My Ex's Father Is the Mafia King I Am Court-Ordered to Evaluate, and I Am the Reason He Is in the Cell novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: Hands Free

Fay's POV

Niko left in the cab at seven, and he did not say it.

He stood at the top of the dock stairs with me for a full minute, his hands shaking.

Then he said, "I'm sorry, Fay," and walked up the gravel without looking back.

I had heard what I had heard.

An accident, a recorder in a coat, a gun in a pocket because his aunt had told him to carry it.

It did not make the dead man less dead.

It made the boy I had loved a person instead of a monster, and I did not know yet what to do with that.

I stood in the cottage kitchen afterward with my back to the stove and my arms crossed.

Kostas stood across from me, with his hands at his sides.

The strap on his ankle had left a red mark from the gravel walk, and the thing still chirped now and then.

"I'll stand up on Monday," I said.

He did not move.

"I'll say the size and the date and where I bought it," I said. "I won't say anything else."

"Fay," he said.

"I don't want you to thank me."

"Then I will not."

"I'm not doing it for you," I said.

"I know."

"I'm doing it because a man is dead, and he had a mother. I put a jacket in a prosecutor's hand eleven months ago for the wrong reason, and I'm going to put it right."

"Yes," he said.

"And I'm not doing it so you'll come home."

"No."

"I'm doing it because I'm the only one who can," I said.

He said nothing.

I looked at him, at the gray in his hair and the mark on his cheek gone yellow and the big scarred hand hanging open at his side.

I thought: tomorrow they will take him back.

I thought: tonight is all there is.

"Come here," I said.

He came.

He stopped in front of me, and I put my hands on either side of his face and held it.

His skin was warm and rough with a day's beard.

"Your hands," I said.

"Where you put them," he said.

"Put them on me."

His eyes changed.

"Say that again," he said, very low.

"Put your hands on me, Kostas. Anywhere you want. For as long as you want."

"You said hands where you put them," he said.

"I'm putting them on me. I'm taking the rule off. Tonight there isn't one."

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