48. Chapter 48
48
Layla
“What next?”
“We wait.” He says it so calmly and casually that I swear my eyes have just bugged out my head.
“Wait!” I exclaim, fully aware of how shrill my voice is. “Are you insane? I’ve just found out my parents were some sort of government agents, that they were assassinated, that your mother was the third person in the crash. That I’m wanted dead, and you want me to wait.”
I knew it would hurt going back over my parents’ shit, but I did not think it would lead me to where I am right now, hurtling towards a mental fucking breakdown.
Another one.
“I’m sorry but no, I’m not just going to wait .” I start to climb off the desk, but he tries to stop me, so I just spin around, knocking everything I hit with my legs onto the floor in the process. I storm into the hallway, walk to the hidden door on the side, yanking it open and pull out my jacket and trainers.
He follows me. “Where are you going, sunshine?”
“I don’t know.” I wrestle with my jacket as I try to get it on.
“You can’t leave.”
“Just watch me,” I say, anger coursing through my system. I wrestle with the arms of my coat. “Oh, fuck off.” I throw the coat on the floor and open the front door to his apartment.
“Layla.” Luca is next to me in a flash, shutting the door, holding it in place. “You can’t leave.”
“Your mother died in the same crash as my parents, Luca. Your uncle—how are you holding it together?” My voice quavers.
“I just have a better poker face.”
“Can we go for a drive or something? I just want to sit somewhere quiet. It’s too loud, there’s too many people. My brain-”
“Somewhere quiet?” he asks, and I nod. “Wait here.”
He returns a few minutes later with his keys. “Come on,” he says, holding his hand out to me.
As we step into the lift, he presses the button for the roof.
“Wait, I thought we were going for a drive?”
“We can’t leave the building. I need to put things in place, we aren’t safe just roaming the streets without security.”
“You need to plan a war?”
His jaw clenches, he doesn’t answer.
We’re quiet as we ascend one floor to the roof, the doors open straight out onto a roof garden.
“Wow.” I whisper as I take in the beautifully decorated terrace. Wood decking runs along most of it, the space split into zones, one corner with a large wooden awning, open to the elements, but wrapped in fairy lights that twinkle like the stars that are missing in the overcast night.
I follow the pathway towards the awning, Luca beside me, touching the large leaves of the plants that hug either side of the trail. I ground myself, feeling the moisture on the leaves, how the surface feels against the tips of my fingers, smooth and rubbery. Damp from either a light rain or someone having tended to the terrace.
“It’s beautiful,” I say. I stop in the awning and take in the fairy lights. “Is this a communal area?”
“Used to be, it’s mine now.”
Of course it is.
I smile and then sit down on the huge dome swing chair that hangs beneath the awning.
He sits next to me, lifting his arm and I snuggle into his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart, smelling the amber, vanilla, and sandalwood smell that I love so much.
The chair rocks softly back and forth with the weight of our bodies.
I take a breath and try to process my thoughts.
I calm my heart.
I calm my head.
He says nothing. But his warmth and steadiness radiate into me, the soft caress of his fingertips run up and down my arm. He swirls a pattern on the top of my hand before running back up. Rinse and repeat.
The silence stretches.
“What’s going to happen?” I ask. I tip my head up to see the profile of his beautiful face.
Half his face is in the shadow, half in light.
He’s ruthless, cunning, dangerous, but he’s also caring, protective, honest, and kind. He just doesn’t show the light side of him to many other people.
He’s built an empire; he’s built a family. His own fucked up family, but it’s a family all the same.
Roman, Isla, Henry, and the rest of his inner circle, they would all die for him.
“I can plan all night, Layla, but I can’t sit here and tell you what’s going to happen next, because I don’t know. What I do know is I will die before anything happens to you.” He leans down and places a kiss on my forehead. I close my eyes. “I’m sorry.”
I shift and the chair swings. “I don’t think you’re really to blame for this one.”
“Maybe not, but I could have stayed away.”
“No. No you couldn’t. Will you tell me about her? Your mum.”
A wistful smile spreads across his face, a longing expression fills his eyes. “She was bold and brave. That fire in you, she had it too.”
“I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say, grinning, and he pinches my side making me squirm against him.
