Deep (Pagano Family #4)(68)

Both Bruce and Donnie were still in the hospital, six weeks later. For Donnie, that was as the doctors expected. The damage to his face had been severe, nearly fatal. Nearly all of the skin had been seared away on one side, and in a few places, everything down to bone had been destroyed. He wouldn’t be leaving the hospital until, essentially, he had a new face.

Bruce hadn’t been discharged yet because he’d been shot in the gut with a shotgun, and the pellets had pierced several vital organs. Bouts of sepsis had slowed his recovery. But he finally seemed to have turned a corner.

Since she’d been strong enough, Bev had gone to the hospital often to see her friends. She felt—she was—responsible for their pain. The men who’d come into the diner had been there for her. Especially Bruce. He was a good man, a simple man, living a simple life. He had a wife and children. And he’d almost died because Bev was in love with Nick.

Nick was still standing just outside the bathroom door when she came out. He smiled and brushed his fingertips over her temple. “You’re beautiful.” His hand moved down the side of her face and then to her neck. She could feel him lift the gold chain in his fingers and pull the sun out from under her shirt. “I have meetings, but it should be a short day. I’ll see you around three. We’re expected at Ben’s at five-thirty.”

She smiled. He was so gentle and patient with her now. He was always Good Nick. Since that night, he’d been kind and solicitous. He’d told her that he would do anything in his power to help her, and he was as good as his word. Even as she’d been forcefully taught how profoundly dark and dangerous his world was, even as he’d told her how dark his own life, his history, was, she’d come to know him as a tender, loving man.

He was helping her. Bev thought that without him, she would have sliced through her feathers by now. But he was there and steady, and so patient. Trying to show him that his care was helping had cleared a way for his care to help.

But she couldn’t imagine being intimate with him, or anyone, ever again. The mere thought of a man’s body on hers made her skin constrict and her stomach twist into a knot.

His hand still held her pendant. She bent her head and kissed his knuckles. “Okay. I’ll be back by then.”

“Good. I love you, bella.”

“I love you, too.”

Sky was standing near the door, her bag still on her shoulder. “You ready, Bev?”

“Yep. Let’s go.” She picked up her purse from the table near the door. With a last wave at Nick, she followed Skylar out. They were headed to the hospital to visit the guys.



oOo



Donnie had had surgery the day before and was still heavily sedated, so Bev and Sky sat with him for a little while as he slept. Sky had grown fond of him during his long hours sitting in the booth while Bev worked. There had been other guards, of course; Donnie didn’t work nonstop, but the others had cycled, several different men, usually taking shifts while she was sleeping or, at least, home. Only Donnie—and, at the end, Smash—had been a consistent presence in her life.

Bev had come to consider him a real friend. They had talked a lot about their lives and families—in fact, Donnie knew more about Bev’s family than Nick yet did. She knew he had a little boy, and that he was having to fight with his ex to see him as often as he wanted. She knew that he liked skinny girls with little tits, and that he liked watching ballet—she’d been sworn to secrecy—because ballerinas were the “hottest women on the planet.”

She knew he liked Marvel comics and science fiction. She knew he’d been kicked out of his family on the day he’d been made—trading a broken family for a whole one, he’d said. She knew he loved Ben and Nick like a father and brother and would do anything for them.

Bev and Sky sat quietly for a little while, watching him sleep. His head was wrapped in gauze, but he seemed to be sleeping peacefully. The nurse had told them there was no chance he’d wake, but it was good to see him at apparent ease. He was still in a tremendous amount of pain, usually. But he’d been goofy and funny during their visits nonetheless.

“Do you know what you’re going to do?” Skylar’s voice surprised Bev. She’d been woolgathering, thinking about the night she and Donnie had made homemade pizza and argued over toppings. She’d started to shred cheddar cheese, and he’d looked at her like she’d been preparing to spread cat turds on the pie.

“Hmm?”

“About work. Are you going to come back?”

“I don’t know. The vertical hold in my head goes wonky when I try to think about that. Why?”

“Because I need to work. I’ve been trying to hold out for Bruce to get better, but I don’t know if I can. Rome’s paying for everything right now. I had no savings, so he’s been covering everything.”

“Is he getting angry about it?”

“No—that’s the problem. He likes it. With all my free time, I’ve been cooking and organizing the apartment and cleaning—just looking for shit to do. He loves it. Last night, he asked if I’d thought about getting married someday. Like he wants a ‘little woman’ all of a sudden. Freaked my shit out.”

She knew that Skylar never wanted to get married. Her mother had been married four times, to increasingly violent losers. In Sky’s mind, marriage was a prison. And Romeo knew that, too.