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"Yet," I hear myself add, and I don't know which one of us that word ambushes more. "I don't love you yet. And I'm not saying this to punish you. You just told me the truth, so I'm telling you the truth back. Six months ago I was begging you for my brother's life. I never chose any of this, and I'm still holding on to the end of this year because it's mine. It's the only thing in this marriage that's mine. So that's where I am. That's what I've got."

I wish he’d shout at me, but instead, that warmth he had a second ago just drains away. His mouth tightens, and for a moment he looks almost tired, like a man who got exactly the answer he'd braced for. He nods slowly, and he chooses not to argue, not to push. I hate that I can read him this clearly now because the man who buys headstones, breaks into my home, and kills a man for me is sitting across the table swallowing my "not yet" like it's no less than he expected and no more than he deserves. He looks down at his plate. His jaw tightens.

"All right," he says quietly, and picks his fork back up. "Eat something. It's gone cold."

That's it. No pressure, no reaching for my hand, no speech. He asks me if Dr. Shah is the one with the glasses, and tells me his father has been doing crosswords since he was a little boy, a habit he’s never broken. We eat dinner like an ordinary married couple while my chest aches the whole way through.

It's later, lying in the dark next to him, listening to him breathe, that I finally stop running from it. I told him I don't love him. I said it to his face, and I think it might be the biggest lie I've ever told, because for months I have been denying all these feelings, the emotions that come rushing when I am with him.

I'm falling for him.

I'm falling for my husband, and I can't tell him because the end of this year is my way out, my freedom, my life back, and I've been holding on to that door handle like a woman hanging off the side of a boat in a storm.

But I didn't check the calendar today either. And lying here, like this, with my husband, I'm starting to think that when I finally let go of the handle, it won't be because he took it from me. It'll be because I stopped wanting the way out.

CHAPTER 25

Laszlo

"It's Saturday night. We shouldn't be working," Rafe points out. He is a man of few words, so I take this very seriously, since he never has opinions about us working on a weekend.

I glance up from the paperwork. He and Tomek are throwing a ball between them across my home office. I haven't told them to stop because I'm trying not to check my phone constantly like a psycho and I don't want them to notice.

Manon has been working all day, and then she messaged to say she wasn't coming home after her shift because she was going out with a friend. That was the entire message. Going out with a friend. Don't wait up. Who the hell is this friend? Manon is an introvert who doesn't have any friends, unless it’s a new friend—see, I’m doing my best to be less ‘hands on’ with her—and the fact that she didn't say where or even until when is already giving me heart palpitations.

I'm itching to know where she is and who's standing within ten feet of her. It would take one phone call. I wouldn't even need to make it myself—I could raise an eyebrow at Rafe and have the name of the bar, the name of the bartender, and what she's drinking within four minutes. For seven years, knowing where Manon is has been my religion, and I practice it more faithfully than any priest who’s ever lived.

But after our last conversation, I'm forcing myself to give her space.

I don't love you yet, she said. Yet. One word. I've been thinking about it constantly, analyzing it, taking it apart, and I've come to the conclusion that she wants to drive me insane with a single yet. So tonight I'm trying to be the kind of husband who might turn a yet into a yes, and it turns out that such a husband stays home on a Saturday signing invoices for embalming fluid while his wife drinks cocktails in some undisclosed location. I've read the same invoice four times. I've straightened the pen tray twice. I need something to focus on, and these things are within reach.

I suck at this good husband shit.

Tomek catches the ball and doesn't throw it back, which is how I know he's about to say something.

"Boss. Serious question."

"Those are rarely your strongest."

"It's Saturday night. Can we at least go and get some pierogi? There's a place in Brooklyn, my aunt's cousin runs it, and on Saturdays she does them fried, with the onions⁠—"

"Hmmm." I grunt.

"...and the sour cream comes in a little jug, Boss. She doesn't bring out the little jug for just anyone."

"If you say one more word to me about dumplings, I'm putting you on the cremation logs until Christmas."

He appeals to Rafe with a look. Rafe is standing at the window with his back to the room, and without turning around he says, "It's a good place."

Rafe is my complete opposite. My hair and skin are dark; his hair is blond, his skin is fair. We share the same eye color, deep blue, but his Eastern European bone structure makes women stop talking mid-sentence when he walks into a room. Unfortunately, I only get a glance and the occasional moan. I doubt that’s on account of my being half Italian. He's covered in tattoos from his neck to his knuckles, his nose has been broken twice, and somehow all of it just makes him better looking, which I find personally offensive, seeing that I’m the boss here. Bartenders give him free drinks. Widows come up to me at funerals—at funerals—to ask if he's single. Women take one look at Rafe and their underwear simply evaporates. It’s all wasted, if you ask me.

In Rafe, I see a murderer with good bone structure and some deep, old wound that will probably never heal. I've known him for twenty years. He once got through a funeral, a police interview, and a four-hour drive without saying a single word, and the thing that finally drags testimony out of him is fried dough.

"Fine," I give in, dropping the pen. "The two of you are Polish, my father is Polish, and the Italian half of me has never once won a fight against fried dough. If I spend one more Saturday evening alone with Dolores's reheated casserole I'm going to start eating out. Actually I’m done with that. Pierogi it is."

Tomek celebrates by throwing the ball at the back of Rafe's head. Rafe catches it without looking, then crosses the room and lays his phone on the desk in front of me. His sleeves are rolled to the elbow, the ink running all the way down, and I catch myself admiring the work.

"Before the pierogi," he says, "have a look at this."