long walk along the beach.” She was next to me before I expected her to be. Her hand slipped into mine, intertwining our fingers.
I sighed and nodded.
We walked the length of the property and crossed the crude road, our boots finding purchase along the rocks that separated land from sea. Water rushed into the cracks every so often, filling the voids, and then rushed back out. She released my hand when I bent down to pick up a rock and throw it.
“Tell me what happened that day,” she said. “The day that changed everything.”
The day I lost my old man and my brother.
I cleared my throat. “My old man took us to the Bronx Zoo. He’d take us there when he had something important to talk to us about. They had a green-eyed tiger that he called my spirit animal. The keeper used to let us feed him sometime.”
I bent down again, looking for another stone to throw. “Our old man told us he had a bad feelin’ about something. He had them often. His business was to basically piss everyone else off. Because if you’re not pissin’ someone off in that world, you’re not doing something right. Enemies mean that you’ve made it. You stand for something that someone else wants.” I stood then, four small rocks in my hand. I flung one out and the sea took it.
“He warned us that things were gettin’ dicey. That if something happened to him, he wanted us to run things. Take his legacy and make it stronger.” I rubbed the stones between my palms and then flung another one, this one going further than the last. “After we left the zoo, we were goin’ to eat dinner at my old man’s apartment. Molly always cooked a special meal on Sundays, and we were expected to eat with them. A car had pulled across the street before we got inside, and when my old man made eye contact with them, he told us to go inside and wait.”
I climbed a mound of rocks, turning to give my wife my hand. She took it and stood beside me, her eyes narrowed against the horizon.
“I didn’t. I had a cold feelin’ along my neck, like a wild animal was about to sink his teeth into it and cripple me. Because I waited, so did Kill.” I flung another rock, this one going wild with a gust of wind. It landed somewhere in the distance with no proof that it did. “My old man was leanin’ down, talking to the two men through their rolled down window. They were arguing but keepin’ their voices low. It was one of Grady’s men and a Scarpone. As they were arguing, a bunch of cops pulled up, tires screeching, sirens blasting. They pulled guns as soon as they jumped out. Stone’s old man was screaming at mine to put his hands up.
“My old man did, but he told Stone he had business to finish first. Scott Stone, who was a beat cop at the time, disagreed. Before Stone’s father gave him the okay, he cuffed my old man, and as he pulled him back from the car, Scarpone shot him in the chest. Right in his heart. The cops started firing. So did the men in the car. I went to go to my old man, but Kill jumped on me before I could get there. Someone was shooting at me. He took the bullet meant for me.”
“And lost his legs,” she said, taking the last rock from my hand and throwing it. She put her hand along my side and pulled herself around so she was standing in front of me at the very edge of the rock. “Then you stole my heart out of revenge.”
“I spent my entire life, my darlin’, waiting to steal the right one.”
She blinked up at me, her eyes a true blue. “The right one—the one you found through vengeance.”
“If the path to hell can be paved with good intentions—” I shrugged “—maybe the path to heaven can be paved with meant-to-be.” I dug in my pocket and pulled out the necklace I’d given her on our wedding night. I dangled it in front of her face, and when she went to take it, I pulled it back. “You take this off, or even try to give it back to me again, you won’t be able to sit for two weeks.”
She pushed it toward me with a wicked glint in her eye,