his knees, Brose took out a pistol, and Markus’s body fell to the ground, his face covered in blood. I collapsed next to him and screamed and roared and then I tried to get my hands on Brose, but ten men had their guns on me. Brose let me go ’cause he liked the sight of me so upset, I reckon. And I just left, Selena. Just walked away from my brother, leaving him there on the concrete. I bought his body later so we could bury him. I had to buy the body! I had to send one of my men to the Wraith compound and make a deal for the body just like I was making a deal for a shipment of guns. And I just left. My brother, bloody and dead, and I just walked away.”

  “What were you supposed to do?” I ask softly.

  He leaps up, limping on his good leg to the wall, and then punches the tiles hard. They crack and fall away. “Anything!” he snaps. “Fight, kill, die. Not run away like a coward.”

  I go to him and place my hand on his shoulders, kneading them. “You had ten guns on you. You said that yourself.”

  “I shouldn’t even be talking about this,” he says. “You were stabbed by some prick and I’m standing here moaning like a woman about my problems.”

  “You’re not moaning.” I take his face in my hands and lock our eyes. “Don’t go all hard on me now. You’re allowed to be upset. It’s good to be upset.”

  “It’s good to be upset?” He raises an eyebrow. “How’s that?”

  His lips are quivering and he keeps closing his eyes as though fighting off tears.

  I wrap my arms around him and lead his face to my chest. “Hush,” I whisper, as he starts to cry. “I’m with you. I’m here.” He cries chokingly at first, fighting off the sobs, but then he loses control and vibrates with unstoppable emotion. I cradle him the whole while, stroking his hair, whispering and trying to soothe him. It’s clear he hasn’t cried in years, if ever, from the way the tears consume him. He’s not an expert crier, like I was, able to switch off the tears when Clint walked through the door.

  When he’s done he turns away, head low. “Goddamn,” he says, wiping his face. “I don’t know what the fuck just happened to me.” He wipes at his face and then turns to me, eyes red but dry. “That’s won’t happen again. You have my word on that.”

  “What are you talking about?” I say. “Nothing happened that you need to make amends for. You just cried. You’re allowed to cry.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” he says. “A man in my position is never allowed to cry.”

  We return to our place on the floor, nothing to do but hold each other and wait.

  “I tricked the guards,” I say. “Before you got here. And I got free from my cuffs.” I tell him about the screw and the takeout, the bat and the violence.

  He smiles sideways at me. “It’s like we’ve swapped places. I’m the emotional woman and you’re the tough man.”

  I pinch his nose. “Listen here. A woman can be strong and a man can be emotional. Okay?”

  “I’ll agree to that if you agree to never tell a soul you saw me cry, even your own mother.”

  I place my hand on my chest. “I swear I will never tell anybody that you have a heart.”

  He inclines his head, ignoring the sarcasm. “Much obliged, ma’am.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Dante

  I feel like an asshole for letting myself cry, but less of an asshole with Selena than I would if I’d cried with some other woman. But more than anything I feel like an asshole for self-pitying myself after hearing Selena’s story. I don’t know what’s happened to me in this cell. It’s like she’s cast a spell on me.

  “I want to tear this Clint bastard apart,” I say. “I’ll find him and I’ll make him pay. I’ll end him.” My anger drives my words, not logic. If logic was driving them I wouldn’t be saying any of this because most likely I’ll be dead by tomorrow.

  “You don’t have to do that,” she says. “He’s in prison for a long time. He tried to kill me.”

  “You don’t think I can get him in jail?”

  “Dante!” Selena snaps. “I don’t want that. He’s gone. I’m done with him. To have you do something to him would be like admitting he’s still a part of my life, like he has some say in what I do. He doesn’t, okay? He doesn’t have any say at all. He’s a small little man and he’s never getting out.”

  I nod. “Okay, then.”

  As I wait for death, I sit with this woman, and we talk about nothing and everything. In this cell with Selena, I’ve already talked more than I have to most women in my life.

  “So you’ve never read much?”

  “I never finished school,” I say. “I was too busy.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Fighting. Outlawing.”

  “At fifteen?”

  “Hell, at twelve. Markus started me young.”

