Chapter 13 Zarina
ZARINA
“You know I catered in, right?” Tamayo leans against the metal prep table with her arms crossed, sleeves pushed up to show off her tattoos.
She let me choose her outfit this morning, and I feel like I played myself.
The olive-green sweater rumpled over a soft, collared shirt with the front tucked into a pair of light-wash jeans screams soft-boi-friend, and I have to continuously remind myself we’re surrounded by children.
Except right now. In the kitchen of Alphabet House.
The kids are entertaining themselves while the caterers set up in the dining hall and Rita supervises.
Darius was literally dragged away by three teenagers the moment he entered the building to do god knows what, and Pat made a point of challenging the reigning champion to a round of Mortal Kombat.
Which left us alone in the kitchen.
I swallow down my impulses and ignore Tamayo as I wipe the chopped basil off the sides of my knife into the filling for my blueberry, basil, goat cheese pies.
It’s bougie, but it’s my favorite Thanksgiving dessert, and I used to make it every year with my grandmother.
After she passed, I made it alone while the family cooks bustled around the kitchen.
Mother refused to do anything that made her seem like more of a traditional woman, and Father was not to be trusted near a stove. And I wanted Nona’s pie.
I pop a blueberry in my mouth. “The caterers don’t have Nona’s recipe.”
“She taught you?” Tamayo closes the small distance between us, pressing her chest to my back but keeping her hands in her pockets.
I nod, juicing a couple lemons. “She used to make the whole meal. Refused to let the staff work on Thanksgiving.”
“And you helped.”
I half-smile. “With the pie.”
“Not the other stuff?”
I wrinkle my nose. “Too much work.”
She chuckles and presses a kiss to my temple. “When did she die?”
“I was twelve.” I pour the filling onto the waiting crusts.
Tamayo rests her hands on my hips and her chin on my shoulder. “Your mother doesn’t seem like the type to carry that tradition.”
“You’d be right.” I spoon the last of the bowl into the third crust. Tamayo watches as I fold the edges of the crust over on each pie and then brush them with egg wash.
It’s domestic, like we’re cooking together on a Tuesday after a long day at the office.
Except the office is gun smuggling and drug running and money laundering.
And a long day includes more violence and cleanup than expected.
I set the pastry brush and bowl in the sink, and before I can do it myself, Tamayo’s touch is gone and she’s loading the baking sheets into the preheated oven. And now, I’m the one leaning against the prep table with my arms crossed and admiring her. Definitely played myself with that outfit.
She closes the oven and grabs the magnetic timer off the fridge. “How long?”
“Twenty-eight minutes.”
She glances up like she heard something in my voice and frowns at me. “Princess. Are you checking me out right now?”
“Me? Checking you out?” I press a hand to my chest and gape in mock insult. “Absolutely not.”
Tamayo hangs the timer back on the fridge, the numbers counting down, and stalks across the large kitchen. Normally, she’d be in dark colors with clean lines and quiet power, and I’d feel the full force of it wash over me with the focus of her attention. But today, she’s touchable.
She rests her hands on either side of me, and I drag mine up her chest and around her neck. My fingers play with her hair. “Thanks for helping me.”
“No problem.” Her thumbs brush over the waistband of my skirt, my sweater tucked in and secured by a belt.
She presses forward until our hips are flush, her leg between mine and forcing my knee to poke out of the slit of my skirt to accommodate.
I stare into her eyes, linger on the mole that lives under the left.
She stares back at me so intensely, it feels as if the brown of her irises widen larger and rounder, ready to devour me.
We haven’t moved, are hardly touching, and yet my breath is already short.
“Twenty-eight minutes,” she murmurs, her voice low. “What could we do in twenty-eight minutes?”
I drop my fingers under the collar of her shirt and scratch back up to her scalp. “Whatever could you mean?” I tease.
She grins wolfishly. “I love it when you play innocent.”
“Why’s that?” My voice is more breath than sound, my chin lifting to wait less than an inch from her lips.
Tamayo doesn’t take the bait. Instead, her hand slips off the table, away from my hips, to lift my knee out of the slit. “It makes me the rogue, come to steal the princess’s virtue.”
“You can’t steal what was never there.”
She pouts, honest-to-god pouts, and I almost laugh with how out of place it looks on her face. “Don’t ruin my fun.”
I do laugh then. Head thrown back and sound spilling out loud enough to bounce off the walls. I shake my head, catching her smile so big that her eyes nearly disappear with the force of it. “Fine,” I concede. “Corrupt me, rogue.”
“With pleasure.” She’s still smiling with all her teeth when she kisses me, hooking my leg around her waist and pulling me as close as possible.
I dig my nails into the knobs of her spine as she slides her hand up my thigh.
I had tights on earlier, but Tamayo requested I take them off before we left.
Apparently, she had the intention of sliding her hand under my panties to grip my ass all along. I slip my tongue into her mouth to trace the edges of her own. She claws at my sweater to pull it out from where it’s tucked, allowing her access to the skin underneath.
“For fuck’s sake,” a voice sighs.
