Chapter 18: The Shower

Thurston was still standing there with the lawyer's folder open when we left the ballroom.

I didn't wait for his face to finish falling.

Neither of us said a word in the car.

Rocco held my hand on the seat between us.

I watched the lights of the bridge go by.

At Rock Hall the house was dark except for the lamp Zia Ines left on in the hall.

Her door upstairs was shut, and I could hear her snoring through it, soft and steady.

"Shower," I said, on the landing. "Come with me."

"My arm."

"I'll wrap it."

I wrapped his shoulder in plastic and tape in the big white bathroom at the end of the hall.

He stood with his hands at his sides and let me.

I had never undressed him.

I took my time over it. I slid his jacket off, then the shirt, and unbuttoned his trousers.

He stood very still and let me look.

He was broad and scarred and inked from his collarbone to his hips.

I put my mouth on the line of script above his heart.

"What does it say?"

"My mother's name." He swallowed. "She died when I was nineteen."

I kissed it.

Then I turned on the water, and stepped in, and pulled him after me.

The tile was wet and warm. Steam rolled up around us, and the hot spray hit my bare shoulders.

Rocco stood under it with his eyes shut and his good hand braced against the wall.

"Livia."

"Don't move," I said. "It's my turn. You had the counter."

His eyes opened.

I put both palms on his chest and pushed, and his back met the tile.

I went down on my knees on the shower floor.

He went rigid under the spray.

"You don't have to."

"I know I don't."

Keep reading free with an account. Start They Auctioned Off My Housekeeping, Then the Mob Paid a Million for It from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.