Page 107 of The Butcher's Wife

ANNETTA

Dom wakesme up with a gentle shake of my shoulders. “Let’s go, angel.”

I blink slowly at his shadowy features. “What time is it?”

“Four in the morning. I got coffee for you. Come on.”

I reach out, my fingertips brushing against the fur lining of his coat. “Did you go out?”

The last thing I remember was falling asleep on top of him after we had sex.

He thrusts a pair of jeans into my hands in response.

We’re going out of the penthouse? This can’t be good, but the possibility of going somewhere new has me slipping into my clothes without argument. Bleary-eyed, I follow Dom as he leads us to the kitchen, presses a warm travel mug of coffee into my hands, and takes us to the parking garage, where the frigid night air snaps my mind into focus.

I have a sneaking suspicion that he went out to hurt Lasso. He might have even killed him. As I start up the SUV, I wait to feel a sense of injustice at what Dom could have done.

Lasso was shitty, but did he deserve to die?

Dom feeds me directions through the nearly empty streets to Lake Shore Drive. The long highway skirts the city’s edge, bathed in bright light from skyscrapers along one side, and on the other, a yawning view of the vast, dark lake. The inky depths strum at my awareness as I drive along the scenic route.

Frederico’s open mouth.

Lake water rushing inside.

His look ofoutrage, and the deep, sure pleasure at what I’d done all flood through me.

I’m not responsible for what Dom may or may not have done, but I won’t fault him if he did it. Sometimes you have to make your own justice in this world.

I’ve figured out where we’re headed well before I see Cousin Red next to the open gates of Graceland Cemetery. Dom nods in his direction as I pull into the entrance and park in the cemetery’s tiny, empty parking lot.

“Come with me.” Dom grabs his coffee, stepping outside with a blast of cold air, and slamming the door behind him.

The only sounds in the empty cabin are faint metallic pops and pings as the car cools. I don’t move from my seat, fixing my gaze on the patch of darkness under the small stone awning for visitors up ahead. Tombstones line the walking path in my peripheral vision just outside the windows.

Whatever relief I felt at getting Maria and Lucia home ices over in this place. Somewhere, Serafina’s body is buried in one of those graves.

I take a deep breath in the stuffy, dead air of the car cabin.

The door swings open next to me.

“You coming?” Dom rumbles.

“No.” I reach for my mug and sip my coffee, wishing I could be as unaffected as I sound.

He chuckles next to me. “Should I carry you out?”

I clench my jaw. “I don’t want you to.”

I don’t care if he’s bigger and stronger than me. He can yank me out of the driver’s seat and march me through the cemetery until I stand at my sister’s frost-covered grave, but he can’t make me do anything I don’t want to. I’ll stand there in the darkness for hours if I have to.

Everyone seems to think Serafina’s soul is there, buried in the dirt, lonely and waiting for visitors, but I already know what I’ll find when I go there.

Nothing. She’s gone. That’s it, and no amount of begging, bargaining, or rage will bring her back. I’m the only person in my world who seems to understand that.

Dom sets his coffee cup on the hood of the SUV with aclink. He lowers himself until the heat of him brushes against my face, and pine and smoke fill the air. “You need to forgive her.”

I snap my head toward him—our faces are inches apart. His chocolate-colored eyes are too kind in the soft glow of the car’s interior lights. I wish he’d be angry. For all his protection, all his promises, all of his rage at the other people who’ve hurt me, I want him to beangryfor me, just for this, so I don’t have to carry all of it on my own.