Chapter 14
It was their very first argument and Nicky didn’t know how to react to it. She doesn’t understand where Tricia is coming from, and it was one of the first times that she just couldn’t see them coming to a middle ground about it. The right thing would be for Tricia to tell Uncle Danny the truth, right?
Should Nicky go and tell Uncle Danny what Tricia told her? Would that be a breach of trust that they couldn’t get over? It was something that Nicky remembers Tricia telling her more than once that she’d never be able to forgive.
‘Trust is the hardest thing to get back, ya’ know?’ Tricia had told her once when their conversation had wandered into past relationships. She knows that Tricia has scars the same as everyone, and more than once her girlfriend had woken up reaching for something that Nicky never asked about.
Maybe she should have?
Nicky stared at their front door before taking a deep breath and making a decision. Sitting in the apartment wouldn’t help anyone or help her come up with an answer to her question. She might as well head on to class.
Her professors sounded more like white noise than anything else, but she did her best to focus on what they were saying. She really needed to remember the information, but…But there was something else on her mind.
Specifically the bite mark, and how someone…how someone hurt the woman she loved. Whoever it was…and the way Tricia mentioned it? She didn’t get justice. The man, based on how Uncle Danny thought it had been Mattie, was still out there. This time he killed his victim. How close…?
No, Nicky wasn’t going to let her mind go down that pathway. She wasn’t going to think about how she might have never even met Tricia if that person had…No. Just, no.
What do you do? What’s the right thing? Well, if she asked her mom, her mom would tell her that the right thing would be to tell someone. There’s a murderer on the loose and Tricia could have the information that could lead to his arrest.
The clock finally rolled around on her last class and she stared longer than planned at the clock before standing with a plan decided on. She quickly scrolled through her phone before bringing up Little Tony’s phone number and sending off a quick text.
Nicky stared at the phone until he finally responded back. She didn’t feel particularly happy, but at least she was taking a step forward instead of staring blandly at a wall. She needed more information.
It wasn’t a long walk from class to the coffee shop that Little Tony liked, but more than once she had to force herself to keep moving forward. She should call Tricia and talk to her about it…but how can she ask Tricia to relive any of it?
Tony was easy to spot. He always liked the back of a room and today wasn’t an exception. If Nicky thought about it…Tricia had a similar habit of putting her back to a wall whenever they happened to go out somewhere. So did her Uncles and grandfather…
“Hey!” Tony raised a hand and waved as if Nicky could have possibly overlooked him. “Finally willing to give the male Assante a chance?” His wink was completely a play that Nicky couldn’t help but smile at. The flirting had never bothered Tricia even if it had made Nicky look awkwardly between the two siblings to see how her girlfriend would react.
“You know me, Little Tony.” Nicky dramatically put a hand over her heart. “I could only ever handle one Assante.” Her smile must have looked a bit more forced than planned because the playfulness was quickly gone from Little Tony’s face.
He motioned towards the chair in front of him and the cup of coffee sitting on the table. “I went ahead and got your favorite. What my sis do this time around? Give Tony all the gory details. You know as well as I do she’ll come around. I haven’t seen anyone more in love since our parents. Kind of disgusting, truly.” His words didn’t match with what his expression and body language was yelling at her.
She could still walk away. Nicky could give an excuse and go back to the apartment to pretend that they’d never had their argument. She could pretend that she didn’t know… “Who raped Tricia?”
Little Tony choked on his drink for a good minute. He waved off the concern of one of the workers but Nicky didn’t look away from how his face lost even more color after getting his coughing under control. For a moment he looked like he was about to deny it before slumping back. Little Tony rubbed a hand down his face and looked at a point just beyond Nicky’s shoulder. “I don’t know.” His voice was barely above a whisper. “She never told me.”
Nicky looked down at the coffee and the steam that was still coming off of it. “Did it…did the person leave the bite mark?” She grabbed the coffee cup in her hands just so that she’d have something to stop her hands from shaking.
“Yeah.” Little Tony jerked his eyes down to stare at the table. “She had to wave down a cab to take her to the hospital. Tricia…she was really messed up. She kept begging me not to tell dad and not to do anything stupid. She didn’t…” Little Tony wrapped his hands around his own cup now. “She didn’t want dad to get in trouble again.” Here there was a sardonic smirk accompanying his words. “The ‘Job’ is hard to do whenever you’re emotional invested.”
She heard the quotations on ‘job’ and couldn’t stop the words from forming before leaving her mouth. “You joined the family business?”
His eyes jerk up and harden for a split second before softening. “Nah. I never had the stomach for it. Tricia, though? A natural. She never flinched away from the stories and always loved finding loopholes. Probably why she’s going to law school, and one of the reasons why Uncle Gino thinks she’d be a good wife to Rin.”
“You think Rin did it?” Nicky backed away from that line of thinking just a bit. The other information? Well, the Tricia she knows would never harm someone if she could help it. Though Rin was a name that she’d hear from Tricia more than once.
Little Tony let out a quick laugh at that. “Rin? No way. He loves her too much to ever hurt her, and respects my family too much to try that. He was raised old school. Women are to be protected, even if they can easily protect themselves.”
“How about…”
“Why she tell you?” Little Tony interrupted, the glint of a hunter showing in the look he was now giving her. “Tricia never told anyone. I only knew cause…I just did.”
Nicky reached out a hand to place on one of his. Even though the other Assante flinched, she didn’t pull back away. “She mentioned your mom, too. I’m sorry that they never caught…”
“Justice was served.” Little Tony moved backwards with a mask on that looked so similar to Tricia’s that she felt a pang in her chest. “Maybe not your kind, but ours. One of our only works of art as a family.” His smile was just as shark-ish as Tricia’s had been not too long ago.
Now that…no. Just…no. She couldn’t think of what that information meant and what her brain was connecting the dots to. Just…no. Not happening.
Her ring tone going off has her looking away from the cold-eyed man that she usually thought of as a friend and digging in her purse. At that moment she felt afraid of what her girlfriend’s family could truly be capable of. “Uncle Danny? What’s wrong?”
“You answered. Where are you?” Uncle Danny’s voice came through the phone and Little Tony was looking at her with the mask completely gone. But which was really the mask.
“At a coffee shop with a friend. Why?” Nicky asked, gathering her purse in on hand and watching as Little Tony stood with her.
“There’s been a disturbance at that apartment you share with your, uh, your girlfriend.” Uncle Danny jumbled over the words. “I’m heading there now. One of the uniforms on scene…I thought you must have told them to call for me.”
“No.” Nicky answered and something on her face must have clued Little Tony into the fear that had nothing to do with the information she got over coffee and everything to do with the phone call. “The only person there is…I gotta go.” She hung up the phone, putting the information dump that Tricia’s brother just gave her on the back burner for now. “We have to get to the apartment. Tricia…”
Little Tony was already heading out the door, with Nicky at his heels.