“I’ll check around. If it’s been a year, it might be hard, and we don’t even know for sure that the girl dated a guy in our family. Lots of guys talk shit and pretend to be a lot harder than they are and our family name is known all over the West Coast.”
“Any help you can offer would be good,” I say and squeeze his shoulder. “And if you can keep this from the others, we’d appreciate it.”
“You want me to hide something from my own fucking family?” Damon stares at me with a menacing glare for several seconds and I notice Grace pale, but Damon’s face splits in a grin. “Happy to fucking do it.”
I laugh and shake my head and Grace looks like she’s going to puke, the poor girl, she’s way too fragile for that kind of humor right now.
We spend another hour drinking some wine and catching up before we head out again. Grace gives Damon everything she can about Riley and he promises to look into it, “But I can’t guarantee I’ll find shit, just so you know.”
Outside in the car on the way back to the apartment, Grace suddenly reaches out and grabs my hand. She squeezes it hard and tears roll down her cheeks, fat and slow, and her shoulders shake slightly as she cries quietly, staring out the window.
I say nothing. What can I say? It’ll be okay? Don’t be sad? Nothing’s going to bring her cousin back from the dead no matter how hard we search. She might get her revenge but at the end of all this, her life won’t be any different and she’ll still be alone.
She knows it as much as I do, and it says a lot that she’s still willing to go forward even knowing nothing will change.
It says she’s fiercely loyal and loves her cousin more than life itself.
That’s the kind of woman I want at my side.
I hold her hand tight so she knows I’m here for her and say nothing and let her cry, because words don’t mean shit, only deeds do, and I plan on showing her how I feel.
Chapter 16
Grace
Meeting with Damon was the happiest I’ve been in months and the saddest I’ve been since Riley died.
Talking about her like that to Damon was cathartic—I wanted him to know about my cousin, the girl so full of life, so strong and clever and beautiful, the girl that was taken away too soon and torn from the world like a cleaver through raw meat. He didn’t make any promises about finding her killer, only that he’d ask around and see if any of the guys had heard of her or anyone that might’ve dated her, and that was enough for me.
It was hard, but it was good.
And it only makes my internal dilemma that much worse.
But I still don’t understand why Calvino did it.
“You got something on your mind?” Kia leans against the bar and smiles at me, her bright white teeth shining in the black lights. I wish they’d turn those off sometimes. “You seem distracted tonight.”
“Sorry, nothing important, just thinking.” I smile back at her, relieved that she’s even talking to me. Calvino’s not in this evening which is probably why she’s not going to great lengths to pretend like I don’t exist.
“You seem good, you know,” Kia says out of nowhere as Dustin returns with a few drinks for her customers. “Like ever since you got together with Calvino, you’ve got a glow about you.”
I laugh awkwardly and shake my head. “I doubt that.”
“Come on, girl. Tell the truth. You two are serious, right?”
“Not even a little bit.”
“That’s bullshit. I see the way he looks at you.”
“Yeah? How’s that?”
“Like you’re the only girl in this place. Even when there’s a pair of perfect boobs up on the stage, he’s still watching you no matter what. It’s almost kind of creepy if it weren’t so sweet. You’ve got that man wrapped around your finger.”
I shake my head again as she winks at me and walks off, strutting her hips toward her table, and I feel a little spike in my stomach. If only she knew.
I definitely don’t have him wrapped around my finger—but he did take me to Damon’s and started the process of finding Riley’s killer when he didn’t have to. Our deal was I get his information first then he helps me with my problem, so I didn’t expect him to start in on the hunt until things were totally finished and out in the open.
And yet he did it anyway.
I have to wonder why a guy like Calvino would give a damn about a girl like me, but maybe there’s some truth to what Kia said—maybe Calvino cares more than he says he does.
I’m smiling and my stomach’s doing flips, and I don’t know why the hell I feel like this. It only makes keeping my conversation with Vince from him that much worse—but Vince’s threat against the girls here keeps reverberating through my head.