“Sounds like someone’s been making assumptions again,” he drawled.
An odd thumping began in my chest, and I shook my head. “It wasn’t an assumption.”
He took a step forward, and once again I took one back.
He slipped his hands into his pockets as his gaze fell down my body. It was hardly leering and more observant, like I was in fact another species and he was wondering if I was edible.
His eyes narrowed on my pink heels. “You think you’ve got some proof, huh?”
I nodded, feeling strangely breathless under his scrutiny. “My mamma said you acted the perfect gentleman at church.”
“I did act the perfect gentleman.”
“So, it’s a matter of if you want to be one?”
He didn’t say a word, but his neutral expression confirmed it as his stare traveled back up from my heels.
“And I’m guessing you don’t want to be one right now?” I realized I shouldn’t have said it as I was saying it.
His heavy gaze reached mine, burning me.
He gave his head a slow shake.
Okay.
I’d stood my ground long enough, much longer than the Sweet Abelli ever would. But now, I just needed to get the heck out of here.
“Okay, well . . . I’ll see you around.”
I couldn’t think of a less idiotic response, so I only took a step to go around him—but, before I could, something grabbed my wrist. He grabbed my wrist. His grip felt like a band of fire; rough, calloused fire. A cool breath of fear mixed with something boiling hot leaked into my bloodstream.
He stood a couple feet from me, his grip the only thing connecting us. “Write up a list of your sister’s hobbies. Likes and dislikes, shoe size, dress size, and anything else you think will be useful. Yeah?”
“Yeah,” I breathed. How many men had he killed with the hand wrapped around my wrist? It wasn’t a hard grip, but it was heavy, firm, immovable. It made me aware of how much smaller I was, how unnerved and out of place I felt. How I couldn’t leave unless he chose to release me.
He watched me with an inquisitive gaze. My heart felt close to stopping and my skin was burning up. It was inappropriate for him to touch me, future brother-in-law or not. My papà could come out of his office any moment, but this man didn’t seem to care. I did, though, especially after the scene earlier.
“I’ll give the list to you on Friday at the engagement party,” I managed to say and tried to pull my wrist away.
He didn’t let me go. My pulse fluttered when his thumb brushed my knuckles. “I was under the impression the Abellis could afford more than a fifty-cent ring.”
I glanced at the ring on my middle finger. It came from one of those vending machines and had a purple round-cut jewel in the center. The thought of it sobered me.
“Sometimes the cheapest things are the most valuable.”
His gaze came back to my face, and we looked at each other for a moment. His grip slipped down my wrist, palm, fingers. The rough pads of his fingertips brushed my softer ones, and made my heart skip a beat.
“I’ll see you at lunch, Elena.”
He left, disappearing into my papà’s office.
Cazzo . . .
Leaning against the wall, the ring was a heavy weight on my finger. I could take it off, put it somewhere it couldn’t haunt me, but I knew I never would. Not yet.
His grip still burned like a brand on my wrist as I left the hallway.
Once again, he’d said my name in the most inappropriate way.
“Murders came with smiles, shooting people was no big deal for us Goodfellas.”
—Henry Hill
BILLIE HOLIDAY PLAYED SOFTLY FROM the old pool radio. Condensation dripped down crystal glasses, and silverware glinted in the bright sunlight. It was a hot July afternoon, but the steady breeze was the perfect interlude.
Lights wound around the wooden slats of the patio cover, and my mamma’s rose bushes were flourishing. The chairs were soft and the food was good, but it could only be so comfortable having lunch with a bunch of strangers. However, the seventies ad sitting across from me didn’t seem to share the same opinion.
“Anyway, the cop let me go and he didn’t even take my coke—”
“Gianna.” The word was a low warning from Nicolas’s spot at the table.
She rolled her eyes and took a deep drink of wine, but she spoke no more.
I wondered why Nicolas had chastised her and what their relationship was. Siblings? They did appear to find each other annoying, but I was sure I’d heard somewhere that Nicolas was an only child. Gianna’s senior citizen of a husband sitting next to her hadn’t said a word, except for some oddly-timed chuckling. I was beginning to think he was hard of hearing.
Gianna was my polar opposite. Where I was quiet, she spoke with abandon and laughed loudly. Where I was demure, well . . . she’d stuck her gum to her cloth napkin before eating her pasta without twirling it around the fork. I was a little jealous of her carefree approach to life.
Tony sat on her other side. He leaned back in his chair with his jacket unbuttoned looking bored, but I knew him better than that. I’d seen that smug way he scratched the scruff on his jaw like he was angry and amused at the same time. And that never meant anything good. He was handsome, but if I wasn’t his sister I wouldn’t touch him with a ten-foot pole. His recklessness was dangerous for anyone involved, especially himself. He caught my uneasy look and shot me a wink.
Low chatter and the scraping of silverware filled the yard, but beneath that lay a tense air that wouldn’t dissipate, an uncomfortable vibe the breeze wouldn’t take with it. Everyone seemed to be easily chatting amongst themselves, so maybe it was just me. I brushed it off.
Gianna didn’t stay quiet for long, though she no longer spoke about 8-balls of coke. She changed the subject to horse racing. That was an acceptable conversation many joined in on. It wasn’t like this was a drug-free zone—in fact, many people came through this house on a daily basis with drugs on them—but out in the open, it was Cosa Nostra etiquette to pretend we were the classic example of a white-picket-fence family. Even if our homes were surrounded by an iron gate and security instead.
I was happy to see that Adriana had shown up instead of boarding a plane to Cuba. She sat next to her fiancé and Papà at the other end of table.
Maybe I was a coward, but I was glad I didn’t have to sit near Nicolas. I was the perfect hostess and had a polite response for anything—as inappropriate as the comments could sometimes be when people were drinking—but with him, words were at a loss for me. I felt tongue-tied around him, tilted off my point of gravity, and truthfully just hot, as though a blush permanently warmed my skin.
It might be unpleasant speaking to him, but it was too easy to look in his direction. If not for his size, he could easily fit Adriana’s pretty-boy preferences when he had a sober expression on his face. He was tan, his hair was almost black, and I couldn’t help but notice that his biceps were defined through his shirt. My future brother-in-law was even more handsome beneath bright sun. It was unfortunate his personality didn’t match.
What I found the most intriguing about his appearance, however, was the dark ink that showed through his white dress shirt. It was vague, but I thought it went all the way from his shoulder to the gold watch on his wrist. Nicolas Russo had a full sleeve. I knew that gentleman look was all smoke and mirrors.