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to read her lips. Not that they were paying any attention to her.
    “Don’t, Dominic. He doesn’t need to know the rest. You’re not that man anymore.”
    He turned to her. His lips at her ear were shielded by her long hair, but his nearness and cold breath still caused her to shiver. “You’re actually encouraging me to keep a secret?”
    She pulled back and looked into his eyes. Her voice was soft and her eyes sincere. “This one, I am. You said it yourself—they’re your demons. Don’t make them his as well. If you need someone to help carry your burdens, I’ll be that person.”
    “I don’t want you to carry my burdens, Querida. I don’t want anyone to.”
    “Well that’s exactly what’s going to happen if you tell him about all the things you had to do to make sure he had a good life. Look at him, Dom.” They both turned to watch him laughing with Gabe. “You just told him what you are, and still he laughs. Do you think he’d be the same person if you told him you’ve killed for him?”
    Dominic shook his head slowly. “No, he’d never be the same again.” Hadn’t he just thought the same thing before they had come down for their talk? He knew she was right. Again.
    “You’re too good to me. How did you get to be so wise?”
    Kerrigan shrugged. “Maybe it’s in my blood.”
    Availia Milena Cruz was the wisest woman he had ever known. Almost oracle-like. It certainly seemed the woman he loved even more than the air he breathed was becoming more and more like her grandmother with each passing day. Maybe it was part of the gift that had been passed down through generations and generations of the women in their bloodline, or maybe it was just the kind of people they were. Either way, he considered himself a very lucky man to have had both women grace his miserable existence. He was a better man because of them. He would never take that fact for granted.
    “I dreamed about him last night.” The shadows under Colton’s eyes darkened with his statement.
    “Who?”
    “Our father. Or at least he said he was our father. Drake, right?”
    Simply bringing up the topic almost seemed to drain him of what little bit of perkiness he had managed to hold onto. Dominic had noticed the way his little brother had been shuffling around like an eighty-year-old man, rather than the strapping college student that he was. He had chalked it up to an obsessive amount of studying and way too much partying, but he had been with them for long enough to be rejuvenated again. Maybe it had something to do with Drake after all, which did nothing for Dominic’s otherwise cheery disposition.
    “He was in your fucking dream?” Concern laced with outrage tainted his voice. All sorts of red flags flew up in his mind as to what that could mean.
    “Yeah, it kind of happens a lot, actually. And it never starts out with him in it. Last night, the dream started out with you and me tossing the baseball around like we used to. Do you remember that? I was maybe nine years old.”
    Images of a time long ago flashed before Dominic’s eyes. Colton was in his ratty Florida Marlins cap, smiling proudly about how he had just knocked the ball over the fence surrounding their tiny home and into old Ms. Kramden’s back yard. She was a cranky old bat and refused to let them climb the fence to get their toys back when they hadn’t been careful. Colton had looked terrified when Dominic scaled that fence anyway. Ms. Kramden had come out of her back door, yelling and waving a broom at him as he had hopped back over into the relative safety of their yard. Colton had looked up at him with awe in his bright eyes, praising his big brother for his heroism.
    “Gosh, Dom, you’re so brave. I’d’ve pissed my pants, but not you. Nothing scares you,” he had said.
    Dominic had put the ball in his hand-me-down mitt and ruffled his hand over his kid brother’s head, causing his cap to slide off. “Watch your damn mouth, kid.” He hadn’t been