“This is the deal and you know it. My brother, your husband, runs this town. What he doesn’t run, Marcus or Vito do. And Hank and Eddie protect it. In that mix, there are allegiances and there are alliances. Some of them are unholy, but for some reason, all of them work. And if you think you don’t come with Daisy, Jet, Roxie, Jules, and I could go on, and those men won’t shut me down because you do, you’re wrong.
I put my hand flat on the table between us and kept talking.
“Honest to God, Indy, this is the first time I understand what I want to do with my life. And if I’m going to be taken seriously doing it, I have to do it. I have to be professional about it. I have to be smart about it. And I have to make my own allegiances and alliances, and the most important ones I can make are with Lee Nightingale, Marcus Sloan and Vito Zano. You get involved, Indy, any of you, I’m done. Lee will see to it, and even if he didn’t, any member of the Hot Bunch has enough cred on the streets to make that happen, and any one of them wouldn’t hesitate. I don’t want to be done, and I need to do everything I can to avoid that. Are you with me?”
“I’m with you,” she said softly.
“I need to believe in that,” I told her, then continued with the honesty. “I love you, but I can’t be making my plays in that game, focusing my attention on that and dealing with you or any of the Rock Chicks at the same time.”
Her hand came out again and curled around mine. “I’m with you. I get you. I understand. And you can believe in that,” she stated firmly.
Yeah. I could believe in that. Indy wouldn’t lie to me.
Or she would (told you we were cut from the same cloth), just not about something like this.
I drew in breath and let it out, saying, “Thank you.”
She grinned and replied, “Our next come to Jesus, should there be one, which I hope there isn’t, but if there is and you feel the need to court the wrath of Tex, let’s do it at Paris on the Platte so I can get a Café Fantasia and make it worth it.”
Shit. I should have thought of that. Paris had the second best coffees in Denver.
I grinned back. “Agreed.”
Her hand tightened on mine. “Love you, honey.”
Again with the breath, this one going in deep and coming out deeper. “Right back at cha, sister.”
She let me go, let the tough part go, and I knew this because she again sat back and she changed the subject.
“So. Ren Zano. He’s hot. You’re hot. You look great together. And bonus, he doesn’t seem to mind you throwing a punch at him at a wedding, which is good news for you.”
I laughed because this was true.
She continued after I stopped laughing and she did it smiling, “So you love him. He loves you. Are there Catholic classes in your future?”
My brows drew together. I wasn’t following.
“What?”
“They’re Italian. They’re Catholic. You’re not. You’re Presbyterian, and the last time you were in a church, the reverend had to stop services to shout at you to turn your headphones off because AC/DC’s ‘You Shook Me All Night Long’ was screwing up his message.”
This was true.
And I’d learned from this to sit in the back.
“In other words, I’m not sure you’re going to convince them your gig is more important than theirs. What does Ren say about that?” she asked.
I didn’t know what Ren said about that. Ren and I had been too busy breaking a commandment to discuss religion.
Or pretty much anything.
“We haven’t gotten that far,” I answered, and I saw her brows draw together over her shades.
“Okay,” she said slowly. “So what about the families? How are you going to handle that?”
At least I had that sorted.
“They’re just going to have to deal,” I announced, and Indy stared at me.