Gabriel wrapped his arm around my shoulders, whispering questions in my ear, but I couldn’t hear them. I heard the ring of the gunshot. Heard the wet flopping sound Mr. Sabella’s body made against the concrete floor. I heard the whooshing sound his blood made as it poured out of him, slowing down as each second passed.

I’d never seen a dead body before. Even when my Gran died, she’d opted for cremation, so there was only an urn at her memorial service. I hadn’t even seen a prepared dead body before, so the sight of Mr. Sabella blood-splattered and limp on the floor was a shock. Even more of a shock was stepping over my two dead co-workers in the lobby. Roger had been at Sabella Security the longest. The other guy had been relatively new. I think his name was Jeff.

When we turned the corner of the hallway with the dead bodies out of sight, Gabriel stopped walking, grabbed my hand, and pressed it to his cheek.

“Are you okay, Lindsay?”

His eyes were as blue as ever, but there were lines around them now I’d never seen before. Lines of fear and worry and tension.

“I think so,” I said, though I didn’t know if that was true at all. Nothing felt right anymore. The world had changed in a matter of hours, and I hadn’t caught up yet.

“I need to know you’re okay,” he said. “Because when we leave this basement, the world up there doesn’t know what happened down here. You are going to have to act normal, blend in. Can you do that?”

“You’re in the mafia,” I said. It wasn’t a question, so much as a statement. I needed to understand the facts of this new world I had unintentionally become a part of. “And you just killed those three men back there.”

“For you,” he said. “I did it for you. I know it’s a lot to take in, but I did what I had to do to save you.”

“You used me,” I continued. “To get closer to Mr. Sabella. To steal something from him. You already knew who I was when we met.”

He shook his head. “No, I didn’t. I had no idea who you were. I didn’t know until the day I helped you carry the box up to your office.”

“And what has our relationship been since then?” I asked, remembering all the nights we’d spent together, how I’d let him into my home. “Is that why you suddenly wanted to hang around with me? Because you thought I could help you get close to him?”

“At first, yes,” he said. “Yes. I thought you could help me, but then I got to know you and I grew to like you. A lot.”

My heart clenched at his words. I liked him, too. At least, I had earlier that afternoon. When I’d thought I was going to sell my first painting, he was the first person I called. In the few weeks I’d known him, he had become the person I wanted to share good news with. That had to mean something. Except, did it? He was in the mafia. What kind of life was that?

“I don’t want to rush you, but we have to get out of here,” he said, looking around. “Someone will come down here eventually, and we want to be long gone when they do.”

I nodded. I knew he was right, but I didn’t feel ready to blend into a crowd just yet. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to leave with him.

He moved as if he was going to leave, but then he stopped and squeezed my fingers. “Promise me you’ll give me a chance to explain.”

I stared up at him, unsure.

“Please, Lindsay.” His blue eyes were pinning me to the spot, reaching inside of me and scooping out my heart.

Finally, I nodded. “Yes, okay.”

With that, we walked up the stairs and melted into the last few workers heading home for the day.

I thought we would head home, but Gabriel told me it wouldn’t be safe. Even though Mr. Sabella was dead, there was no way to know more of his goons wouldn’t come for us.

“So, what, can I ever go home again?” I asked, thinking I was being sarcastic. But then Gabriel looked at me, and I realized the truth. “I can’t, can I?”

“I wouldn’t recommend it,” he said.

After that, we didn’t talk for a while. I didn’t feel capable.

Gabriel used cash to get a hotel room. It wasn’t as seedy as I would have imagined, but it was in a bad enough part of town that I was glad Gabriel would be staying in the room with me, even given the events of the day.

I took a shower, turning the water too hot, allowing the steam to cleanse my pores and my mind. By the time I walked into the room, a scratchy hotel robe wrapped around me, I was finally ready to hear what Gabriel had to say.

“I already told you I didn’t have a family,” he said. “But what I didn’t say is that I found a family. Or, at least, as good a family as I was going to find. The Bianchi family took me in, they gave me a job, they gave me a direction.”

“You killed people?”

He nodded, his lips twisted to the side. “When I had to.”

It was crazy to me that Gabriel being a murderer wasn’t an immediate deal breaker. A few days before, that would have sent me running in the opposite direction. But now, I had to hesitate.

“It was only when my life was in danger,” he said. “And I know it sounds bad but killing people and having food and a warm bed was better than being on my own. I was desperate.”

“Are you still desperate?” I asked.

“I was today,” he said. “When Richard Sabella had you and I didn’t know if I’d ever see you again. I was beyond desperate. I would have killed one hundred more men.”

He was looking at me hard enough that I thought I’d melt from the intensity. I had to look away, watch where my fingers twisted in the bathrobe.

“I can’t be the girlfriend of a mafia member,” I said, the words nearly catching in my throat. I didn’t want it to be true, but it was. I’d never be happy in his world. “I’ve always been eccentric, but that is a little beyond.”

“Then I won’t be a mafia member,” he said.

My attention snapped back to him. “You’d quit?”

He nodded.

“I though you said they were your family.” I wanted to slap myself. Gabriel was willing to give up his entire life for me, so why was I trying to talk him out of it?

Gabriel reached out and ran his calloused thumb over my knuckles. “I’d rather have you.”

I turned my hand inside of his, letting his thumb wander across the palm of my hand and over my wrist. Currents of electricity sizzled up my arm, and I tried to imagine living without this. Living without ever feeling this way again, and the idea alone was miserable. Gabriel did things to me I’d never experienced before. There was a dull ache inside of me that seemed soothed when he was around. I still wanted the things I’d always wanted—to have my own studio and make a living painting—but they didn’t seem quite so earth-shattering when he was around.

“Do you want me, too?” he asked, his voice quiet and breathy. He asked as if he didn’t really want to know the answer.

I twined my fingers up his forearm and hooked them behind his elbow, drawing him to me until we were almost nose to nose, my lips brushing against his as I spoke. “I want you.”