Page 95 of Dance of Thorns

I stand abruptly. “I’ll be back, Sergey.”

He frowns. “Where’re you going?”

“Brooklyn.”

“I already toldthe police everything I saw.”

D’Angelo’s large frame fills the doorway of his duplex as he eyes me warily. Behind him, I can smell dinner cooking and hear teenagers laughing and yelling over the sound of the Jets game.

“I know you did,” I say calmly. “I’m just looking for any details you may have forgotten at the time due to the shock, but have maybe since remembered.”

He looks me up and down, then folds his muscled arms over his chest. “Do I need my union rep or my lawyer present for this?” he growls.

I shrug, reaching into my pocket and pulling out my wallet. I thumb out three hundreds and lift them between two fingers. “I don’t know…doyou?”

D’Angelo’s gaze drops very deliberately to the bratva tattoos on the back of my hand, and the others on my neck, visible above my collar. Then our eyes lock.

“I'm not interested in your money,” he growls.

“And I’m not interested inyou, if that’s what you’re worried about,” I mutter back. “You did nothing wrong. In fact, I think you probably saved her life.”

His brow pinches. “So… This is about the girl?”

I nod.

“She yours?”

“She is,” I growl.

D’Angelo takes a deep breath. He glances behind him, then turns back to me, stepping out onto the small porch and half-shutting the door behind him. “Like I said, I already told the police what I saw…”

“I know,” I say, pulling the report out of my jacket, my eyes dropping to it. “It says here that you didn’t see who pushed her, and I wanted to?—”

“That’s not what I said.”

I raise my eyes to his. “Excuse me?”

D’Angelo shakes his head. “I didn’t say I didn’t seewhopushed her.” He looks at me with a mix of sadness and maybe pity. “I said I didn’t seeanyonepush her.”

My jaw tightens. “As in, you couldn’t see?—”

“As inno one pushed her,” he murmurs. “I saw the whole thing plain as day. Your girl threw herself in front of my bus.”

22

DOVE

A shadow falls over me,jerking my attention from the diary and cup of tea I've been sitting with at the kitchen counter. Heat suffuses my face, and I quickly close the book when I see Bane standing at the other side of the island.

“Hi,” I blurt, still blushing.

I'm not blushing because he’s just walked in on me reading Lark’s diary. I don't feel like I “almost got caught”. A few days ago, I decided on the off-chance that BaneknewLark’s diary and would recognize it, I disguised it. The bright blue is now covered in the dust jacket from asuperboring book I happen to own on the Vaganova Method called The Fundamentals of Classical Dance.

So, no. My face isn’t reddening because of what I’m doing.

It’s because ofhim.

The feelings that have been slowly creeping like tendrils through my insides have put down roots and started to grow, no matter how much I try and fight it.