Page 203 of Ricardo

I want to go to him.

That is ridiculous.

I know that. I know Owen may have approved the substitution. I know he may have taken the calls. I know he may have opened a door he had no right to open.

But I also know the look of someone realizing too late that he has made a grave mistake.

Ricardo looks down at me. “Do not.”

“What?”

“Feel sympathy for him.”

“I don't,” I say.

“You are a bad liar.”

“You are very irritating.”

“I have been told.”

“By many women, I assume.”

“Mostly by you.”

Despite myself, I smile.

Then Dante’s gaze catches mine from across the room.

The smile dies as quickly as it forms.

He stands near Matteo and Tomasso, face angled toward his phone, body positioned so he can see Rusk, Owen, the side corridor, and the entrance without seeming to watch any of them. He looks calm. He looks capable.

He looks like someone I used to know better than almost anyone.

Then he looks away.

The space behind my ribs aches.

Ricardo feels the change in me. His fingers still for a second, then his hand lowers from my back.

He is trying.

That makes it worse somehow.

I look toward the hospital tables because it is safer than looking at Dante. Jeannette Salazar is making her first farewell pass, exactly as I predicted. She touches Mario’s arm with the kind of affectionate familiarity reserved for wealthy donors. Mario accepts it with a polite smile.

Victoria stands beside him, serene and beautiful, one hand resting lightly against her stomach. If she is worried, she hides it well.

My parents stand near the far side of the room.

My father is no longer speaking with Deputy Commissioner Wells. He is watching me.

No.

He is watching us.

His eyes move from Ricardo’s face to mine, then to the hand Ricardo has just dropped from my back. My mother says something beside him, her smile still in place, but my father does not look away.