She looks up at me and smiles mildly, working her hand up to my neck and rubbing soothing circles there, twisting the hair at my nape in between.
“So Goldie’s in a dress,” she muses, peeking out the corner of her eye across the table, where my fearless female sidekick is necking wine like it could be water. In a dress. It’s unheard of, as is drunk Goldie, but with each day that’s passed, I’ve seen her struggling to hold up her fierce front. Maybe it’s the women she’s suddenly surrounded by. Maybe it’s the sense of relaxation. Who the fuck knows, but I’m happy for her. “I hope you didn’t mock her,” she adds.
“I’m brave, Beau, but not that brave.” And neither are any of the men. “Danny’s invited me out on the water in the morning,” I say, trying to hide the shudder her touch on my neck is spiking. “He’s planning on taking Rose to St. Lucia tomorrow evening.”
Her playing fingers pause, her face somewhere between worry and wariness. “They’re leaving?” She looks across to Rose. “But she’s not mentioned it.”
“I don’t think she knows. And have you mentioned we’re leaving?”
“No,” she says slowly, returning her attention to me, her expression sarcastic. “Because I don’t know when we’re leaving.”
I say nothing, pulling her in close and kissing her temple.
Soon. Very soon.
24
BEAU
* * *
Everything so far has been smooth and without drama, but I can’t help but feel like I’m bracing myself for an explosion. James has told me to pack, which I have. I’ve learned Danny is planning on taking Rose to St. Lucia. Both suggest the end is in sight, so why the hell can’t I see it? I try to quieten my erratic heart and fail. It isn’t because I’m fearful of what may be going down. Today has been so much harder than I imagined. Things seem to be slowly knitting together for Danny and Rose, but I can’t help but feel like for us they’re slowly unraveling.
I look up at James when he slowly rises from his chair, my face questioning. “Where are you going?” I ask, trying to keep the panic from my voice. He’s the only thing anchoring me right now, the only thing keeping me here and relatively stable. “I’ll be back in a second.” He kisses my head, but his eyes are on Danny, who’s rising from his chair too. Naturally, Rose looks at her husband in both warning and worry. He catches it, smiling, but he still leaves, taking his drink with him, and James follows, along with Brad, Otto, and Ringo. Nolan remains at the table, and I soon figure out that there’s a good reason for that when he shuffles across a few seats and starts keeping a tipsy Goldie busy, topping up her wine glass.
I move my eyes across to Rose, feeling her staring at me. Her head tilts, her jaw tight. I discreetly show the ceiling my palms. I have no idea what’s going on, but my stomach is twisting anxiously. I’m even more suspicious when Esther joins Rose. That woman would do anything for her son, including distracting his wife while he murders someone on their wedding day. The Bear? Is he immune from the murdering hands of James and Danny today? I bite my lip, unsure.
“Darling girl,” Zinnea coos, dropping to a chair beside me, relieving a consistently wary-looking Father McMahon from her bold presence for the first time since we all sat down hours ago. The fairy lights are now twinkling above, the music playing a little louder, cocktails now being handed out. “What a beautiful day. Small, intimate, but so extravagant too.” Her eyes widen when a waiter offers her a tray loaded with various elaborate glasses, all as colorful as Zinnea. She pulls two pink cocktails from the tray and hands one over, pushing her blonde wig over her shoulder. Her fake lashes flutter, her cheeks glowing with some sort of shimmery powder. She looks remarkably together, and I know part of that is because of me projecting calmness. “How are you feeling, darling?”
Don’t ask. “I’m fine,” I say, reaching for her hand and squeezing, faking a smile to within an inch of my life. “It’s been a lovely day.”
She sighs, nodding, casting her eyes around the table to the remaining guests. “Odd, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
“Acceptance.”
I look around, seeing the Vikings with Daniel between them, Rose’s son showing them something on his cell, and then across to Goldie and Nolan, who have been joined by the guys who run the boatyard. The priest is talking to Doc, still looking quite bewildered.
“All of these people were strangers to me weeks ago,” she says, sighing, “and now they’re so much more.”
I wrap my lips around the straw and suck, wincing at the strength. And wincing at the thought of leaving. Not Miami, but this house. These people. There’s no doubt that without them, without this support network, no matter how bizarre it is, I’d be far worse off. James needed an army. He found one. But he also found a fucked-up family, and walking away from the safety blanket of Rose and the others is going to be a challenge I never anticipated.
James has said we’re leaving. When, I don’t know, but I also don’t know where he’s taking me. Something tells me it’s not St. Lucia. And something horrible and unsettling is telling me I might not see Rose again.
25
DANNY
* * *
I know it won’t be long before Rose is hunting me down. No business today, it’s what I said explicitly, and yet here I am stalking to my office, Brad, James, Otto, and Ringo in tow. I read the look Ringo flashed me after he took a call from Bud on the gate. Who the fuck is here and, more significantly, why?
I swing the door open and make a beeline for the bottle. “Who?” I ask shortly, trying to contain my anger.
“Two of Conner’s men,” Ringo replies as I swing around in surprise. “And a guest. Len’s escorting them here.”
“Conner?” James looks at me in question. “British Conner? Is that who found Brunelli?”
“Yeah.” I knock back my drink, glancing down at my watch. We’ve been gone three minutes. I give it ten until the search party arrives, and no man will want to be in the vicinity of my wife when that happens, least of all me.
“Fucking hell,” Otto breathes, dropping to the couch. “Does Goldie know?”
Goldie?
“What do you think?” James asks sardonically. “If she knew the root of her trauma had been found, she wouldn’t be out there relaxed, drinking, and wearing a fucking dress, would she? She’d be kitted out in everything she needed to torture a man to death.” James looks at me, clearly stressed out, and I can’t help but wonder if it’s because he’d like to make a mess of him too. What the fuck did this guy do to Goldie to warrant such stress and fury? “I strongly advise you to get Brunelli the fuck out of here,” James continues, helping himself to a drink. “Unless you want your wedding to be a bloodbath, because that’s exactly what it’ll be if Goldie sniffs him out.”
Something tells me it could be a bloodbath if I let James at him too.
“What did he do to her?” Brad asks, looking between both James and Otto for an answer. The tension levels are through the roof.