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Throughout it all, I thought of Dario.
I thought of the way he’d dropped me off, his Rolls pulling up to my driveway, his hand passing me the suite’s access card. He’d told me to text him if I needed anything, and to use the place whenever I felt like it. I told him I wasn’t ready for it, and he pushed the card on me anyway.
I’d hid it in my T-shirt drawer and vowed not to use it. I’d changed out of the new clothes, hung them in my closet, and decided I wouldn’t wear them. I’d scrubbed the scent of him off in the shower and fought the smile that came as I thought of him.
I had to remember our differences. I was nobody and he was somebody. I was single and he was married. I was too young and naive, and he was too old and …
There were too many words to complete that sentence. He was too everything—a black hole that could suck me in without even feeling the crush of my soul.
“They don’t mean anything to me. Maybe I’m ready for someone who does.”
I couldn’t get him out of my mind. And worse, I didn’t want to. I tipped back my third beer and looked away when the goalie smiled at me.
* * *
DARIO
The room was blindingly bright, the fluorescents reflecting off the white tile walls. Dario shut the door and flipped the lock, giving his eyes a moment to adjust. He stepped forward, undoing the buttons of his dress shirt and taking his time as he eyed the two men slumped against the far wall. One moved his foot and the chain scraped against the concrete floor. The bigger of the two lifted his head.
“Who’s there?”
Dario didn’t respond, shrugging out of his shirt and examining the bandage on his forearm. The bleeding had stopped, thanks to the neat line of stitches from the doc. Not the first stitches he’d received this year, and probably not the last. He hung his shirt carefully on the door’s hook and stepped closer to the two men, his dress boots clicking against the concrete floors.
There was a special place in hell for men who hurt women. He’d learned that at an early age, when he’d watched his father beat the shit out of his mother when the Saints would lose, or when his beer was warm, or when his luck at the casino had turned to shit.
It was why Dario didn’t drink. Or gamble. Or watch football. It was why he’d forced the Cajun drawl from his speech and abandoned work boots and jeans for suits and ties. It was why he’d avoided the fishing boats and had gotten his first job on the casino floor.
His entire life, he had strived to be the opposite of his father. Now, he looked down into the swollen face of a man so much like him it made his fists ache.
“If you’re gonna kill us, just do it already.” The man coughed, and a spittle of blood came out.
“I’m not going to kill you.”
He’d decided that after seeing the look in Bell’s eyes when she had asked him about the man who’d cut him. He’d seen the worry there, had noticed the way her mouth had tightened, her jaw set. If she ever brought it up again, he wanted her to be happy with his answer. And if making her happy meant keeping people alive, then fine.
He squatted before the man and examined his swollen face, the eyes now puffy slits, the top lip split and hanging in an unnatural way. This one had squealed when he’d tied him down, his fat body flopping against the restraints. It’d taken two of them to get him into place and into a position where he could use the bolt cutters and the cauterization tool.
The man’s lips cracked open. “Why are you doing this?”
An excellent question. The man must have been surprised at the dark suits waiting outside the small-town bar. He must have been confused when they duct-taped his mouth and handcuffed his wrists, must have hated the back of the Hummer, especially once they closed the lid. Fifteen minutes later, when they’d tossed in the second man, he’d probably wondered who he’d been, had probably been annoyed by the stranger kicking and flailing inside of the tight compartment. He’d certainly seemed surprised when Dario had pulled off his blindfold, and he’d realized the man was his son, also prisoner inside this room.
All day, Dario had left them alone. Plenty of time to think about who he was and why he was torturing them. Dario grabbed the man’s shirt and pulled him forward. “You tell me why I’m doing this.”
It was the same command he’d given the men that morning. And all morning, the two men had confessed. Thefts. Deceit. Abuses. Rapes. They’d given names and dates, details and apologies.