“John and she were never close as kids. Back then, women were kept out of business. But as I got older and we were brought closer to the Covenant's operations, she started to naturally get closer too. John was never supposed to take the seat, it was supposed to be my father. But he was killed, so John inherited it and took over from my grandfather. When that happened, we were moved into John’s house for protection. Once you become a leader the target on your back gets bigger.”
“So, you grew up with Levi?”
“I did, we used to be close. Really close. Inseparable actually. But he started seeing me as a threat, I was next in line. Not him. When he was old enough to realise that, everything became a competition. And then when I was eight, Mum became pregnant.
“I think that’s why John brought us in closer. I had no father figure. We may not be the most traditional family, but we have values, and family is everything. Mum, unfortunately, fell in love with the wrong man and ended up carrying the baby of the leader of the biggest Russian arms dealer in London.”
“Oh, blimey.”
He lets out a laugh. “Such a way with words. And yes, oh, blimey. I always assumed her death was something to do with the Russians. I personally saw it as an opportunity, as did Mum, an opportunity to have allies outside the families. But the Covenant thought allies were not something you publicly had. We didn’t want a piece of the weapons trade.”
“And you said it was a girl?”
“She would have been 24 this year.”
“Why do you think your mum did it?”
“Fucked a Russian?”
“No, you idiot.” I whack his arm. “Worked with my parents.”
“I can only imagine it was something to do with protecting herself, me, the baby, and maybe the fucking Russian. Who knows.”
“What happened to the Russian?”
“Disappeared.”
“Which is code for killed.”
“See, sunshine, you do understand my world.”
“I’m sure you said something once about sarcasm and it being the lowest form of humour.”
“It does sound like something I would say.”
“Hmm.”
He kicks forward, and the chair starts rocking again.
“I like it up here,” I say.
“This is my favourite spot.”
I look up at him. “You know, I think most mafia crime lords have a swinging egg chair surrounded by fairy lights.”
“My life is crazy, full of scheming and death. Always looking over your shoulder, always thinking about the what ifs . Even the most fucked-up people need a place they can sit with their own messed-up thoughts.”
“Are you happy?”
He lets the question hang in the silence that stretches between us.
Finally, he says, “I’ve spent my life in darkness, and then I found you. And you are everything that I wasn’t looking for, and everything I was missing. You have this amazing fire in you, and I want to burn in your flames until there’s nothing but light left.”
I sit up and position myself so that my hands rest on his chest, and I look up at him, both our bodies slouched down in the chair.
“Do you know something, Luca Knight?” My eyes burn into his. “You say you’re surrounded by darkness, but you’re not. Roman, Henry, Emily, Emma, James, even fucking Isla. They all care about you. They will do anything for you, follow you anywhere.” The fairy lights twinkle in the darkness of his eyes. “You hide behind the bad, because it makes it easier, it’s the persona you want to portray. But you’re not a bad person.”
“Sunshine, you really do have me on some pedestal. I—”
“Oh, you make bad decisions, for sure. Your profession could be something slightly more legal.” He grins. “But you protect the ones you love; you fight for what you believe in. You do anything for your family. You sir are a good person.”
“My mission’s complete, you’re officially brainwashed.”
“Shut up.” I whack his chest. “I just see through the web of deceit. You’re an arsehole, but you’re my arsehole.”
“You know calling me an arsehole really won’t get me to fuck you.”
I laugh and rest my head on my hands, his chest rumbling as he laughs too.
“Aren’t you tired of it? The bad decisions, the plotting, the looking over your shoulder, the responsibility of it all. Aren’t you tired of it?”
“It’s all I’ve ever known.”
“But does it have to be?”
His phone starts vibrating in his pocket and I push off his chest, giving him the space he needs to answer it. I want nothing more than to launch the phone over the side of the building.
“Anything?” He says into the phone as he shifts underneath me, and I crawl off to let him stand. He begins to pace.
“I’m coming.” He puts the phone back and takes a deep breath.
“Quiet time over?”
“Quiet time’s over. Come.”
“Can I stay here for a bit? It’s so peaceful.”
His lips turn down and I already know the answer. “No, sunshine.”
I shut my eyes, letting the last beats of calm wash over me, basking in the light from the fairy lights, enjoying the cool breeze on my skin.
The calm before the storm.