Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
By the time I got home last night, it was just past three am.
When I checked in on Frankie, she was asleep.
Which is why I made myself go to my own apartment and stay there.
I wanted her to sleep without having me wake her up.
Now, seeing how tired she looks, I wish I would have climbed into her bed.
“Why didn’t you sleep well?” I ask. She’s currently seated on the passenger side of my car.
“I don’t know.” Frankie looks away from me. She’s lying. She knows.
“Frankie? Why didn’t you sleep well?” I repeat.
“Because you weren’t in bed with me, okay? Fine, I’m a needy, whiny girlfriend and it appears I need you in my bed from now on so I can sleep. Happy?” she snaps at me.
I smile. “Insanely happy.” I pick up her hand and bring it to my mouth.
“If it makes you feel better, I slept like shit without you too.” I fucking like that she needs me.
I wish it wasn’t so hard for her to admit that, though.
I get it, I think. She wants to be independent, doesn’t want to rely on someone else.
The thing is, I really fucking want her to rely on me. I’ve never given her a reason to think she couldn’t. I’ve always done everything I can to help her whenever she’s in trouble. That won’t stop.
Baby steps, I remind myself. I just need to take baby steps and not rush this.
“Why didn’t you just come in? You seem to have a key to my apartment, which I would love to know how you got that, by the way.”
“I have a key to everyone’s house, babe. I did come in. You were asleep so I left you, thinking you needed the rest.”
“Emilio, how long did you watch me sleep?” Frankie asks.
“About ten minutes.”
“Creep.” She laughs.
When I pull up to the curb out front of the diner, I turn to her. “Wait for me to open your door.”
Frankie rolls her eyes. “I know the drill.”
I step out of the car and immediately search up and down the street before I make my way around to her side. Scanning left and right again, I then open the door and hold out a hand to her. Which she doesn’t take.
“We can’t be showing any kind of PDA in public, Emilio. My father has eyes all over this city.”
“Fine, but when we get back to your apartment, I’m going to make up for all this missed time touching you,” I promise her.
“Deal.” She smiles.
I pick a booth at the rear, sitting with my back to the wall and my eyes on the door.
Frankie smirks as she sits across from me. “Paranoid much?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You do.”
“Fine, I don’t like being out with you without security.”
“No one is going to come after me. You do know my father owns this city, right?” she says.
“Being cocky gets people killed, Frankie.”
“Maybe, but I’m also here with you, and no one is going to protect me against the bogeyman like you always do.”
She’s right. I’d never let anything happen to her.
“What do you feel like eating?” I choose to change the subject and pick up the menu.
“You,” Frankie whispers. “But I’ll settle for waffles with strawberries and cream.”
“Fuck, babe, you can’t say shit like that to me. Now my dick’s harder than it already was.”
“Pretty sure your dick is always hard, Emilio. You should probably get that checked out. Could be a health thing.”
“It’s having a hot-as-fuck girlfriend thing,” I tell her.
“Thanks.” Frankie smiles widely.
A waitress comes by our table. “Morning. What can I get y’all?” she asks.
“I’ll have a coffee, black, and chicken and waffles. She’ll have a chocolate milkshake and waffles with strawberries and cream. Thanks.” I hand the girl the menu I was holding, then snatch Frankie’s from her and hand it over as well.
The waitress turns to Frankie. “Is that what you want?”
Frankie smiles at her. “Oh, I’m going to make him tip you big. I like you. Yes, thank you. He knows me too well.”
“Right, I’ll get your order in. Your drinks will be right out.” Without a second look at me, the waitress turns and walks away.
“I would be careful about your food. I think she might spit in it.” Frankie laughs.
“What did I do?”
“You ordered for me, assumed you knew what I wanted,” she says. “It’s the twenty-first century. Us women have voices and can order for ourselves.”
“I’m aware you have a voice, Frankie, but I knew what you wanted. It would be rude if I didn’t order for you,” I tell her.
“Maybe, maybe not.” She shrugs. “So, what’d you get up to last night with my brother?”
“Nothing interesting. He did save me from a bullet, though.”
Frankie blinks at me. She doesn’t say a word, just sits across from me blinking.
“What’s wrong?”
“What do you mean he saved you from a bullet?”
“Some asshole shot at me. Alfie pushed me down before the bullet could hit me.” I keep my voice low.
“I wish I didn’t ask,” Frankie mumbles. “Is my brother okay?”
“Yes,” I tell her. “How’d your lunch with Elias go?”
“He’s annoying,” she groans. “And grouchy.”
“Yeah, he is,” I agree.
The waitress brings out our drinks. She smiles at Frankie as she puts a milkshake in front of her. “I gave you extra chocolate,” she says and then places a mug of coffee in front of me without a word.
I notice that my cup is only three quarters full. I normally wouldn’t tolerate this kind of blatant disrespect. But right now, I’m with Frankie and I don’t care what anyone else is doing.
“How long is Elias here for?” Frankie asks.
“No idea. He turned up yesterday morning. There are some issues with work. We’re trying to sort them out.”
“Are you safe?”
“As safe as houses, babe.” I smirk. “No one is taking me out. I just got the life I’ve been waiting for.”
“What life is that?”
“The one where I get to call Frankie Giuliani my girlfriend.”
“You know, for some big bad cartel prince, you can be really sweet sometimes.”
“I want to talk to your father. About us,” I tell her.
“What? Why would you do that?”
“Because I don’t like lying to people, Frankie, and I really don’t give a fuck what anyone thinks about us being together. If I go and talk to him, he might be reasonable enough to see that we are happening with or without his blessing.”
“It’s without, Emilio. My father is never going to be okay with me dating anyone. Especially you.” She sighs.
“Well, he will have to find a way to live with it. Because we are not going back to where you ignore me and pretend I don’t exist.”
“I never ignored you,” Frankie argues. “I just ignored how you made me feel.”
“Same thing.”
“What happened to let’s just keep this a secret? That secret lasted not even an hour before your family knew about us. My brother knows. My mom knows. Aunt Lailani and Sammie Junior.”
“Also, Uncle Carlo and Aunt Antonia, CJ too,” I tell her.
“Great. Why not just put it on blast on the front pages of the tabloids?” Frankie groans.
“Is it really that bad? For the world to know that you’re dating me? Are you that ashamed?”
“I’m not ashamed of you, Emilio, and you know that. I don’t want to make anyone upset. I don’t want to cause a rift between our families, and I don’t want to be the reason you die.”
“You’d be the best reason I could think of to die, Frankie.”
“That’s not funny.”
“Wasn’t trying to be. He’s going to find out. I’d rather it be from me.”
“Fine, but we’ll go together. He won’t kill you in front of me,” she says.
My lips tilt up at the sides. “I don’t need my girlfriend to be a human shield.”
“Too bad. That’s exactly what I am for you. You know my mom took a bullet for my dad when they were first married and they lived happily ever after.”
“Frankie, I’m only going to say this once. You are never jumping in front of a bullet for me. If you see a gun, you step behind me.”
“And I’m only going to say this once. Actually, that’s a lie.
I feel as if I’m going to be saying this a lot.
You, Emilio Lopez, are not the boss of me and you cannot tell me what I can and can’t do.
If I want to save your pretty ass from a bullet, I will and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. ”
“Eat faster,” I tell her.
“Why?”
“Because I need to get you home so I can fuck the sass right out of your mouth.”
“You’re welcome to try.” Frankie laughs.