I wondered if she was on the pill, and in a disturbing way kind of hoped she wasn’t. I wanted an irrevocable tie to this woman. I wanted to write my name on her skin, to do all kinds of fucked-up shit so she knew she was mine. Like lock her in my room and hand-feed her. With indifference, I finished my cigarette and contemplated the logistics of that.
Luca’s headlights pulled into the drive. He tucked his shirt in and fixed his cuffs as he got out of his car. “I’m gonna take a wild guess. It was the little pink princess that pissed you off and ruined my night.”
I shook my head at his stupid nickname for her and lit another cigarette. “Surprising you could even find someone to fuck that ugly face of yours.”
A smile pulled on his lips, and he rubbed a hand across his mouth like there might still be something on it.
“Did you have to pay her?” I asked, listening to the city in the background. Sirens, tire noise, the neighbor John’s TV playing endless ballgame highlights through an open window. He was an enforcer of mine, and I considered giving him a raise to fix his goddamn air-conditioner. If I wanted to listen to MLB all day I would’ve turned it on.
Luca walked to the fridge and grabbed a beer. “Might’ve been better if I had.” He cracked the can and took a seat in a lawn chair. “She fucking talked about you the whole time.”
“Interesting.” Inhaling deeply to get Elena’s scent out of my nose, it smelled like the end of summer. Like fresh-cut grass, motor oil, dying heat, and the urban sometimes bitter smell of the city.
A corner of his lips lifted. “Isabel.”
> “Ah. If you think I know how to shut her up, you’re out of luck.”
He laughed.
I actually knew of a few ways, but I didn’t want to talk about Isabel. Agitation still rolled under my skin, and I stepped out of the garage and leaned against my Mustang in the drive.
The brief thought of Isabel reminded me that she would be here in the morning. She was just my cook and, to be honest, a shitty maid, though she used to be a regular fuck. Well, Mondays and Thursdays when she was here, anyway. She’d been a convenience, but then she fucked Tony and came with unwanted drama. I hadn’t touched her in a year and had only run into her a few times.
I considered what I should do about her. Not even a man in the Cosa Nostra would parade a mistress or ex-lover in front of his fiancée. And knowing Isabel, she would go out of her way to try and make Elena uncomfortable about our brief past. Would Elena even care? A burn radiated throughout my chest at the thought that she wouldn’t.
“Your pink princess is going to meet her tomorrow,” Luca said, though it was more a question about how he should handle it.
A movement in the window upstairs caught my attention.
I took a deep drag and met Elena’s gaze behind the glass. Soft lamp light lit her reflection. Messy black hair and soft eyes. My heart rate picked up an awkward rhythm.
I’d gotten what I wanted, what I thought I needed to end this obsession with Elena so I could stop fixating on her and get back to my life. But as I looked at her now, a throb ached in my chest, right behind the breastbone. Like her gaze had bruised me with a mere look.
My eyes narrowed on her as I blew out a breath of smoke.
“Let her.”
“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”
—Confucius
BIRDS CHIRPED. SUNLIGHT STREAMED IN pleasant rays through the window. And it felt like I’d been ridden hard and put up wet. A twinge of soreness ached between my legs, and my skin felt tender, as though Nico’s rough hands and scruff had rubbed me raw.
The reminder made me warm everywhere, though I knew it shouldn’t. My feelings toward him were flighty and annoying to even myself. I wanted a straight path to follow, with maturity and thoughtfulness, but I couldn’t seem to find that with him. He made me hot and then he made me cold. He was soft and then he was intense. He was rude and then he killed a man so he could have me.
I wasn’t using my brain when I thought of him, but another organ entirely.
One with a pulse.
I’d fallen asleep to still smelling him on my skin, in my hair, everywhere, and contentment had filled my chest. Though, there was a prickling sense of unease as well—at the crash that had come from his room shortly after I left, and the animosity seeping under the door. The violence was a normal staple in my life, but it was the cause of it that worried me.
Maybe Nico was finally realizing I came with baggage I wasn’t ready to give up. And I could only imagine he was regretting not getting a virgin wife. He didn’t like to share—that much was obvious.
Maybe I wasn’t what he thought he wanted.
Maybe he would return me now that he’d gotten me in his bed.
My papà would surely kill him if he tried that, but Nico never did seem afraid of breaking the rules. However, if my father wasn’t happy with the match, as I’d heard, maybe he would be glad Nico changed his mind?