“I know what you’re thinking, Em. You’re planning to run again. Don’t do it. Your family loves you. They want you back. We all do.” I whirled around, the half dead blood-pumping organ beneath my ribcage beating fast and desperately. Sal stood less than a foot from me, his face exactly as I remembered it—all razor-sharp angles, a little curve at the bridge of his nearly too long nose, perfectly counterbalanced by his full bottom lip. The heavy shadow of stubble made his olive skin appear darker along his jaw. Nostalgia pinched at my chest. Too bad he didn’t look as ugly on the outside as he was on the inside. It would make seeing him so much easier.
“Don’t. Okay? Just don’t start with the lies today of all days. Not when I have every reason to suspect my deranged family put a contract out on my husband and killed him.”
He reeled backward as if I had physically slapped him. “I don’t know what’s goin’ on in your head, but I can assure you the Trassatos didn’t have anything to do with your husband’s death.”
I shoved the hard wall of his chest, and he stumbled, unprepared for my assault. “He was shot through the mouth. I may have been young and naïve when I ran away, but even I know that type of killing is a message in our world.”