Come, little sparrow.
I raised an eyebrow at him. “Inglese?”
“Sorry, a force of habit with my family,” he said with a thick South Jersey accent. “I knew you spoke the language.”
“You did?” I pushed my hands to my hips and narrowed my eyes at him. “How did you know that?”
“Because I know everything about you.” He waggled his eyebrows. And it was cute but somewhat terrifying. “Are you ready?”
“Someone has been stalking me for weeks. Is it you?”
He pushed a hand through his short, blond hair and stepped toward me. A dark shadow cast over his features as his jaw flexed. “I’ll keep you safe.” Then he extended his hand to me. “Let’s go.”
He led me down the stairs and dragged me outside in a hurry. I lived in a studio apartment on West End Avenue since I wasn’t eligible to live in the dorms on campus anymore.
I couldn’t see his face clearly in the darkness, only the strength in his jaw and the definition in his muscular body. He was tall, well over six feet, and towered over me.
As he led me across the street, he shielded my body with his hand from the oncoming traffic. “Fucking drivers in this city,” he muttered when a taxi almost hit us. Then he swore a few times in Italian, yelling at the driver.
“So, where is the party?”
“It’s my best friend’s thirtieth birthday,” he said with his eyes ahead, focused on the busy street. “We’re going to his apartment.”
Thirty?
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-nine.”
“You don’t look that old.”
“No?” His eyes met mine. “How old do I look?”
I shrugged, biting my lip to steady my nerves. “Mid-twenties would have been my guess.”
“I’ll be thirty over the summer.”
My dad would have had a stroke about me hanging out with a much older man, let alone one of the Luciano brothers.
“Let me guess. Your zodiac sign is Leo.”
His head snapped to me, then he winked. “Good guess. August ninth. When’s your birthday?”
I dared a glance over at him and blushed at how he undressed me with his eyes. “I thought you knew everything about me.”
He raised his broad shoulders a few inches and grinned. “Just making conversation.”
“Since you know me so well, when is my birthday?”
“July seventh.” He clicked his tongue. “Next question.”
He turned his head away to dodge the people coming at us at full speed. It was Wednesday night in Manhattan. Droves of people passed on the sidewalk. Some were drinking out in the open, not giving a single shit. Men stumbled out of a bar on our right, shouting at each other.
I waved my hand in front of my face as we passed an older man smoking a cigar, choking me with the scent. “I saw you heading toward Greene Hall earlier. Why?”
“I graduated from Columbia Law a few years ago. I was on my way to see an old friend.”
I glanced at the dark ink on his hand as he scrubbed it across his jaw. “No offense, but you look more criminal than justice.”