Blood and Fire (McClouds & Friends #8)(167)

His soft tone sucked her in. She did, and wished she hadn’t. She hated it. That soft look. It killed her. Because she couldn’t trust it.

“Lily.” His voice was rough with emotion. “About what happened in there, with King. I’m so sorry that I—”

“Don’t.” She jumped up. Hot coffee spattered all over Bruno’s arms. “Any apology you could make would only make it worse.”

She backed away, but he followed. “You have to understand,” he pleaded. “This guy, he f*cked with my head, Lily. When I was a little kid. He’d programmed me, somehow. And he knew details about us, things you’d said to me that only the two of us could have—”

“I don’t want to know the gory details,” she said. “I don’t give a shit what he told you. He was a psycho. A monster. You knew that. And you believed him, instead of me. That’s not something I can just put behind me. So . . .” Words failed her. She shook her head. “So nothing. Good luck with your life. Good bye.”

“No,” he said fiercely. “I won’t accept that.”

“It’s not up to you! Don’t make me get ugly with you!”

He held his hands out, palms up. “But I—”

“Get one thing straight,” she cut him off. “I appreciate that you saved my life, OK? I appreciate you saving the babies, too. Superheroic. Yay for you, you get big-ass points for that. Thank the McClouds, too, for their help. They have awesome timing. God bless them.”

“Lily—”

“I even appreciate the fact that you didn’t kill me on sight, being as how you thought I was one of King’s drones.” She hurried on, intent on getting it out before it turned to cascades of snot. “Very generous of you, under the circumstances. So thanks, OK? Thanks a million. And now, just please, please f*ck off.”

She turned her back and walked away, praying that he wouldn’t follow, and realized that she was tiptoeing, listening for his footsteps behind her. Hoping that he would follow her.

He didn’t, though.

Then the sniveling came, the tears. She clutched the blanket around herself and blundered on into the darkness.

Any direction would do, as long as it was away from him.





36


Six weeks later . . .





Aaro smelled Petrie before he spotted him sneaking a quiet smoke behind the conservatory while hiding from the wedding crowd. He looked good for a man who’d been shot in the ches





t six weeks before. His suit was flapping loose on him, but it stayed on.

Aaro sussed the suit with the expert eye of a person who’d grown up with gangsters. Versace, on a cop’s budget. But he’d researched Petrie after what had happened at the cop shop with the girl. The guy came from money. He was wearing some of it today. Petrie caught sight of him, looked up. His face relaxed when he saw that it was Aaro.

“Got a death wish?” Aaro asked. “Sucking on those damn things with a hole in your lung?” He held out his hand. “Here. Give me one.”

Petrie shook one out, gave him a light. They sucked their cancer sticks in companionable silence. Aaro pulled out his flask, took a gulp of single malt, passed it on. “Might as well slam your liver, too, while you’re at it,” he said. “So you’re hiding, too? Why’d you come?”

Petrie sipped at the flask. “Had to. Zia Rosa knows where I live.”

“Ah. There is that.” Aaro blew out smoke. “The curse has taken hold. When they start inviting you to their weddings, you’re meat.”

Petrie’s eyebrow twitched in unwilling curiosity. “Curse?”

“It comes from hanging out with the McClouds,” Aaro said. “When I took up with them, my cars started blowing up. My house. These days, I sleep with a girl I meet at a bar, and pow, she explodes in front of me.”

“You blame that on the McClouds?” Petrie’s mouth twitched.

“Look at yourself. You get interested in them, and suddenly you’re in intensive care, tubes up every orifice. I’m telling you. It’s the curse.”

Petrie let out a philosophical sigh. “Maybe so.”

“Don’t try to run,” Aaro added, helpfully. “It’s too late.”

Movement caught his eye through the wall of the conservatory. A bright color that whipped his head all the way around to see if . . . yes, it was. Oh, holy shit. “That’s Lily Parr,” he said.

Petrie lunged to see and winced. “That’s gonna be interesting,” he said. “What’s she doing?”

Aaro craned his neck to keep her in sight. She stood in the shadows of a rhododendron bush, looking pale and spooked. Her red-gold hair gleamed in the afternoon sunlight. “Lurking, like us,” he said.

“Should we, uh . . .” Petrie hesitated.

“Tell Bruno? Hell, yeah.” Aaro stubbed out his cigarette on the sole of his shoe. “I’ll go find him.”

Bruno burst out the door that led to the solarium, decked in a tux, a bag hanging over his shoulder. He held his newly adopted baby girl Lena under the armpits. He looked wild-eyed and hassled.

“There you are,” Aaro started. “Good. Look, man, we just saw—”