Shattered Dreams (Boys of Bellerose, #3)(67)

Angelo nodded slowly, and I was grateful that he still hadn’t released my hand. This was a tough conversation we were long overdue to have. “I never pushed too hard,” he admitted. “You were alive and I wanted to keep you that way, but I promise that I’ve always been looking for information. Now that we know Grayson received a kill command, maybe he can send us in the right direction regarding what actually happened that night.”

It was probably time for me to tell someone exactly what I remembered in my flashbacks. The details had slowly been resurfacing in dreams ever since the explosion at the record label. I was finally at a point where I felt like I was clearer on what had happened that day.

“The day of the fire I’d just come back from an ultrasound,” I said quickly, wanting the conversation done, “and I heard my parents arguing. Dad was telling mom that she’d gone too far and that they were going to kill us all. That she wasn’t dealing with white-collar criminals but the mafia. Mom kept assuring him it was fine and that she’d done it for us and the cursed baby.”

Angelo’s eyes were so dark that I couldn’t differentiate pupil and iris. He looked beautiful, but also scary and dangerous as he stared into my soul. “She called it a cursed baby?”

I nodded, unable to speak for a second. “And the fire was that night,” I managed to say.

There was no way it was a coincidence. “I need to speak with my father,” Angelo rasped, anger still imprinted across his features. “For the first time, I think I’m ready to push the fucking issue. I swear, Bella, if I find out he ordered the hit that killed your parents and our baby, I’m going to put the Ricci boss six feet under.”

Now it was my turn to squeeze his hand half to death. “Don’t you risk your own life, Angel. Nothing will bring Penelope or my dad back, nothing. And if my mom was the cause of the fire, then she got exactly what she deserved. I won’t lose you as well to this senseless fucking war.”

Angelo and Jace were my constants. Constants that changed from friend to lover to enemy, depending on the day. But constants all the same. To lose them would be the death of myself, and I’d had enough death and loss already to last multiple lifetimes.

“Leave it with me, Bella,” he said, and that didn’t reassure me at all. Before I could yank his stubborn ass across the damn table—or at least attempt to—and demand that he stay safe, the waiter returned with some bread and oils for dipping. Angelo released my hand so that there was space in the center of the table for food, and I kind of wished we were anywhere but here. I’d take hand holding over bread any day. Or both, maybe. Yeah, both would be nice.

“Are you ready to order, sir?” the waiter asked, ignoring me completely.

Normally, that would piss me right off, but I had way too many other things to be stressed about. As much as Dr. Candace said I needed to deal with the past to move on from it, the past had such a hook into me that dealing with it wouldn’t be a simple or easy task.

It was going to have to be cut free, painfully, leaving parts of me scarred and disformed.

“Bella?” Angelo said softly, and I cleared my throat, realizing he and the waiter were both staring at me. Clearly, I’d missed whatever had been said. “Are you ready to order?”

Right. Right. Fucking food. My stomach was so tight I doubted I’d be able to stomach anything, but I was going to give it a try. For Angel.

“I’ll take the gnocchi,” I said quickly, having already read the menu while Angelo showered. “And a small side salad.”

“I’ll take the Ovation Lamb,” Angel ordered, “with seasonal vegetables and mint gravy.”

Oh damn. Instant food envy. That’d been my next choice… maybe he’d let me try it.

The waiter disappeared, leaving us to our conversation. But I didn’t want to keep flogging that dead horse. We were on a date, not a joint therapy session, right?

“How did it feel being out on stage with Bellerose?” I asked him instead. “Is it weird for you?”

He sipped his wine, considering my question, then shook his head. “Not really. It feels… I don’t really know how to explain it, but it feels natural. As though it was always meant to play out like this. Is it weird for you?”

I wrinkled my nose. “Yes. But no. It’s like I keep getting memories of Snake Soup practicing in Jace’s garage overlaid with the lights and glamor of a Bellerose concert. It's strange but in a good way. How is it playing with Rhett and Gray, though?”

Angelo’s lips curved in a smile that was less reserved. “Can I tell you a secret?”

Surprise parted my lips. “Um, of course.”

He ran his hand over his mouth, groaning with embarrassment. “I already know their music. After… everything, when Brenda got Jace his deal with Big Noise and I had to walk away from the music—and you both—I sort of stayed in the loop.”

“You mean you’re a secret Bellerose fan?” I pictured Angelo locked in his bathroom, lip-synching into his hairbrush, and the mental image was awesome.

He chuckled. “Um… sort of.” He licked his lips, and I couldn’t stop watching the movement. Was I turned on? Yes. I was human, after all. “Jace would kill me if he knew… but even though I never signed a recording contract, Brenda and I stayed in touch.”