52. Niccolò
52
NICCOLò
T he three of us take a seat at the desk. I roll a chair over to sit next to Isabella while Enzo sits on the other side. He continues to stare at us, one elbow propped on the armrest, with his chin resting in his hand.
That fucker is strong as hell. He might not have the overly muscular stature as some of their guards, but there’s a reason Enzo is an underboss, and it’s not just because he’s Matteo’s brother. The dude is deadly, and I’m really fucking glad I didn’t have to go at it with him because I think we both would’ve done some irrevocable damage to each other.
“So?” Enzo says, waiting for us to explain.
“Don’t blame Isabella for any of this. I was the one who asked her to keep us a secret from you guys.”
“He’s lying,” she interjects. “I’ve been resistant to tell you and Teo because I knew how you’d react.”
“How we’d react?” Enzo says as if shocked by that statement. “You act like we’re unreasonable.”
“I’m sorry, were you in lalaland just a few minutes ago when you nearly killed Nicco?”
“Nope, I was present for that,” Enzo states, as if my life is so damn meaningless. Offensive, but I’d probably feel the same way if I was in his shoes.
Isabella is glaring at Enzo now, and he looks at her like he’s done nothing to receive that end of the stick from her. “What? I obviously didn’t kill him,” he says, pointing at me. “He’s perfectly fine. Right, Nicco ?”
“Perfectly,” I say in agreement, which, for the most part, I am. There’s a slight kink in my neck, but I’ll work that out later.
“See, stop being so dramatic, Izzy.”
“Enzo, you almost snapped his neck.”
“You want to know what’s crazy?” he says, ignoring his sister and bringing his attention to me. “You didn’t fight back once. Not even a little fucking bit. You realize I was going to kill you until Izzy went and declared her love for you and all that shit, right?”
“Oh, I know. With the amount of pressure you were putting on the back of my neck, I’m surprised you didn’t.”
“So why didn’t you fight back?” Enzo asks.
I give him a loose shrug because the answer isn’t hard. It’s obvious, actually. “If it was my time to go, then there’s no point in fighting that.”
“You’re putting your faith in fate now?” he mocks.
“I’m putting my faith in Isabella and I.”
Enzo narrows his gaze on mine. “So you knew she’d save your ass?”
“What I know is me and Isabella are fucking endgame, and I know as her brother you wouldn’t do something that would destroy her.”
Enzo’s quiet for a moment as he considers my words. “So you did know she would save your ass.”
I chuckle softly. “I wasn’t absolutely sure. I was just hoping.”
Isabella smacks the back of her hand across my chest. “You were hoping ? That was your plan? What the hell were you going to do if Enzo hadn’t cared about what I said? What if I panicked, froze, and didn’t say anything at all? Nicco, that was a terrible plan.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” I give her a cocky smirk, and she shakes her head.
“I cannot believe you,” she mutters.
“I can’t either. I thought I was unhinged, but you’re a damn idiot for putting your life in my sister’s hands.”
“Hey!” Isabella says, whipping her gaze to her brother.
“Look, I don’t think you understand just how close you were to losing your man,” Enzo says.
She gives her brother a scoff, and I’m glad we can all find some humor in my near-death experience. Maybe this is exactly what Isabella needed to finally put our relationship out there.
“How did you even get in here? I locked the door.”
Enzo smirks. “You do realize I was the one responsible for setting up the security system here, right? I have a master key that gets me through every single door in this place.”
Isabella’s face blanches.
“Yeah, didn’t really think that one through now, did you?”
She scoffs. “No need to be an asshole. Jeez. What, is Teo rubbing off on you that much?”
“Excuse me? I take great offense to that, but I’ll choose to ignore it because he actually hasn’t been that terrible lately. I’m telling you that Lux has brought out a whole new side to him. For the most part, at least.” He pauses for a second as if to consider that. “Okay, maybe only sometimes.”
“So you’re not going to tell him about me and Nicco?”
Enzo lets out a sigh and mutters, “I knew you were going to ask me that.”
“Please, Enzo,” she begs.
“We actually need to talk about that,” he says.
Shit, here we go.
“What do you think you’re doing, Izzy? If Teo had found you in here with him instead of me, you know his ass would’ve been put in a body bag before you even had a chance to push him off you.”
Well, damn.
“I know, which is exactly why Teo cannot know about me and Nicco.”
“So, what… you expect me to keep this secret from him forever?” The shock in Enzo’s voice is prominent.
“No,” Isabella hurries out. “No, I just need you to keep it to yourself for a little bit.”
Enzo tilts his head, stretching it toward one shoulder before tilting it to the next, the stress of what Isabella is asking him to do clearly getting to him. “This is such a bad idea,” he mumbles.
I look over at Isabella, who’s on the edge of her seat now, her hopeful eyes lighting up.
Sliding his gaze to mine, he says, “The only reason I’m going along with this is because of my sister.”
“Understandable,” I say.
“She quite literally saved your fucking ass tonight. I can tell she cares about you.”
“ Love ,” Isabella says. “I love him, Enzo.”
“Yeah, whatever… love ,” he says, brushing her off, and it nearly makes me laugh at how deterred he is from the word.
“I’m only going to say this once, Nicco. I don’t know what happened between you and my sister a few years ago, but I know whatever it was, hurt her. Now I know Izzy isn’t an idiot, so since she’s taken you back, that must mean you had a damn good reason for doing what you did.”
He pauses for a moment as if he’s thinking about the next words to come out of his mouth. “But if you hurt her again, she won’t be able to save you like she did today. I’ll make sure I fucking end you before you even have time to realize it.”
“I would expect nothing less,” I say, giving Enzo a nod. “I never plan on losing your sister. Not again.”
Enzo slides his gaze back to Isabella and says, “This goes against everything I’ve been raised to do. Teo will not be happy when he finds out about this, and to be honest, I’m not exactly thrilled about it either.”
She goes to speak, but he beats her to it, continuing by saying, “But I see it.” He looks at me before looking back at his sister. “I see the feelings that you have for each other, and I’m not going to stand in the way of that. You deserve to be happy, Izzy.”
“He makes me happy. I promise. When I lost him, I lost a part of my heart, and now that he’s back, I’m finally starting to feel whole again.”
“But so help me, if I find out he had anything to do with our parents?—”
“I didn’t,” I interject, my blood boiling at the accusation. “I would never do something like that to the woman I love.”
Enzo studies me as if he’s trying to find a sign that I’m lying.
“I’m telling you the truth,” I say. “You can try to find the lie within me, but I promise you won’t find it.”
Silence fills the air between us before Isabella says, “So, just to confirm, you won’t tell Teo, right?”
Enzo runs a hand over his face before letting out a long sigh. “No, but listen,” he says, pointing his finger at his sister, “I’m not going to tell him only because you need to. You need to be honest with him.”
“I know I do, and I will. I fully planned on doing so, I just needed to have some time with Nicco before doing all of that. You know… figure out exactly what we’re doing and where we stand with each other.”
Enzo glances between the two of us and says, “Yeah, well, I think you both know where the other one stands. The question now is, what’re you going to do about it?”
Isabella and I exchange a look. “Honestly, I don’t have a plan,” she says to Enzo. “I thought I would have more time to figure out what I will do, but now that I have not only Lux keeping a secret from Teo but you too, I just… I don’t know, but I know I’m running out of time, so I promise I’ll have a plan soon.”