“I’ll always come for you. It kills me that I made you think, for even a second, that I might not. I’m so sorry, tesoro.”

I’m sorry for lying about being a detective.

Damon nodded. “I understand why you did, considering my… familial duties.” (That was one way of admitting you were a mafia boss.) “It’s also why the arrangement we came to before I found out your real job – and the contract we both signed – is officially null and void.”

Micah nodded robotically. He had known it was coming. He’d had plenty of time to think it over the past week, and he’d come to the same conclusion. Even if the man forgave him – which it appeared that he did – it wasn’t fair to ask Damon to trust him again. Not when Micah was a proven liar. Not when Micah still worked for the police.

It left his whole operation entirely too vulnerable to potential espionage.

“It’s not safe for you. And it’s not fair for me to ask you to choose between me and your career.” A pause. “I know you took an oath, and that asking you to resume what we had before would put you at odds with it.”

It was true.

Micah had felt torn in two different directions since he’d met Damon. Damon was so good at keeping the more… felonious aspects of his work out of Micah’s sight (and mind) that he forgot at times just how dangerous the man was. But it had all come to a head after the fiasco with Jason Vitali.

“Only married people are immune to testifying against each other.”

Everything Damon said made sense. Micah didn’t blame him at all for wanting to break it off – for good this time. But that didn’t mean he was just going to let him go.

So when Damon opened his mouth again, he quickly interrupted.

You’re right.

Damon raised his eyebrows, a strange, almost… hopeful glint in his eyes. “I… am?”

Micah nodded, quickly scribbling more.

That’s why I’m quitting.

“I… what?”

If Micah was forced to choose between Damon and helping people, he honestly didn’t know which one he’d pick. But choosing between Damon and working for the NYPD? Easy.

I’m going to use the money you gave me to open my own detective agency. I already have the credentials. But I can’t lose you again. I just can’t.

“Please,” Micah whispered.

“I thought I told you to hush,” Damon said, but there was no heat in it. He looked flabbergasted, like he actually thought Micah would let him go without a fight again.

Don’t leave me. Please.

Micah didn’t care how pathetic it was, he would beg on his hands and knees if he had to.