Page 130 of Bad Bishop

“I’m meeting your brothers and Sam in Harlem.” He kept his shades on.

“Is this about the Russians?”

The answer was in his silence.

My heart sank. I didn’t want him to go to Vegas. I didn’t want him to risk his life for this stupid…nothing.

“Why? Igor did terrible things to you, but Alex was nothing but a true friend,” I pointed out.

“Alex must retaliate. He’s the new pakhan. Plus, I betrayed him. I’d rather kill him than die.”

“When will you go to Vegas?”

“This week.”

“This week?” My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach. “When were you going to tell me?”

“As soon as I had a concrete date.” He turned his attention to his phone in the central console. Flipped it screen-up to check his messages.

“I don’t want you to die,” I blurted out.

I was afraid. It was okay to be afraid. It was not okay to be a coward.

And a coward wouldn’t have admitted her feelings.

This seemed to grab my husband’s attention. He put his phone down and placed his thumb on my jaw, his fingers wrapped around the nape of my neck.

“They call me Deathless for a reason.”

“Koshchei, right?” I remembered. Of course I remembered. I remembered everything about him. “That’s the name Igor gave you.”

“Yes.”

“I read the tale,” I signed dejectedly. “The God of Death gets impaled through the chest in the end.” Tears clung to my lower lashes. “He dies an agonizing, violent death. And he dies a villain.”

“Iama villain,” Tiernan said, not an ounce of regret in him. “I am selfish. Soulless. Perverse. A few soft kisses and hard fucks did not change that. Nothing can, sweetheart.”

The words were a bucket of ice thrown over the past few weeks. How foolish I’d been to think he developed feelings for me just because I developed feelings for him. Mama was right. I opened my legs and lost my mind to this man. Just like she’d expected.

I swallowed hard. “I can’t change your mind, can I?”

He shook his head gravely.

“Well, then.” I opened the door, hopping out. “Have fun planning your own funeral, Tiernan.”

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

LILA

I couldn’t see straight as I walked the distance from the car to our building, Irish soldiers engulfing me from all sides.

I wasn’t ready to face Imma in the apartment, so I slipped into Fermanagh’s instead. The place was packed as always. Drunken old men and sex workers aplenty. It could be argued that a man of Tiernan’s means who truly cared about his pregnant wife wouldn’t want her to live in a place like this. Now that he had ripped the rose-colored glasses from my eyes, I could finally admit this to myself.

Weaving into the back of the bar, I grabbed curry chips and a Coke and dragged my way up the stairs, contemplating knocking on Tierney’s door.

I loved Imma, but she’d never relate to me. In her view, Tiernan was a splendid husband. He gave me a credit card and no blue marks on my body. The rest, to her, was just white noise.

Mafia wars?