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Something tells me Valentina won’t, either. I might call her my pet, but she’d try to gnaw her way out of any cage I could construct for her that didn’t have the legal stamp of marriage on it. She won’t bow to being my mistress. And if I don’t make good on my offer of marriage, Vinny will make sure some Italian fucker does.
I’ll kill him. Slice his guts out if he even tries…
“Who?”
Rowan’s question makes me realize I’ve said those last words out loud.
I shake my head and start walking. The line of people outside the front of the church is gone now. Everyone’s been let inside. I wonder if somebody tried to wipe all the whiskey away. Or if they’re just going to leave the casket shut.
There’s only one person out here now – a man – who unfolds himself from the backseat of a black luxury sedan. He’s tall, dressed immaculately in a cream-coloured suit with a soft grey sweater beneath. Some fancy looking fabric that moths would love. Cashmere or some shit like that. Odd choice for a funeral. But he isn’t heading for the doors with those long-legged strides.
He’s heading for us.
“Darragh Gowan.” He speaks with a London accent, a posh one that makes me think of Buckingham Palace and boarding schools. Black hair is swept back from thick brows and smoke-grey eyes.
“Who’s asking?”
“Oh,” he gives a slight chuckle, showing large, white teeth that contrast with the olive richness of his complexion. “I wasn’t asking.”
I crack my knuckles, trying to release some of the tension drumming up at the backs of my eyes. I’m about to tell him to cut the shit before I cut out his tongue when he holds out a hand and says, “I’m Amos al-Khatib. I am – was, I suppose – in business with Callum Gowan.”
I stare at his outstretched hand. Stare at the perfect line of his ivory sleeve. It would be so easily stained with blood. I can almost see it now. Seeping from edge to elbow.
Then, he says something that has me jerking my gaze right back up to his face. Straight to the strange smoke of those eyes.
“I know who killed him.”
Chapter 4
Valentina
One week in Montréal and everything’s arranged.
Tomorrow, apparently, I will be marrying Salvatore Di Mauro.
I say apparently, because I still don’t really believe it’s going to happen.
I don’t think Darragh will let it.
Even as we gather for the rehearsal dinner and I prepare to meet Sal for the first time, I still don’t accept that this is real.
Mamma fusses with stray strands of my hair as we enter the large restaurant for the rehearsal dinner. My hair has been trimmed and highlighted within an inch of its life, shimmering honey and gold breaking up the dark shade I’ve worn since August. New hair, new me, I guess. Or maybe I should say old hair, old me. Since I always used to wear it lighter like this. It was only that brief stretch of summer, from August until mid-September, that I had it back to its near-black natural colour.
They echo through my head. Words wrapped in the rough smoke of Darragh’s voice. The memory of what he said to me on that rooftop.
This hair colour suits you.
He was the only one who said it. The only one who liked it. That natural slice of myself.
Oh, Jesus. If I’m going to start whining that Darragh Gowan was the only one who saw the real me…
It’s just too pathetic to think about. Even if it might be true.
“Stop poking at her like she’s your pet poodle,” Papà grunts at Mamma. The little jabs spoken through Mamma are the closest he’s come to speaking directly to me. Mamma’s hand drops at the same moment that my teeth clamp together. Pet.
I force my jaw to unlock.
“He used to call me that, you know,” I say lightly. Breezily, even.