“What?” Luis demanded. “What do you want from me?”
“I want to know how it feels.”
“How what feels?”
“To be normal. To love someone and have them love you back and not spend your entire life looking over your shoulder.”
“I still look over my shoulder,” Luis said. “I looked today and there you were. It never goes away, so if you’re looking for deliverance, you’re not gonna find it.”
“I know that. I just want my family to be safe. For my—to be trusted, you know? I don’t care what happens to me.”
Luis hit Benito with another suffocating silence. His gaze drilled holes in Benito’s soul, and Benito couldn’t stand it. His soul was Mickey’s. And Gianna’s. Rosetta’s, maybe.
Not Luis Pope’s.
“Why now?” Luis asked suddenly. “Did something happen?”
“Do you really want to know?”
Luis held his stare a moment longer, then shook his head. “Nah, I guess not. Unless you killed someone. I’m not about that life. I can’t be. I got too much to lose.”
“I see that.” Benito glanced at Paolo again.
Luis’s gaze turned murderous. “Don’t think I wouldn’t. If anyone looks at him.”
“I didn’t mean it that way. Just that I know you love him. And I’m jealous.”
“Of Paolo?”
“Of both of you. I had... something, and I fucked it up. Even if I can get off the road, I can’t get it back.”
“You know that for sure?”
“Yeah. If I’ve killed anything, bro, it’s that.”
Understanding warmed Luis’s features. His hands twitched, as though he wanted to reach out and... whatever. Benito had no idea.
But Luis kept his hands to himself. He stood and returned to Paolo. Another fiery discussion ensued, then Luis came back. “Come on,” he said. “I’ll come with you.”
“Where?”
“Wherever you’re taking that grenade you’re hiding under the table.”
* * *
Luis escorted Benito to the underground. They rode ten stops west until they got to Hammersmith.
Benito followed Luis out of the station. “I’m supposed to meet him in Angel at ten.”
“You’re going to be early then,” Luis said.
“Why are you doing this?”
“Doing what?”
“Marching me somewhere. You trying to get me whacked, Pope?”
Luis crossed the road. Then he stopped outside an ale pub that was already serving coffee and artisan cakes—a world away from the greasy spoon Luis had made his home with Paolo. “I’m taking you to see him on his turf—his real turf—so you can see what’s important to him.”