Read Online Reckless by Winter Renshaw - Free Book Online

mojo.
    “He was in the army, you know,” the woman adds, her voice just as crinkled and papery as the skin on her shaking hands.
    “Well, that’s wonderful,” I say. “I’m very appreciative of his service to our country.”
    She grins bigger. “He used to come see me all the time, and then he got married. They moved out east. Connecticut. You ever been there?”
    Oh, sweet Jesus. I’m trapped in a conversation I don’t want to be in, and I see zero exits ahead.
    My phone buzzes in my pocket. Maren has sent me a string of question marks.
    “He has four children,” she adds. “Jaylin . . . Janaya . . . Jenson . . . and what’s the last one’s name? Oh, goodness. I always forget. Oh, right. Jacoby. No. Wait. That’s not it . . . these kids and their names these days. Back in my day, we gave our kids real names.”
    “Cristiano Amato?” A raven-haired nurse calls from the doorway ahead.
    I reach across and tap Cristiano’s arm and he sputters awake, appearing disoriented for a few seconds.
    “That’s us,” I say to the lady. “It was lovely chatting with you.”
    Her face falls, and I feel sorry for her for a moment, but within seconds I’m following Cris back, and the nurse is asking a million questions that he can’t keep up with. When did this happen? How did this happen? Who did this?
    I answer them for him. We were at a bar. Some guy was talking shit about our oldest brother, Alessio, saying he took the easy way out by retiring early and that he was a disgrace to Baltimore Firebirds fans everywhere.
    Cristiano overheard and wasted no time socking him across the jaw.
    The guy stumbled to the floor.
    There was blood.
    The guy’s pals circled around my brother.
    And then some other guy popped out of his bar stool like some drunk ninja and jabbed Cris square in the nose.
    By the time I helped him off the floor, the guys were long gone and the bartender was telling us to get the hell out of his place before he called the cops.
    “Noble,” the nurse says, smiling and turning her full attention to my brother. “Your brother’s Ace Amato? I love baseball. Huge Bluewings fan. Please don’t hate me.”
    The two of them laugh, and she examines him with gentle hands, standing unnecessarily close. Her perfume fills the small room, some fruity, coco-nutty combination, and I’m thinking she probably just came on shift.
    She’s younger, like him, and I can tell she sees clear past the fucked-up nose. She can tell he’s a looker. I roll my eyes and stifle a chuckle. I’m used to this. People act like Cristiano’s some kind of god everywhere we go. I’m convinced half the couches he crashed on over these last couple years belonged to girls hoping they were going to get lucky with that lady-killing bastard.
    With Cristiano busy scoring points with his nurse, I retrieve my phone and fire off a text to Maren.
    YOU STILL UP? SORRY. THEY CALLED US BACK.
    Within seconds she replies, YES. BUT NOT FOR MUCH LONGER.
    I write, CAN I TEXT YOU WHEN I LEAVE? HOPEFULLY IT’LL BE SOON. THEY JUST HAVE TO SET HIS NOSE.
    She takes a little longer to respond this time, and knowing my luck, she’s already fallen asleep, but lo and behold, my phone buzzes a minute later, only it’s not a text coming through, it’s a phone call.
    “Hey,” I answer, keeping my voice low and chin tucked. I turn my back toward Cristiano and his nurse.
    “I had to call you,” she says, a sliver of a smile in her tone, “because every time I type the word ‘you,’ it autocorrects to ‘you are a stinky butthead.’ My boys have clearly been messing with my phone.”
    I chortle. That’s definitely something my youngest brother, Fabrizio, would’ve done back in the day.
    “So I didn’t want to send the wrong message,” she says, “you know, literally.”
    “Appreciate it. You may have given me a complex. Thought I left my stinky butthead days back in elementary school.”
    “Anyway, I’m still up,” she says, sighing. “Something