  “Wasn’t that scary?”

  “I guess it was. Fear is like a muscle, though.”

  “The more you work it the bigger it gets?” she shoots.

  “I was gonna say the more you work it, the stronger you get. I guess I was scared once, but I’m not anymore.”

  “So nothing scares you?”

  I trace her lips with her finger. “The idea of losing you scares the shit outta me. That’s why I’m here. Though I can’t say there’s much reason in it.”

  “Because we only met yesterday? Or a couple of days ago? I’m not even sure exactly how long it’s been except that my belly really hurts.”

  “Mine too,” I say. It growls for food. “But yeah, you’re right. It’s crazy to me. We met so recently and yet, I need you.” I laugh, feeling like a fool. “I couldn’t just leave you here. Everybody’s been acting all surprised by me because I won’t just let you go. I’m not usually the love-struck man. One of my friends said it was Cupid, and I’ve got half a mind to agree with him.”

  “Cupid,” Selena muses. “And not just my winning personality?”

  “Maybe it’s partly that.”

  “So what did you do?” Selena asks. “When you were a kid, apart from outlawing? Because I read a lot, probably too much. I was that weird girl sitting alone in the cafeteria with my head in the clouds. I remember once, even a teacher told me I read too much. Not in so many words, but told me I was antisocial and should make more of an effort with the other students. Maybe she was right. But you should’ve seen Mom when she found out. It was like watching a tornado head for the teacher’s office.”

  “Why reading?” I ask. “I’ve never much seen the appeal.”

  “Because when you read, you can be anybody. Being somebody else is very appealing to a young, awkward girl. My guess is there are as many different reasons that people like reading as there are readers. But you haven’t answered my question. What did you do as a kid?”

  “You mean kid stuff?”

  “Yeah.” She smiles. “Kid stuff.” She touches her belly, maybe thinking about the pact that started all this.

  “I played video games. I played quite a few video games, in fact, until Mom and Markus sold the Xbox.”

  “They sold it?”

  “Don’t cry over it,” I say. “They needed the cash. It was a low point in the club or some shit.” I tell her not to get upset about it, but the truth is the day they sold it I was angrier than I’d ever been as a kid, even when I was beating the shit out of the other kids at school for calling me a lowlife. The kids’ parents told them I was a dirty wretch on account of my brother, and not to bother with me.

  “Where are you?” Selena asks. “Because you’re not here, with me. You’re up in the clouds somewhere.”

  “I wish that door would open,” I say, staring at it as though that’ll accomplish anything. “I’m tired of waiting for something to happen. There’s nothing worse in life than waiting for something to happen.”

  “Are you really that eager to be taken to Mexico and made into a slave?” Selena whispers. I can tell the idea terrifies her. She doesn’t want me to go. She doesn’t want me to suffer. I don’t know what she’d say if I told her what is really going to happen. But I won’t tell her. She needs to get out of here. That’s all that matters to me.

  “What if the stress has stopped me getting pregnant?” she says, a cute smile on her lips, a wicked glint in her eyes. “Can we keep trying?”

  I think of a gravestone with my name on it. Can a gravestone fuck? I would laugh if it wouldn’t make her ask for an explanation. I kiss her instead, tongues dancing, lips scraping, bodies pressed close. “We can keep trying,” I say, when the kiss ends, though she must know it’s impossible. There are things I want to say to her, like how I want to take things past the original agreement, about how I never wanted kids but I think having them with her would be the best damn thing ever. But if I say them then she might think they have a chance of happening, and I know they can’t. This is the end of the road for me, but it doesn’t have to be for her.

  But then she does it for me.

  “I want more than our agreement,” she says. “I know they’re going to take you away, but you’ll escape. You’ll escape and you’ll find me and then we’ll run away together. I know how mad that sounds but we can do it, Dante. We’ll go somewhere far away just like your brother was going to. We’ll start a new life. We’ll take Mom with us and get her into a hospital wherever we end up. We’ll fight for a new life. We’ll have a family.” She pauses. “Or am I coming across like the most forward overbearing person in the history of forward overbearing people?”

  “Not even slightly,” I say. “I want all that too.”