“Do you? Do you really? I’m an addict. Heroin. I am a fucked-up man. And not always a nice person. When I met Delores, I told her that I was fucked up, a real SOB. I told her that she’d be better off picking someone else.”

Oh. Stone’s true message finally broke through. “What did she say? Clearly, she didn’t listen.”

He smiled again. “Like I said, everyone underestimates Delores. She’s sweet, but the woman has a spine of steel. She told me that it was her choice. Got right in my face and informed me that I didn’t have the right to tell her what to think or who to love. That if my addiction was a problem, she’d tell me so, but it wasn’t.” He shrugged self-consciously. “I still have bad days, but she stays. She loves me. I don’t deserve it, but it doesn’t make it any less true.”

Dani swallowed hard. “How did you know?” she asked hoarsely.

His smile became sad. “That you feel like you don’t deserve him?”

She nodded, unable to speak for fear of losing it for the second time that evening.

“I didn’t,” he said. “Not until this minute. But I suspected. I’ve watched him watching you for months. I’ve watched you watching him when you thought no one was looking. You want him, but you tell him no. You’re not stupid and you’re not mean. I can only assume there are other issues in play. Your HIV status?”

“That’s one,” she allowed. He was wrong on the mean, though. I am not a nice person, either.

“Well, I’m not a doctor or a shrink or even a nice guy, but I am a good judge of people and I think you should talk to him. Tell him what’s standing in your way. And then take a page out of Delores’s book and let him make his own choices. He’s a big boy, Dani. He can deal, one way or the other.”

She drew a deep breath. “Okay. I will. When he comes back.” Because he would come back, if only for the boys.

Stone tilted his head, studying her. “Good. Oh, and by the way, we got the name of the big bald guy and gave it to Adam.”

Dani’s jaw dropped. “What the . . .” She narrowed her eyes. “What happened?”

“We were in the casino on the Lady of the River and a fight broke out. The manager mistook Diesel for the security manager, whose name is Scott King. Diesel’s tracking him now.”

Dani ground her teeth. “And when Diesel finds him?”

“I don’t know, and that’s the truth.”

She shook her head, exasperated. “You couldn’t have led with that?”

“You didn’t ask what we found,” he pointed out. “You asked how he was. I simply answered your question.”