Page 28 of Angel
When six o’clock rolled around Paige booked it from the hospital, barely looking over her shoulder to make sure I followed.
We climbed into my BMW, my feet dragging the entire way.
I didn’t know what came next, but I was fearful it wouldn’t be good. What if I dropped Paige off at her apartment and never saw her again?
Soon she would be married to another man, and I might be (thanks to my family) barred from even contacting her.
My teeth ground together and I hit the gas pedal a little too much, clunking over a speed bump as we left the hospital’s parking lot.
I couldn’t let such a thing happen.
Packing up at the house took close to no time. I waited for Paige in the main living room, giving her some space before our drive back together.
She entered the doorway, the duffel bag swinging from her hand, her eyes steely and dark in a new way. Her gaze floated past me and over to the fireplace’s mantel.
I bolted up from my seat. It had been stupid to wait for her in the living room, so close to the photo that caused her so much pain.
“You ready?” I asked, rushing forward and extending my arm to her.
She walked past me like I hadn’t spoken, her eyes still fixated on the mantel.
“Paige, you don’t have to look at that.”
“No,” she softly said, her back to me. “It’s fine.”
She stopped in front of the photo and peered up at it. I shoved my hands into my pockets and counted the silent seconds as they crept by.
Slowly, she reached a finger up to graze it across the photo. “This man.”
I gingerly made my way across the room to join her. “Which one?”
“This one.” She pointed at the youngest person in the photo. “He was there the day my parents died. He was one of the men.” Her throat bobbed up and down as she swallowed. “Not one of the ones with guns,” she added in a low voice. “But he was there.”
My stomach flipped. “What? Are you sure?”
She stared me down with such intensity I couldn’t do anythingbuttrust her. “Yes.”
“Wow,” I breathed. “You saw their faces?”
Her eyelashes fluttered and she turned away. Realizing I might be taking things too far with the questioning, I put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I should just be quiet.”
“It’s fine. You don’t have to worry about saying the wrong thing. Do you… do you know who that man is?”
“I...”
There was no use lying. Paige didn’t deserve that. “Yes, I do know who he is.”
I half expected her to fly into a rage, to demand I fess up and reveal the man’s identity. Instead she just gazed at me with an unreadable look on her face.
“He’s a friend of the family,” I said.
That part was true.
Well… For the most part.
All in all, it was actually more complicated than that, but I couldn’t find the nerve to go on. Not with Paige looking up with those doe-like eyes.
“They never found out who killed my parents or why. Now I’m guessing it has something to do with their involvement with the mafia...” Her eyes fell to the floor. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
