Chapter 15 Momentum #2
Santino gave her a pained look. “Have a little faith in me, beautiful. This”—he indicated the photo again—“is the truck which is going to move anything and everything you can’t bear to part with.
Today. We are going to put on shoes and head over to help the guys pack up.
Mostly because I’d have to kill them if they lay a single finger on your laundry. ”
She raised a hand to her head as her rampaging thought process did a full reversal. “Okay.” Maybe. “But I haven’t— There are things I—”
Santino bumped her raised hand aside and framed her face in his palms, pulling her close and speaking softly.
“If you want it, you keep it. If you keep it, we make room for it. That’s all that matters.
” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “If it’s functional but you don’t care for it, or serves a purpose but you dislike some feature—anything like that—you tell me in what way the thing benefits you, in what way you might miss it from your life, and we will decide together on how to deal with that situation as it comes.
You don’t have to worry about the cost of the truck, any last month’s rent, or whatever expenses there are in thinking over what you keep. I’ll handle the money.”
Her fingers were curled into his shirt again.
How had she so easily transferred her well-established nervous habit onto him?
That seemed like a thought for reflecting at a later date.
Instead, she released a slow exhale. “Most of what I need to keep is small, on its own.” Her entire wardrobe was small in comparison to his closet, she had learned.
“But I have an exercise bike I want to keep. It’s not fancy. It’s just been … reliable.”
“Think it could share space in my home gym? I’m sure I could move some stuff around and make a spot for it there.”
She stuttered. “You really need to give me a proper tour.”
His grin returned with a low laugh. “Fair.”
He had a home gym. That was interesting to know. She could see herself exploring that. Reiko nodded. “A gym sounds like a good fit.”
He swooped in for a hard, brief kiss before straightening. “There you go. Problem solved. Should we head out before Marco and the rest can get too snoopy?”
Reiko almost agreed before she finally remembered the thing she had told herself to ask when he came home that day. He’d thrown her significantly off by showing up so early, and with a guest. “Wait!”
He arched a brow.
She swiftly extracted her new phone from the pocket of her skirt—the maid had bought her a skirt with pockets, so the maid was her current favorite member of the staff—and raised it up. “Can I get a picture of you for my contacts?”
Santino broke into a wide smile. “Should I make it all slutty, too?” He moved to lift his shirt up, partially revealing his abs.
The response triggered a burst of laughter from her and Reiko fought to roll her eyes. The man was ridiculous. She didn’t know how he could be flirty and terrifying and indisputably in control at nearly every moment all at once. “No, you fiend.”
He matched her laughter, plucked her phone from her grip, and held it over her shoulder while simultaneously spinning her into him. “Luca, take a picture. Do a good job and I’ll let Guiseppi share whatever he makes for dessert with you.”
“Yes, sir,” Luca replied with a startling amount of enthusiasm.
Reiko couldn’t think about that, because Santino was moving her again, plastering her back to his front and folding his arms over her chest. With their height difference, he was able to rest his chin on the crown of her head.
Santino adjusted his grip so his lower arm curved beneath her breasts, his hand angling toward her hip, and he quipped, “Say cheese, beautiful.”
Her smile came with a laugh, though she knew she was also blushing, as she settled her hands in a lazy hook over his upper forearm. “Cheese,” she replied.
They held the pose for a moment and she thought she heard a faint shutter sound.
“Okay, got it. Here you go.” Luca held the phone back to them.
Santino accepted it and pulled up her gallery. She only had three photos—two she’d taken of herself, and the newest one—so it was easy to find. And when he enlarged it, her heart did something strange.
They looked good. She was small against him.
Dark haired to his light. Her smile equally small but visible in her eyes, compared to his wide and toothy one—also, of course, reflected in his eyes.
His hold was possessive, but she didn’t show as bothered in any way.
Which was accurate. If anything, they just looked like a normal, happy couple.
“What do you think, beautiful?”
Reiko smiled, took back her phone, and set the photo as her wallpaper. “I think I still need one of you. So I can look at this one all the time.” She tipped her head back. “And Luca earned dessert.”
Santino barked out a laugh and eased his hold. “All right, all right. Whatever you say. Luca gets dessert and I’ll pose alone. But, text me that pic.”
She responded by raising her camera and capturing the teasing glint in his eyes.
A few minutes later they had their shoes on and were walking hand-in-hand down the front steps to the waiting Rolls-Royce when Armando—standing beside the idling vehicle—pivoted to the side and the took the mood with him. “Stop!”
