Another thing Italian men couldn’t help but notice were clothes. Her suit that consisted of a pencil skirt and a one-button black jacket might have suited her, but it didn’t take him feeling the material in his hands to know it was probably picked off a department store rack.
He began to wonder how she would look in a tailor-made suit with expensive Italian fabrics, like he wore …
Quickly folding up her jacket, he placed it between them on the seat as he slid over abruptly and put his face forward.
Nadia didn’t know what had happened. She was simply counting down from ten in her head, trying not to pass out, when she felt the cold chill of Dante’s eyes on her. The moment she turned to look at him, his almost kind demeanor from when he had helped her get out of her jacket had quickly dissipated to a cold shoulder that matched his eyes.
She wasn’t sure if it was the coldness from him or taking her jacket off that had instantly cooled her enough to focus on the situation at hand. With the fear of passing out finally subsiding, she went for her phone but couldn’t find her purse. It must’ve dropped outside the car when Dante had thrown her in.
Shit. She couldn’t even check how Haley had managed the meeting with Desmond Beck. I bet she wants to kill me right about now …
The help Haley was banking on clearly wasn’t going to happen.
Nadia wasn’t sure if Haley was going to even believe her excuse.
Taking a side glance over at Dante, she thought, He might be hotter than Al Pacino, but he’s clearly as dangerous as Tony Montana, as she was thrown into full-fledged Scarface. There was no longer any doubt in her mind because, SPOILER ALERT … the rumors about Dante Caruso are true.
Thank God Haley hadn’t chosen Dante’s folder. She managed to find some relief in the situation. Then, looking heavenward, she made a silent wish.
I sure hope Haley had a better meeting than me …
Three
Well, You Do Today, Ms. Brooks
“I say you should continue on with the vacation, sir,” Amo told him, still behind the wheel and heading to their destination. “Getting on that yacht is the safest thing you could do right now. One-Shot won’t be able to touch you in the middle of the ocean, and you seem to be his only target at the moment.”
His soldier might have a point, but Dante hated running away. He felt like a coward and was about to tell him to head back to the casino hotel when he got a glimpse of his son’s profile.
Leo hadn’t shown much care about anything lately, but when he mentioned going on vacation on the yacht, he had seen a glimmer of interest cross his face. He knew his son desperately needed to get away from the city for a bit and couldn’t take that away. Not when he felt his last child slipping from his grasp, like the rest of his children already had.
Dante moved his eyes from his son to the rearview mirror and firmly nodded.
“You can let me out anytime,” Nadia reminded them that she was still here. “Here’s fine,” she added, trying not to sound worried when she didn’t get a response.
“I’m sorry you were dragged into this,”—Dante was the one to break the news to her—“but I can’t do that in good conscience, Ms. Brooks.”
Whipping her head toward him, she stared at him in confusion while the slight twang of fear returned to her spine. “Excuse me?”
“I’m afraid One-Shot might not take you as just an acquaintance now,” he told her, reminding her that he had cared enough to get her out of Dodge. “You’ll be safer accompanying us this weekend.”
A short laugh escaped her, thinking he must seriously be fucking joking, but then she suddenly stopped. “No.”
Hell no.
Absolutely not.
Nope!
Her little run-in with the mafia had lasted long enough, as far as she was concerned.
Cold eyes pierced into her soul. “I wasn’t asking, Ms. Brooks.”
Nadia didn’t know what kind of women Dante usually hung around, but she assumed they were about as submissive as his men were to him. That was not her.
“Neither was I, Mr. Caruso.”
Dante’s brows furrowed at her response. Getting his way with her, unfortunately, wasn’t going to be as easy as it usually was.
“If I let you out of this car and One-Shot gets even a whiff of who you are, he will find you and either kill you point blank … or worse.”
Nadia slightly gulped, wondering what could possibly be worse than that.
“He will use you to get to me.” His brows relaxed their furrow, his eyes becoming slightly softer. “Since I got you into this mess, you are now the responsibility of the Carusos … until I can get you out.” Suddenly, his fierceness returned. “But I will not let you risk the life of my family because you do not want to go on a yacht for a few days. Got it?”
As much as Nadia wanted to shove her foot up his ass, she nodded … For now.
She hadn’t been more grateful for a car to come to a complete stop when the mad driver put the shifter in park. The eager teen was the first one to jump out of the car. Nadia, on the other hand, wasn’t as eager for the next part of the journey to begin, not leaving the confines of the car until several minutes after the others.
Fuck. She should have never stepped out of the car, seeing exactly where they were. Nadia had been so busy trying to think of a plan to escape that she hadn’t paid attention until she was staring straight at a white private jet.
It didn’t take Dante long to notice something was wrong. “Everything all right, Ms. Brooks?”
She watched the back of his son disappear into the jet, unable to put her words into a sentence that didn’t make her sound like a child in front of him.
The left side of his mouth tugged up, catching on. “You don’t like flying, do you?”
“Correction,” she began to clarify. “I do not fly.” She left out the bit where she believed flying airplanes was like magic.
There wasn’t an ounce of pity on his face when he spoke. “Well, you do today, Ms. Brooks.” Dante then gave a brief nod to his bodyguard before turning his back on her and heading toward the jet.
Her fear of sounding like a child came to fruition as she suddenly felt like the annoying kid of a rich son of a bitch who didn’t have the time of day to parent. And, with Amo suddenly giving her a nudge to get moving, he might as well have been the mean-ass nanny.
“I’m going!” she snapped at the prick when he was about to push her forward again.
As she began to walk past him, she was able to see him head-on, which gave her a better view of him than she’d had in the back seat of the car. “Jesus, how old are you?” she asked incredulously, seeing that, while his frame was massive in stature, his face still had a youthfulness to it.
He gave her a suggestive wink, making her regret her words. “Old enough.”
Nadia couldn’t help putting him back into his place. “But are you old enough to drink?”
His smirk instantly disappeared as his eyes turned into vicious little slits. “Get going.”
“I’ll take that as a no,” she commented with a smile, knowing he was practically a child compared to her. Well, at least she was certain she could definitely outsmart him on her escape plan. Unfortunately, though, as she headed toward her second death trap of the day, it wasn’t going to be possible to escape here. She needed brawn, and Amo definitely beat her there.