Thirteen hours.

That was all it took for Donato to have me out on bail.

“I was just getting comfortable,” I grumbled as I climbed into the back of his car next to my lawyer. Day was just breaking. Donato looked like he hadn’t slept at all. Funnily enough, I had.

“You’re lucky I’ve got friends in the right places,” he said, passing me a glass of whiskey as his driver pulled out into the street. Donato took a long sip of his own drink like he’d been waiting all night to do it. Then he looked at me almost pleadingly. “What the hell are you doing?”

“What needs to be done.” I stared out the windows, a peek of sun coloring the sky salmon. I had a new appreciation for the ability to move about as I pleased. As long as I didn’t leave Manhattan until my trial. Donato’s machinations had helped me avoid house arrest or an ankle monitor.

“We spent three days holed up in Connecticut. You could have mentioned you were planning to confess to murder.” Kane Zegas lit into me as he tossed his phone onto the seat beside him.

I shrugged, in no mood to explain my actions to my lawyer.

Realizing I wasn’t going to respond, he continued. “We can’t retract the confession—”

“I don’t want to,” I interrupted.

Zegas ran his hand through his hair. “I don’t need you fighting me at every turn. The feds will do enough of that,” he snapped. “The main component we have going in our favor is the lack of evidence.”

Donato shifted in his seat and tossed back the remainder of the amber liquid in his glass. I’d hardly touched mine.

Zegas, persistent fucker that he was, kept talking. “I’m working to ensure there isn’t another copy of that autopsy report you had. Alvarez says the evidence is all circumstantial, and there’s relatively little forensics to go on. Most of what they had is either missing or deteriorated beyond use.”

“I’ve confessed. What more do they need?” I said, blasé. I knew that was enough to keep me in prison and Donato out.

Donato threw his glass at the back of the seat in front of us. “Stop this nonsense!” he roared. Zegas snapped his mouth shut, and I sat stoically. “He’s done enough to you. Do not let him take away your life.”

“And letting him take yours is okay?” I leveled Donato with a look I’d learned from him.

His jaw worked, and his grip tightened on his knees. “We will figure this out. I know enough people to get us out of this.”

I leaned my head against the back of the seat. “I’m tired of trying to get out of everything. I’m tired of doing things that I need to get out of.” I let my eyes flutter closed. I was just tired.

“Hang in a little while longer. I never should have kept you in this for so long.” Regret tinted Donato’s words. I hated what I was doing to him, but I still needed something from him.

“All I ask is that you protect what’s mine. The owner of that diamond will take retribution any way she can get it. I need to know nothing will happen to either of them.” I couldn’t speak their names. They were separate from this life, but I had to have eyes on them. For my own sanity, I needed reassurance he’d be there for them should the need arise.

“I’m insulted you think you have to ask,” he spat. We looked at each other for a long moment, all we meant to each other hanging in the air. When I couldn’t stand it anymore, I took the coward’s way out and changed the subject.

“Any progress on who actually started this clusterfuck of a mess? Alvarez has to know who turned you in, Donato.” He was an FBI agent for God’s sake. We should have known that from the start.

“No. Whoever took the tip is keeping the source close. There’s nothing.” Frustration rippled from him.

“I keep wondering who? Who stands to gain? And why now? No one gives a shit about justice for my father. The obvious answer is Angelone. All the pieces add up, but it doesn’t feel right,” I mused. These were the questions that plagued me. I had enemies, but none who would have a real reason to touch this, or even to know about it. There were plenty of other ways to sink me if someone truly wanted to. This was personal. A message. Whoever it was liked that I couldn’t figure out their identity. I was at their mercy. On their timeline.

“The sooner we come up with a name, the more smoothly this will go,” Zegas said without looking up from his phone.

“It’s not Angelone.”

I snapped my head toward Donato. “How do you know that?”

“I asked him,” he said simply.

“And you believe him?” I asked incredulously.

“He learned about the potential arrest and used it to his advantage, but he didn’t start this.” The annoyance in his voice was contagious.

“How did he find out?”

“That’s a question I don’t know the answer to.” Donato cracked his neck on one side and then the other. “He’s been warned to stay the fuck on his side of the city.”

My head lolled to the side, and I watched the buildings go by. Traffic was fairly light at this hour. I just wanted to go home, except I couldn’t really call it that anymore. My home was in a shithole apartment that didn’t even have a proper bedroom. She was probably sleeping on a worn-out sofa and living out of a suitcase. My phone pulsed in my pocket, begging for me to check that blue dot. I ignored it. I could wait until I had some privacy to check on her. After the night I’d had, I needed Vivian as much as I ever had. I wanted to get lost in her.

But I couldn’t. This mess was just getting started. I wouldn’t be selfish when it came to her. At least knowing that she had a chance for something more than my dark world gave me a sense of peace.

“Alvarez will stall as best he can,” Donato assured me.

“Is he trustworthy?”

“He’s done all he can to work with me over the years. There’s always the possibility that someday he won’t, but right now, we really don’t have a choice other than to trust him.”

A roundabout answer for maybe. I hated relying on other people.

I looked out the window again and registered where we had been heading. “What are we doing here?” The car turned down the side street next to Donato’s building and into the underground garage.

“We’ve lots to plan. Namely your defense,” Zegas shot back.

I wasn’t interested. “This has been fun gentleman, but I don’t need a defense. I’m going home. Both of you have better things to do, and I’ve got a charity event to prepare for.”

When I’d asked Giselle to come with me to the Heart Ball, I hadn’t accounted for an arrest. Since I wasn’t in jail anymore, it was too late to cancel, though I wouldn’t even if I thought she’d understand. This was the way I paid tribute to my mother’s memory. If I was a no-show, somehow that would disappoint her. I couldn’t handle hurting anyone else I cared about.

I ignored the strenuous protests that trailed after me as I got out of the car and went straight to the 57^th Street subway station. Everything counted now, my time left as a free man limited. Glutton for punishment that I was, I had to do things where I felt close to Vivian. Riding the subway was just one of them.

She’d be disappointed in me when she found out what I’d done, and that hurt. But I’d promised her from the very beginning that I’d fight for her. This was the only way I knew how.

As I walked down the stairs into the bowels of Manhattan, a glimpse of glossy black hair flashed in the crowd in front of me. Vivian. I picked up my pace, shoving past people to catch up. She was always there when I needed her most. I was alive again just seeing her.

Except as she stopped on the platform for the train, I realized my mind was playing tricks on me. The woman wasn’t my Vivian, didn’t really even look like her. I was a desperate man. Desperate and delusional.

And as the train rumbled to a stop beside me, I accepted that fate.