Page 47 of Reckless Woman
“How are you stillalive?”
“Luck.”
“It’s more than that, don’t you think? Shit, did Viviana…?” Her voice rises to a horrified pitch.
“She’s connected.”
Anna shuts her eyes as I fire the final bullet into their dying friendship. “How did Santiago take it?”
I don’t answer until I’ve chain-smoked my way onto another cigarette. “He doesn’t know.”
“He doesn’tknow?”
It’s like I dropped a second bomb.
Jumping off the bed, she tugs up her bra cups. “You have to call him, Joseph. Right now! He needs to know!”
I narrow my eyes at her reaction, thinking stupid things. Crazy things.
“He has three other jets,” I say coldly. “I doubt he has a favorite.”
“Why didn’t you call him?” She’s acting hysterical now, spinning around in circles and picking up random items of clothes and chucking them at me.
“I didn’t realize you cared so much about what he thought.” I swing my legs off the bed with a groan. I can feel another page turning in this fucked-up storybook of a week, and I’m going to need a ton more liquor to deal with it.
“It’s not that…” She pauses in front of me, her delicate features pinched and scared. “Viviana told me she was flying out to the island today. She would have arrived by now. If she’s capable of bringing a plane down, she’s capable of anything.” She starts pulling on her T-shirt. “I have to warn Eve!”
Fuck.
“Calm down.” I catch her as she starts spinning around the room again, and pull her in close. “I’ll find a way to contact him.”
But she’s rigid and dubious in my arms.
“I had to get to you, Anna. Nothing else mattered more than that.”
“Why is she doing this?” Her voice cracks.Betrayal is the cruelest revelation of all.“I thought I knew her. I thought after Colombia…”
“No one really knows anyone,Luna.”
I think of a night full of angry stars. A boy. A tin soldier.
Letting go, I dress as quickly as my fucked-up leg will allow. “We need a cell and a laptop.”
Grabbing my gun, I’m limping out of the door before she’s asking the obvious question.
Chapter Fourteen
Eve
The griping pain takes another vicious swipe at my stomach. I clutch at the edges of the white dresser with both hands as I wait for it to pass, imagining a baseball bat hitting the hurt away with a perfect arc of a swing.
Damn.That one was even stronger than the last.
“If you’re going to give birth on the fucking floor, can you at least take it into the bathroom?” Dante’s watching me from the doorway, arms folded. Face impassive. “I’d prefer to keep this bedroom sacred for other things.”
“Sacred?” I pause my panting to consider his stupidly inappropriate word. “Nothing that ever happens in this room issacred, Dante.”
“It is at the start of the night, my angel. It sets a precedence to corrupt and defile.”