The Promise (The 'Burg, #5)

by Kristen Ashley

“God doesn’t care who you let in there, just as long as the feelin’s are honest when you let him in.”

Watching Benny Bianchi’s eyes light with humor. Feeling that light shine on me, making me warm all over, even on the inside.

“You’ve gone through the motions to deflect attention so you can carry out whatever scheme you’re hatchin’.”

“Family doesn’t turn their back on family for seven years, especially doin’ that shit when one of their own loses the man in her bed.”

You see the woman you want bleedin’ from a gunshot wound on a forest floor, she survives that shit and gives you a week and a half, Frankie, that’s plenty of time to pull your head outta your ass.

“Only God can judge him and his family for the way they treated you. Here, on earth, the right thing to do is forgive.

That’s the reason forgiveness is divine. ’Cause someone wrongs us, we live with that wrong right alongside them, but it’s us who has to find the strength to let them off the hook. If they work for it, ask for it, only you have the power to offer it to them so their soul can be less heavy. And the right thing to do is use that power.”

“You were mine, even when you were his.” He was right. It was whacked. It didn’t even make sense. But I’d always loved Benny. We were tight. We got along. Of all Vinnie’s family, I was closest with Benny. It made me happy being around him.

“My Al used to say that if he was a younger man, he’d make Enzo Concetti see sense—all the beauty he created, all that beauty he neglected.” And that made my breath turn harsh. “‘Nothin’ more precious,’ Al would say, ‘than your baby girl.’”

“Know one thing on God’s beautiful earth, and that is”—she leaned into me—“love is never wrong.”

“You find yourself open to accepting wisdom, Francesca, got an old lady across the street who’ll give you some.”

“I don’t want you to ever think I’m with you for any reason other than you’re Benny!” I yelled.

“Francesca, no one ever got a gold medal for sittin’ on their ass and doin’ nothin’. You work at somethin’, you work at it hard, you believe in it, you want it, you go after it, you get it—that’s when you get your prize.” Now wisdom coming from Benny. I couldn’t take it so I dropped my chin to rest my forehead against his chest.

“I’d buy you a plate piled high with sapphires and be happy sittin’ across from you as you picked through them, even if you were doin’ it pissed at me for being rational and protective.”

“Babe, you cannot plan life. You can pull out all the stops to plan for everything and life will find a way to fuck with those plans, sock you in the gut, send you scrambling. Through that, you either have the balls not to back down and the strength to know what’s important and hold the fuck on with everything you got, or you don’t have that and you give up ’cause you’re weak. Know two things for certain: I’m not fuckin’ weak and you aren’t either.”

“I’d breathe. I’d eat. I might one day laugh again. But I wouldn’t be living. There is no life for me without you.”

“Like I said, I’m Lee Nightingale. I own Nightingale Investigations. The man I’m sending is Luke Stark. He’ll be there this afternoon. We want the drives prior to his arrival so we can sort through them and set him on task without delay.”

“I’m not dead, either, babe. And I might see a pretty woman, but even if I do, I’m not doin’ my job if you don’t know down to your gut there’s nothin’ I see that’s as beautiful as what I see in you.”

“Never loved another woman. Not in my life,” he said quietly, and my breath went funny. “Waited until I got it right,” he went on. His hand squeezed mine, he moved so the tip of his nose skimmed mine, and he finished, “I got it right.”