Chapter 8 - You Belong With Me
“Because it’s quiet here.”
Those words dismantled every defense Alex had prepared.
Dominic’s confession came slowly.
Not because he lacked certainty.
Because certainty frightened him.
He admitted the Tuesday nights outside her building.
The apartment light.
The bad neighborhood.
The broken hallway fixture.
The fact that he sometimes sat inside the SUV for twenty minutes after a terrible day because seeing her moving behind the curtains reminded him that another kind of life existed.
Alex should have found it disturbing.
Part of her did.
Another part understood.
Dominic lived surrounded by people.
Yet loneliness followed him like a second shadow.
“My men see a paycheck,” he said.
“The women see the cars.”
“And me?”
“You see an inconvenience.”
Alex laughed.
Then he told her he was tired.
Really tired.
Tired of waking up knowing softness could be interpreted as weakness.
Tired of making every decision while calculating betrayal.
Tired of entering rooms already prepared to become the worst version of himself.
“You chose that life,” Alex reminded him.
“Yes.”
No excuses.
She respected him for that, even when she hated the answer.
Then came Marlow’s.
The back booth.
Green ink.
Missing receipts.
Six-dollar discrepancies.
Normal things.
“You’re real,” Dominic said.
The apartment seemed to shrink around them.
Then he said it.
“You belong with me.”
Alex stared.
Everything in her resisted the language.
“I don’t belong to anyone.”
Dominic’s expression changed.
“You’re right.”
She blinked.
He stepped closer.
“That came out wrong.”
“Spectacularly wrong.”
“I’m not good at this.”
“At talking?”
“At wanting something I can’t order people to give me.”
That silenced her.
Dominic lifted his hand.
Stopped before touching her.
Waited.
Alex did not move away.
His knuckles brushed her cheek.
“I don’t mean I own you.”
“Then what do you mean?”
“I mean when I picture somewhere safe…”
His voice dropped.
“It’s wherever you are.”
Alex felt tears threaten.
She hated that.
“So now what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Dominic Russo doesn’t know?”
“I’m having a difficult night.”
“That might be the whiskey.”
“Probably.”
His hand fell.
Alex immediately missed the warmth of it.
That irritated her too.
“Sleep,” she said.
“Bossy.”
“You’re injured.”
“Barely.”
“You almost collapsed in my doorway.”
“Your stairs are unreasonable.”
She brought a blanket.
Dominic looked offended.
“You own a blanket with flowers?”
“It was my grandmother’s.”
He accepted it instantly.
“Beautiful blanket.”
Alex rolled her eyes.
She slept in the armchair.
Or tried.
At 4:17 a.m. she woke and found Dominic standing beside the window.
“Why are you up?”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“You need rest.”
“So do you.”
She approached.
The rain had softened.
Dominic stared down at the street.
“Something’s wrong.”
Alex followed his gaze.
“What?”
“No car.”
“What car?”
“My security.”
Her stomach tightened.
Dominic reached for his phone.
No signal.
He looked at hers.
No signal.
Then the building lights went out.
Darkness.
“Dominic?”
“Come here.”
His voice changed completely.
No exhaustion.
No vulnerability.
The man from the back booth vanished.
The man who ruled half the city returned.
He moved Alex behind him.
A flashlight beam swept across the street below.
Footsteps sounded inside the stairwell.
Dominic reached beneath his discarded jacket.
Alex caught his wrist.
“No.”
He looked at her.
“No shooting in my apartment.”
“Excellent time for household rules.”
“You’re injured.”
“And somebody cut the power.”
The footsteps stopped outside.
Three knocks.
Dominic motioned Alex toward the bedroom.
She refused.
The knocks came again.
Then a voice.
“Boss.”
Marco.
Dominic opened the door.
Marco entered.
Bloodless face.
“Communications are down across the block.”
“Where are our men?”
“One unconscious in the alley. One missing.”
Alex felt cold.
Marco continued.
“Gray sedan was seen two streets north.”
“Grayson?”
“Maybe.”
Dominic looked toward Alex.
“We’re moving.”
She almost argued.
Then saw his expression.
Not controlling.
Afraid.
For her.
“Fine.”
They left through the rear staircase.
Alex wore sneakers beneath her red dress and carried her laptop in a grocery bag because apparently terror did not come with proper luggage.
Marco drove.
Dominic sat beside her in the back.
At every intersection he watched mirrors.
“Where are we going?” Alex asked.
“Somewhere safe.”
“Your home?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because whoever did this knew the security rotation.”
Marco’s eyes met Dominic’s in the mirror.
Inside job.
Again.
They drove outside the city to a small lakeside house.
Nothing about it looked like Dominic Russo.
Wooden porch.
Old kitchen.
Fishing photographs.
A faded couch.
“Whose house is this?”
“My mother’s.”
Alex looked at him.
“I thought the stone house was your family home.”
“My father’s.”
“This was hers.”
He opened the door.
“She came here when she wanted to breathe.”
Alex understood immediately why he had brought her.
Dominic fell asleep before sunrise.
When he woke, Alex was making coffee.
He tasted it.
His face twisted.
“Terrible.”
“You’re welcome.”
Then his phone rang.
Marco answered.
Listened.
His expression became stone.
“What?”
Marco looked at Dominic.
“Victor disappeared from the hospital.”
Dominic stood.
“That’s impossible.”
“He had help.”
“From who?”
Marco swallowed.
“Security footage shows one of ours.”
“Who?”
Marco turned the phone.
Dominic looked.
Alex watched his face empty.
On the screen was footage of a man helping Victor into a service elevator.
A man Dominic had trusted since childhood.
His younger cousin and second-in-command.
Anthony Russo.
Dominic said nothing for a long time.
Then Alex’s laptop chimed.
A new message.
One sentence.
STOP FOLLOWING THE MONEY OR DOMINIC DIES NEXT.
Attached beneath it was a photograph taken less than ten minutes earlier.
May you like
Dominic asleep on the lakeside couch.
Whoever was hunting them was already there.
