"We'll have to agree to disagree on that."

"Pfft, I'm right and you know it," I continue. "Retaliation is a choice, plain and simple. You choose to get revenge. You always have the option of being the bigger man."

Naz stares at me like I've sprouted another head out of my neck. I don't know if I'm getting through to him or not, but I hope so. Because all of this? I really just want it to end. Maybe that's like asking for a miracle in our lives, but it doesn't hurt, I think, to just… ask.

"You know," he says after a moment, looking away from me. "You were a lot more submissive before I married you."

Again, I laugh.

Again, I probably shouldn't.

"Whatever," I say, rolling my eyes as he goes back to reading. I regard him curiously as he does, my words still bouncing around in my skull. Retaliation. Part of me figured that was what he'd been off doing, why he'd left the deli so quickly, leaving me behind. "How'd you get home, anyway?"

"Drove."

"Really? Your car wasn't in the driveway."

"I parked it in the garage."

My brow furrows. "Did you make any stops on the way home?"

He shakes his paper at me, continuing to read. He stopped for the newspaper… he said that earlier.

That's it?

"You didn't go anywhere else?"

Carefully, his gaze slides my way, eyes narrowing slightly. "No."

I drop the subject then, knowing I'm pushing his buttons. We've got a policy now, one we both adhere to: I don't ask questions I can't handle the answers to, because he's not going to lie to me, no matter what it's about. Ignorance, he says, is most definitely bliss, but if I want to know, he's going to tell me.

Call it a perk of marriage.

It's bitten me in the ass before, though, especially with his bluntness.

Like when I brought up Professor Santino and he'd told me, point blank, the pointer stick broke off in the man's ribcage.

So if he says he didn't make any other stops, I'm choosing to believe him.

Choosing it, like I fear he's still choosing retaliation.

K arissa's dreaming.

Or having a nightmare, rather.

I can hear her as she lays beside me, whimpering in her sleep. Her body is tense, jacked up like a live wire. I think if I try to wake her now, she might electrocute me.

I wonder, sometimes, if her dreams are about us. Are they ever the happily ever after variety? Or are they always about all the things I did? The hurt I caused, the pain she went through, the horror of falling in with a man like me. I wonder, but I don't ask her, because I'm not sure it matters.

I'm not sure she ever remembers.

She never mentions her dreams to me.

Besides, dreams mean nothing when it comes to reality.

Life is what it is.

You can't escape it.

The ceiling fan lightly spins, blowing her hair. Reaching over, I carefully brush the wayward hair away from her face, watching her for a moment, before leaning in to press a small kiss to her cheek. She sleeps right through it, deep in the throes of the dream, oblivious to my presence, hopefully just as ignorant to my upcoming absence.

I don't want her to worry about it.

As carefully as possible, I slide out of the bed, making sure not to disturb her. I grab a pair of black sweatpants on my way out the door, slipping them on out in the darkened hallway before making my way downstairs.

I'm grateful I manage to make my way past the mutt. He still doesn't like me... not that I blame him. I did shoot his owner right in front of him once. But he makes it hard to sneak around sometimes. Makes it hard to maintain peace in this house.

It's a warm, fall evening, nearing midnight, but the marble kitchen floor is cool against my bare feet. My footsteps falter as I near the sink, and I reach over, plucking the boning knife from the wooden block on the counter. The handle is black, the narrow blade eight-inches long, the point sharp enough to pull flesh from bone.

That's what it's meant for, after all.

I grab my keys from the hook near the side door before stepping out into the garage, mindful to close the door behind me again. Open doors are invitations I don't want to extend to anyone right now, but especially not Karissa.

I want her to stay right where she is, fast asleep.

Oblivious.

I pop the trunk on my Mercedes before shoving my keys in the pockets of my pants. The moment I do it, I hear whimpering as something shifts around inside the car. Pushing the lid open, I stare down at the form in the darkness, illuminated by the dull lights of the trunk.

Sweat covers him from the top of his bald head to the tips of his bare toes, his face drenched, dripping beads of it, his filthy white shirt clinging to him. And it stinks… Jesus, it fucking reeks. It'll take me a month to get the stench of piss out of my trunk after this. Anger surges inside of me at the very thought of him pissing himself, the spineless coward. He's lucky I don't plunge the knife into his neck, right here and right now. Lucky he might… might… live to see another day.

For his sake, I hope he does.

He looks like he wants to survive.

He stares at me, wide-eyed, panicked. The moment he catches sight of the knife, he breaks out into tears. He's hyperventilating, sucking air through his nose, trying to breathe but the duct tape covering his mouth, wrapped around his head, is damn near suffocating. His wrists and ankles, too, are bound, but it doesn't stop him from flailing around in the trunk, making a ruckus.

"What did I tell you, Armando?" I hold the knife to his throat, the action making him tense and stop moving so much, so not to cut himself. "You let my wife hear you and I'll have no choice but to slit your fucking throat."

He tries to quiet his cries, going mostly silent, but the tears continue to fall. I hate it, the sight of someone crying, be it man or woman, but especially men who are supposed to be a part of the family. Men who pledge to live by the gun shouldn't fall apart the second it's hinted they might die by it, too.

Or in this case, by knife, which arguably, when I'm wielding it, might hurt a hell of a lot more.

Armando Donati was one of Ray's street soldiers, the kind who did dirty work, who roamed in the trenches and wasn't opposed to bending rules off the books to win wars. Kidnapping, extortion, and assault were his specialties, as well as the average every day drive-by shooting. The parts of the life that had no honor. The parts of the life that none of them talked about. Armando had a knack for making a hit look more like a random act. Ray kept eyes and ears all over the street, and most of his information came straight from Armando and his band of bloody thieves.

So, naturally, the second gunfire lit up my father's business, I thought of him.

"No screaming," I tell him. "If you want any chance of going home, you'll listen. You got me?"

He nods frantically.

"Good."

Using the knife, I slit across the duct tape on his mouth, watching as blood flows around the hole, the blade slicing into his lip. He grunts, letting out a strangled cry as more tears fall, but he doesn't scream. He sucks in a large gulp of air through his mouth, immediately begging the second he exhales.

"Please, Vitale, it wasn't me! I swear to God! I swear on my wife, my children! I swear on the family! I didn't do it!"