And then a thought hits me. “Wait—Sammy,” I say heavily. “I don’t want to make him feel threatened in his own home. We’ll have to think of something else.”
Dami rubs a hand over the back of his head with a grimace. “Ricky Benedetti,” he sighs. “Sammy’s been wanting to see him. I’ll send them out together, and Vito can drive them. Gives Sammy his date, gets him out of the house, and Vito keeps them both safe.”
It’s clever. Two problems solved with one move. Sammy protected, even happy, and the house cleared for the meeting. “Alright,” I say.
“Alright,” he echoes.
We look at each other, and it feels like something has changed. Balanced, maybe. Neither of us is pretending the war is over, but at least there’s a negotiating table between us instead of a wall.
Late that night, well past two, I go back into the surveillance room and look at Damiano lying awake in the basement. The night vision turns everything gray-green and unfamiliar. He’s on his back, hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling.
He’s in my bed.
The one from the townhouse, not…the other one.
He must have watched me like this. Sat in this chair, in this room, and watched me sleep and wake and lie there, hopeless. Night after night.
I slowly become aware that I’m shivering there in the leather seat, so I leave the small room and pull on Dami’s robe, burying my nose in the collar to find his scent.
I miss him.
The admission should sicken me. What kind of fool misses his captor? What kind of masochist craves the company of a man who wanted to murder him? But the anger, when I reach for it, is thinner tonight. Worn down and tired. Superseded by other memories.
My feet carry me out of the bedroom and to the elevator. I stand there for a long time, looking at the brass doors, before I enter them at last.
I scan my fingerprint and press the button for the basement.
CHAPTER 38
DAMIANO
The lighton the elevator panel blinks green, and I’m on my feet before it hits the landing, grabbing my gun just in case, because this has to be an emergency, right? There’s no other reason Caligula Clemenza would come down here.
The doors open, and he stands there in the wash of fluorescent light wearing my robe. His face is set in that expression I’ve come to recognize as the one he wears when he’s made up his mind and is going to be a pain in the ass about it.
He looks at the gun. Then at my face. “I thought you’d decidednotto kill me.”
If that’s his opening sting, I can’t wait to see how this is going to end. I put down the gun on the nearest surface. “What are you doing down here?”
“Making bad choices.”
He steps out of the elevator. The doors close behind him, and the darkness swallows us both for a second until he moves to the light switch and turns it on. I blink, my eyes adjusting, while Caligula walks over to me. “You’ve been sleeping in my bed,” he says.
“Your bed?” I repeat, feeling stupid and dull.
“That bed was mine a lot longer than it was yours.”
Today was tough. Trying to think about what moves Big Gee will make when he figures out I’ve gone rogue isn’t difficult—the man is not a master strategist—but I don’t know how much the Bratva are backing him already, or how hard they’ll come for the Clemenza.
Not “the Clemenza.”
Caligula.
He’s not just a Clemenza anymore, which is something I’ve had to admit to myself down here in the darkness.
My robe hangs off his shoulder like always, showing the line of his collarbone, and I want to pull it back up or push it the rest of the way off, and I can’t do either.
“I should hate you,” he says, looking up into my face.