Santino abruptly pulled Reiko so close she was half-behind him, keeping their hands clasped at his back. His easygoing air had vanished, replaced with a tension so solid it could shatter granite. “Wasn’t expecting to see you, Joey,” he called, his voice like cold fire.
Reiko angled her head just enough to see past Santino’s arm and easily spotted an unfamiliar man frozen in place several paces away.
He looked to be in his mid- to late-twenties, had short, dark brown hair with a thin line of a mustache to match, and held both his arms up, palms open.
He also bore a medical walking boot on his left leg.
The man she presumed to be Joey kept his head bent slightly forward as he spoke. “Sorry to drop in, Boss. I let the guards up front frisk me and everything, I swear I’m not packin’. I just really gotta talk to you.”
The incident from the zoo flashed through Reiko’s mind—when someone supposed to have been one of his own had approached him unexpectedly and pulled a gun.
Does that happen more often than he let on?
She knew they’d talked about it, after, but her memory of that conversation was pretty emotionally clouded.
Santino gave her hand a squeeze. “I am glad to see you up and about, Joey. But I’m sure you heard about what happened with Nico. Unexpected visits are making me a little twitchy right now.”
Joey’s head bobbed. “Nico’s why I gotta talk to you, Boss. I’m no traitor. Hell, after what I saw in Chicago, a man would have to be dumber than shit to pull that.” He flicked a rushed glance up. “’scuse me.”
Santino vibrated with brief, quiet amusement. “Well, I don’t disagree with that.” He fell silent for several seconds.
No one spoke. No one moved.
Reiko wasn’t sure anyone breathed.
“Armando,” Santino finally said, “help Joey through the garage. We’ll talk around back. You and Luca will stand guard and if he proves ‘dumber than shit’, we’ll dump his corpse in the city sewer for laughs.”
Reiko watched, uncertain and minorly uncomfortable, as Joey lowered his arms and allowed Armando to maneuver him appropriately.
When they were out of sight, Santino relaxed his grip of her and turned around. “You can go back and wait in the house if you’d prefer,” he said. “This might take a minute. But in case Joey’s got good reason, I need to hear him out.”
She nodded her understanding. The whole idea of packing up her apartment had been sudden to start, so delaying it another half hour or so wasn’t itself upsetting.
She dropped her gaze for a moment to where their loosely linked hands hovered between them.
“I think … I would rather stay with you.” She looked up again, tightened her grip, and finished the thought.
“And you should consider locking your gate if you’re worried about traitors. ”
His lips lifted, though there was something off about the grin, and he dug out his phone as he pulled her to walk with him back up the steps they’d only half climbed down. “Funny thing about that. The gate has guards and everything.” He swept his thumb over the screen and put the device to his ear.
Reiko attempted to smile a silent ‘thank you’ to Luca for getting the door, but as always, he kept his gaze averted.
“When I tell you to lockdown the property, that doesn’t mean you take the opportunity to grope every asshole looking to come talk to me,” Santino barked into the phone.
“It means you fucking lock. It. Down. So that I can step out my front door without worrying about surprise visitors rushing up at me. What’s so hard about that? ”
His lecture paused for a few moments, presumably while whomever he spoke to defended their choices, but their movement continued at a calm-but-steady pace. And it occurred to Reiko she had only seen the back of the property from the veranda attached to Santino’s—their—bedroom.
He really did need to give her a proper tour.
Santino clicked his tongue in the way he did when he disapproved of what he was hearing.
“Put Gio on.” His next pause was shorter.
“You’re in charge for the rest of the shift.
The next person you let through those gates without my say-so is the one who gets you all a one-way trip to the bottom of the Mississippi. Fucking remember that.”
They came to a full stop on the inside of the glass patio doors. Reiko could see Armando pushing Joey into a deck chair off to the side.
Santino shoved his phone away and exhaled harshly, then cracked his neck.
Thoughtlessly, she threaded her fingers through his and reached around to rest her free hand over his chest. “I know they shouldn’t have let him in. But maybe he’s not like Nico. Maybe he’s here with something important to say, and you’ll be grateful he got through.”
Santino flexed his fist around her smaller hand and bent sideways, kissing her temple. “Maybe,” he rumbled. “You sure you wanna be part of this, either way?”
She drew a steadying breath. “I’m sure. Eyes wide open.”