Page 28 of Rubies and Revenge

I stride down the aisle, unwilling to spend another moment on the mob’s hallowed ground, and push into the antechamber. Where the front door stands open with Darius fidgeting in its frame.

Darius doesn’t fidget.

I pause mid-step and frown. Behind him, the night is blue-black with yellow-glowing street lamps dotting the sidewalks. The steps are empty, and on the curb, our car is the only one left. All seems well. But Darius is fidgeting.

“What is it?” My voice is a low timbre, a warning.

Darius grimaces—he knows that tone—and glances behind him like something is there. He sighs. “Something happened?—”

“Where the fuck have you been?” Pat shoves him aside,though Darius barely moves, their face pinched in anger and blue eyes bright as a flame.

I ignore them. “Darius?”

He clenches his jaw, his fist at his side.Fidgeting. “Something happened to Zarina.”

I grind my teeth and wait. Pat’s looking at me like I should already know and Darius like he would rather tell me anything else but this. I shake my head. “Well? What happened?”

“She won’t say,” Darius grumbles.

“Because it’s fucking obvious!” Pat huffs and crosses their arms, their face covered in derision.

“We don’t know anything yet,” he says.

“Typical male bullshit.” They scoff at him. “As if we need hard evidence Marcus laid hands on her. Her face isbruised, for fuck’s sake?—”

I shove past them.

I’ve heard more than enough. Pat is right—I don’t need to know what happened toknowwhat happened. Marcus Accardi doesn’t deserve the benefit of the doubt, isn’t innocent until proven guilty.

Pat calls after me to leave Zarina alone, but I ignore them and round the car, throwing open the door. Zarina sits on the other side of the bench seat, hugging her knees to her chest, forehead pressed against her thighs, shoulders shaking with suppressed sobs. I climb inside and yank the door shut in Pat’s affronted face.

Zarina raises her arms up enough to hide from me, as if I cannot read the rest of her body as well as a billboard. I sigh and slide over, holding my arms open in a silent offering she can accept or reject. She leans against me without showing her face, and I take that as a silent yes, scooping her up in my arms, shifting her legs over my lap, encouraging her head to my chest.

The car pulls away from Saint Christopher’s and the site of what may as well have been our own crucifixion. Zarina and Idon’t speak, not with words. I rub circles over her back and shoulders, stroke her hair, and ignore the growing wet spot on my shirt. And Zarina cries. It’s quiet, vibrating through the cavity of my chest, the pain and anger leaking out of her and absorbing into my skin. All the while, my imagination conjures up visceral images of me cracking my knuckles open on Marcus Accardi’s bones.

The ride home is taking longer than necessary, and I’m positive Pat’s at the wheel, driving us around town to give Zarina time. It makes me wonder how often Pat’s done this for her. How often Zarina cries. How often someone assaults her.

It takes more effort than it should to keep myself calm at that thought.

Zarina sits up, breaking up my thoughts as she swipes under her eyes. “Sorry.” Her voice is thick.

I shake my head and brush the tendrils that escaped her chignon off her temple. My fingers trail around her ear to cup her chin gently and tilt her head up to the light of the passing streetlights, their glow barely enough to illuminate the darkening bruises lining her jaw like shadows.

She winces as I turn her head left then right. “Is it bad?” she whispers.

I will my hand on her thigh to remain relaxed despite the inferno of violent rage licking through my chest. I imagine finding Marcus Accardi alone and repaying him tenfold for each bruise on Zarina’s smooth skin—a broken bone in exchange for each broken blood vessel—and then leaving him shattered and scarred on his father’s doorstep. Sounds fair to me.

But I can’t. Not without retribution. And my rage won’t help Zarina in this moment.

I release her face and pass her the handkerchief from my jacket pocket. “Nothing a little concealer won’t fix.”

She accepts the fabric, dabbing her face and blowing out a breath as she leans her back against the door, legs still on mine.

“Who?” I ask as if I don’t already know the answer. Because Pat was right—we don’t need proof for this.

“Marcus Ass-cardi,” she spits. The name elicits a shudder from her, and this time I can’t stop my hand before it balls into a fist. She watches my knuckles whiten with the force of my grip. “Caught up to me before I left the church.”

A broken bone for each blood vessel.God damn it. “I shouldn’t have left you alone,” I say. “I’m sorry?—”

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