My leg drops from Tamayo’s waist, her hand from my ass, and we both pull back from the kiss to find the interrupter at the door.
Rita covers her eyes, her head shaking. “This is a family function. Do you two have no shame?”
“Nope.” Tamayo brushes my hair back from my face and strokes once across the skin of my ribs before extracting her other hand. She turns to face Rita, her torso hiding mine. “What’s up?”
Rita scoffs. “‘What’s up?’ she asks. Totally normal, like I didn’t just interrupt god knows what.”
I straighten, tucking my sweater back into my skirt and belt. My panties are wet, the feeling uncomfortable and annoying without an accompanying orgasm to make it worthwhile.
Tamayo chuckles, hands in her pockets. “And you interrupted us for what, exactly?”
Rita spreads her fingers to peek through. “Oh good, you’re decent.”
“Rita,” Tamayo sighs.
“Zarina”—Rita ignores her—“your father’s here.”
Both Tamayo and I tense. I’m standing with half my sweater re-tucked and the other half still hanging free and all the muscles in my body flooding with fight-or-flight. Only I’m frozen. Unable to move.
“Riccardo Gallo is here.” It sounds like Tamayo grinds the words between her teeth as she says them.
“Yes, in the atrium,” Rita confirms.
“And he knows we’re here,” I say.
“It seems so.”
“How?” I mutter, not expecting an answer.
Tamayo scrapes the back of her neck in a sheepish gesture. “The mediation—I mentioned our plans. Jimmy or…” She doesn’t say their names, but she doesn’t have to. “They could have told him.”
The meeting I skipped. And good thing, considering Tamayo’s summary of it—long and pointless.
Either way, Father’s here, asking to see me.
The last time I saw him was the engagement party, when I was walking away from an attempted kidnapping he helped facilitate.
He might have looked at me with regret and a tinge of fear, but he didn’t stop it. He hasn’t stopped any of this.
“Is anyone with him?” I ask.
Rita’s gaze volleys between me and Tamayo, like she’s trying to put the pieces of our reaction together. “He has security—white, bald guy with glasses.”
His personal guard, G. I frown at Tamayo’s back, seeing the threads of her sweater in microscopic detail until she turns. She cups my chin and raises my gaze to meet hers.
“I can grab Darius, we can ask him to leave,” Rita offers. I don’t see her face, but her voice is gentle and apologetic. She doesn’t know what’s going on, but she’s reading the room. Reading us.
“It’s up to you, princess,” Tamayo murmurs.
My brow furrows. Up to me. Is it? I don’t know.
If I turn him away, I won’t know why he came here.
His face as I strode out of the party flashes in front of me again.
Before this merger, before our family was in danger, my father and I were more in sync.
Mother pulled our strings like a master puppeteer, but we were on board with each plan, willing to execute it to her vision.
Until he helped her wrap the strings around my neck and squeeze.
What could he have come here to say?
I have to find out. If it were Mother, I would turn her away. But Father, despite his fuckups and lack of a backbone, is not the one pulling the strings. Not really.
“I’ll see him.” I say it loud enough for Rita to hear, my voice steady. “Keep him in the atrium. Pat and I will meet him there.”
“It’s not very private,” Rita says.
“All the better.”
“All right, then. He’ll be there when you’re ready.”
“Thanks, Rita,” Tamayo calls without looking. Rita doesn’t say anything more as she exits the kitchen, the door swinging shut behind her. Tamayo holds my gaze, thumb stroking my jaw. “You’re sure?”
I wrap my fingers around her wrist and nod.
She nods back, leaning forward to press a kiss to my forehead. “Darius and I will be in the hallway just in case.”
“Thanks.” I let loose a long breath.
She pulls back to look at me again. “Do you need anything?”
I swallow hard, wanting to ask but not wanting to, either. A mafia don’s daughter shouldn’t need it.
“Princess,” Tamayo prompts with quiet reassurance.
I grimace, shame pulling at my gut. “A hug?”
“Of course.” She slides her arms around me without hesitation, holding me tight to her chest with her chin resting on my hair.
My hands are trapped between us, my cheek pressed against the soft cashmere of her sweater.
I pull in a deep breath and sink into the weight of her embrace as I build up metaphorical steel to gird my spine.
I don’t think I’ve ever asked for this before—support.
Not for myself, at least. I’ve struck deals, asked for sweeteners, demanded entrance, but never let myself ask for something as simple as a hug to ground me before a difficult moment.
And I’ve never had anyone to ask before, either.
I let that realization fall to the back of my mind. There’s no time for it right now.
“Okay.” I lean back, and Tamayo loosens her grip. “I’m ready.”
Tamayo brushes my hair over my shoulder before releasing me. “I’ll grab Darius.”
“Meet you there.” I double-check my sweater’s fully tucked, my hair falling in manicured waves, my makeup un-smeared.
Tamayo confirms I look presentable before she strides out of the kitchen.
Before I follow, I grab the timer off the fridge.
Father won’t ruin Nona’s pies—plus, it gives me an out if I need it.