His fingers were magic, light and soothing and yet somehow as intense as the rest of him.
Benito sighed. “Tell me you’re real?”
“I’m real.” Mickey held Benito against him. “We should talk, though. If you’re up to it.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re a liar.”
Mickey spoke without edge, but his word choice cut deep. Benito forced himself to pull back from his embrace and stood, his legs stronger than they had been in days. “You must really hate me right now.”
“It would be easier if I did.” Mickey watched Benito pace to the window. His hands twitched, and he folded his arms across his chest. “But I meant what I said the night of the fire... if you can remember.”
Benito rested his forehead on the cool glass and gazed at the twinkly lights of the shopping district across the street. “I think I do. Then I’m worried I don’t, and I’m remembering what I wish you’d said.”
“Maybe the details don’t matter. At least until you tell me why you had blow dust under your car seat. Because I can feel whatever fucking way I want to about you, but none of it matters if you’re on the road, Benito. I can’t be near that shit, and that’s not going to change.”
“I know. That’s why—fuck.” Benito banged his head on the window. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry, man. Your life was your life before you met me.”
“I lied to you.”
“Fix it then. Tell me the truth.”
Nausea rattled Benito’s bones. He closed his eyes, willing it away and praying he wouldn’t faint. When the rush faded, he turned away from the window.
Mickey was still on the bed. He’d closed his eyes too, as if he couldn’t bear to look at Benito, and Benitoachedto go to him.
But he couldn’t. Not yet. “I lied about being off the street because I was scared of losing you. I knew it was wrong, but I thought I had time to make it right. That it would be the truth before you ever found out.”
Mickey opened his eyes. “That you’d be out before I found out that you weren’t?”
“Yeah. I had a plan.”
“But you’d have lied to me forever, though, right? Whatever happened?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” Benito took a breath. “I might’ve told you later on, but maybe I’m a shittier human than you ever were.”
Mickey snorted. “Don’t underestimate what a nasty cunt I was. It’s why I have no fucking right to sit here and judge you. It’s just... hard. I wish I didn’t understand. Then I could walk away.”
“Is that what you want? To walk away?”
“No. I didn’t mean that.”
Benito shivered. It seemed to be all he did these days. Shiver and shake. Puke his sins into the ground while yearning for something better. “A year ago, I lost a fight to be the top boy of my crew. I got shanked and chased out. They threatened my family. Said if I didn’t stay out of London, they’d hurt Gianna.”
“The scar on your ribs?”
“Yeah.”
Mickey whistled. “Nasty.”
“It was a big knife. I deserved it, though. Kind of. Maybe not like that, but it needed to happen.”
“Why?”
Benito shrugged. “I was a bad man, and I was blind to it. I didn’t care who I hurt. I just wanted to win.”