23. Dominic
23
DOMINIC
I drop my interrogation for now, and we finish up eating mostly in silence, except for Ariana complimenting the food. She chose all the high-protein elements of the spread—ate through a man-sized beef tenderloin and then picked out all the chicken in some Thai green curry. This little one is eating for strength.
“I should’ve opened some wine for us,” I say, trying to shrink the quiet while planning my next move.
“I don’t drink, not when I’m—” She breaks off and shrugs. “Thank you for the offer all the same.”
Not when I’m… pregnant? On the run? On a job?
“An Italian who doesn’t drink wine?” I say with a chuckle, ignoring her slip of the tongue.
“Not when I’m held captive,” she says, and her gaze locks with mine, her brow cocked in a dare.
“Captive is a strong word.” I can show her what captive really means if she wants. The guards did hose down those basement cages, and they’re ready for fresh occupants.
“Maybe, but I don’t want to get into a situation where I’m not fully there, if you know what I mean.”
“Fair enough.” I stand and take her empty plate. She stands, too. “No, I’ll do it. You stay put.”
She sits again and helps instead by closing the various containers. We’ve made a dent in the food, but there’s enough left over for another day. She sits and watches me as I pack everything away and put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher.
“Don’t you have help here? This house, the estate, looks like it needs a team of at least ten people full-time to run it.”
“Portia’s coming tomorrow.” Il Consiglio works on a need-to-know basis, and as much as Ariana could be family and is Mafia in some way or another, she’s still an unknown entity and has already seen too much. I go over to the side counter where Portia left several bags of clothes and other things for her. “She brought this for you earlier.”
I put the bags on the counter, and she peeks inside.
“Oh… Thank you. It’s everything I need. It’s more than I need—” She closes the bags with a sigh. “Thank you for this. It wasn’t necessary.”
“You were running around in a hospital gown, sweetheart. I think it was necessary.” I gave Portia carte blanche to buy as she saw fit; she’s after all a mom with a daughter, and knows what a woman like Ariana would need. “And you’re welcome. It’s nothing really.”
The bags are from a big supermarket chain, not where I’d shop for myself, my sister, or a wife, and definitely not where Matteo and Steph shopped for Tasha and Gigi, but it’s better than nothing. I’d hate for Ariana to feel uncomfortable here because she’s got nothing decent to wear.
The way Matteo plucked Tasha out of the pool at her own home and had her standing there in front of us in only her skimpy bikini still gives me the ick. Then again, my brother doesn’t have first-hand knowledge of experiencing something in someone else’s shoes. To each their own. Matteo has his own cross to bear. “How’re you feeling?”
“Still tired, but I won’t be able to sleep now. Not with the nap I had.”
Neither would I. Not with the day I had. I haven’t had time to digest this afternoon’s fuckup yet, and I loathe going to Matteo with a problem for which I don’t have a ready solution at hand.
“Let’s watch a movie?” I hesitate. Why do I even plan to toy with this woman? “Unless you want to go to your room for the evening.”
“No. Not yet. A movie would be great. I’ve…I’ve spent too much time alone.”
With a nod and a weight to my heart, I guide her to the Don’s in-home theatre. She’s playing into my hand. Worst is, when we’re all normal around each other, it’s hard to remember that nothing about this situation is normal and she recently went through a traumatic experience. I’ve been trained to become numb to it all, sticking to logic and pushing emotions away, solely focusing on what needs to happen next.
I unlock the door with my phone, feeling her gaze on me, taking notes. As soon as the door swooshes open, the dreamy scent of aged leather spills out. I switch on the light, and she giggles as she walks inside.
“Oh my God. I’ve seen these, but I’ve never been in one.”
“No?” It’s silly, but seeing her face light up is like a rubber band snap to my heart. It stings, but in a good way. As if there’s life here, after all.
“No…I mean, in Italy? Come on. Everything is so much smaller there.” She walks deeper into the room, which isn’t in the basement like these home cinemas usually are. This room has no outside windows, so it turned out ideal for this. “Real leather, too! I love the smell. You know, in Italy, we see all these things in America on TV, everything so big and bulky and just?—”
She sweeps a hand over the backrest of the closest recliner and looks up at me. And looks. And then looks some more, with a bit of a swallow. A lick of her lip as she registers the words that just tumbled out of her mouth.
My eyes are up here, sweetheart.
Fuck. I bite down on my jaw to keep a straight face, because there it is: that sugar-sweet blush again. I drop my gaze to my feet because right now, a hundred deliciously dirty things I want to do to her are fighting for a place in line. The fantasy is like a fucking to-do list, one I don’t mind adding to as we get to know each other.
I want to start by taking those stray strands and tucking them behind her ear, so slowly, she’ll hear the individual hairs slip into place.
Big and bulky . Her words, not mine. I’m way taller than your average Italian. The muscle is what you get when you pump weights like a man obsessed for decades. Ever since Alex dragged me to the side, demanding ‘ When are you going to stop being a fucking walkover and stand up to him? You have the height, Nicky, build the fucking muscle to take him out. Become the man that fucking stands up to him.’
So I did. Except I never stood up to him.
I clear my throat. “Grab a seat, and we’ll see what’s new. We can watch something in Italian if you like?”
“No, it’s fine,” she says with a weak smile as she slides into one of the front-row seats. “How do you think I got this fluent in English?”
“By watching TV?”
“And listening to radio, songs, and so on, constantly.”
“This is how I kept my Italian going. When my mom passed away, we spoke it less and less at home, especially between my brothers as we all had school in English.”
I switch on the TV and open Netflix. At a glance, it gives my taste away.
“Anime?” she says, and there’s that smile again. “I didn’t take you for a cartoon guy.”
“Come on, it’s anime, not cartoons. What did you take me for?”
“I don’t know… I’ve never seen a man’s streaming profile like this before.”
Netflix and chill is clearly not high on her dating-do list.
“What’s yours like?” I ask, wondering if it is all romcoms and home reno stuff.
“Thrillers and suspense. True crime. Nat Geo channel, that type of stuff.”
“No romance,” I tease.
“I don’t believe in that shit.”
“No?” I don’t have the luxury to believe in that shit , as she so aptly phrases it.
“My mom’s life cured me.”
So did mine. But I don’t say that. Instead, I press play on a new release that seems innocent enough. An action movie about making action movies. “This is good?”
“It’s perfect.”
I close the door and switch off the lights. Now we’re huddled in a dark room with the only light coming from the massive TV screen on the far wall. It’s as close to a real cinema you’re going to get without leaving home. I’d kill for a glass of wine now—I suppose I shouldn’t say this lightly—but Ariana isn’t the only one who wants to be ‘all there.’
As I sit down, I up the volume a notch and settle in my seat, pushing the control so the footrest is up and I can lean back. She’s already done the same with her chair, and observing her trying to figure it out was like watching a kid in a candy store. Everything is new to her. This girl clearly grew up poor, what with her dad dead and her ending up in some Randazzo henchman’s house. And also with Franco. I bet that didn’t end well for her, either.
With a sigh, I kick off my shoes, and in the most innocent way possible, ruck up my pants a few inches. Just enough for her to see the ankle holster with my concealed carry pistol.
And then I get busy with the hard work of feigning sleep.
Let the fun and games begin.