Chapter 24
Aubergine.
The second I saw Nicola, it was like everything else around us melted away.
Several hours ago, I said I never wanted to see him again.
But, truthfully, I was really, really fucking happy to see him right now.
His expression changed the second our eyes met. I recognized terror as his gun dipped ever so slightly.
Then relief. It lasted less than a heartbeat before his face settled back into something unreadable.
The same thought repeated in my head. Over and over.
He came. Even though I chewed him out. Even though I said horrible-- but true-- things to him.
Warmth and relief crashed through me, my eyes started to sting.
Then reality followed close behind, because he’d walked straight into a nightmare.
Judging by the way his eyes swept around the room before settling on Lorenzo, he knew it.
Lorenzo Ferraro, strangely enough, had not been rough with me. If anything, he’d been extremely polite. A fantastic conversationalist.
Somehow, that made him worse. I’d expected some sinister movie villain: smirking, cruel and violent.
Instead, he reminded me of somebody’s wealthy grandfather. Elegant suit. Perfect posture. Soft voice.
I had no doubt he could shoot someone between the eyes and calmly sip his tea in the next moment.
The room turned painfully quiet and tense. I caught Nicola’s fingers fidgeting. His eyes kept returning to the exact spot where the barrel of the gun rested against my temple.
Nicola was calculating, trying to solve a problem with no obvious solution.
“I’ll sit,” he finally said. “If you take the gun off her.”
Lorenzo smiled. “Done.”
His attention shifted toward Michael. “But I would appreciate if they left. I’ve always hated crowded rooms.”
Nicola never took his eyes off Lorenzo.
“Outside," he ordered his brother.
Michael hesitated, then nodded to the others. Three men slipped from the room.
The door was left open. Only then, did Nicola move in slow, deliberate steps.
His shoulders rose with one slow breath before he pulled out a metal chair and sat.
Lorenzo lowered the pistol from my head and took a seat across from Nicola. The pressure in my chest eased, just a little.
“Don Moretti.” Lorenzo folded his hands comfortably across his lap, atop his pistol. “I’ve been patient. I gave you very simple terms.” His eyes drifted toward the warehouse door. “And you ignored them.”
“This woman isn’t a Moretti,” Nicola cut in. “She has nothing to do with Family business.”
“I would say some people become Family long before their wedding.” His gaze lingered on Nicola. “Wouldn’t you agree?”
Nicola didn’t answer, but his gaze was burning.
“I haven’t harmed her,” Lorenzo continued pleasantly, and then gave me an approving once-over. “She’s very pretty.”
His gaze flicked toward me before returning to Nicola. ”So? Are you planning on marrying her?”
Nicola’s jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. “You’re getting off topic.”
I felt my body sag a little.
Oh, gee. Thanks, Nicky. Even your mortal enemy got to know I had been friendzoned.
“I want to know who killed my grandson.” Lorenzo tapped an index finger against the square table between them. “Bring me the man responsible, and I’ll consider tonight’s unfortunate misunderstanding and the bodies… settled.”
My stomach turned. People had died here. Just because of me.
“No."
Lorenzo lifted an eyebrow. “No?”
“You need something from me.” Nicola said evenly. “I don’t need anything from you.”
Did he mean… I was expendable? Jesus Christ. He was not going out of his way to win me over, was he?
Lorenzo rested one elbow on the table, studying Nicola like he was embroiled in a chess match. “I disagree.”
“I already know she’s alive,” Nicola said. “So I’ve already recovered the only thing I came here for.”
… Oh. Okay. That was nice. I’d give him a point back for that.
Something shifted in the room, like a power balance moving from one side to the other. Lorenzo stopped smiling.
“Interesting.” His fingers returned to the pistol in his lap. "You’ve really done quite a number on him, haven’t you, bella?”
“Don’t look at her.” Nicola’s voice cut through the room. “Look at me.”
When Lorenzo’s attention moved forward again, his smile fully disappeared.
“I have what you want,” Nicola continued. “I could tell you who killed him. But it would be pointless. I would never give them up to you.”
Lorenzo studied him for several seconds. Then, he laughed just softly. “You surprise me.”
He rose from his chair and walked toward me. The second a silver pocketknife appeared in his hand, every muscle in my body locked up.
Nicola shot out of his chair, metal scraped sharply across the concrete floor.
The knife flashed and I bit back a whimper, squeezing my eyes shut.
The zip ties around my wrist were cut and dropped to the ground.
I kept deathly still, Nicola slowly straightened. His expression shifted from alarm to genuine confusion. That made two of us.
I rubbed over my aching wrists. My hands felt completely numb.
Lorenzo offered me his arm as though he were escorting me at the opera.
“I am sorry, Aubergine.” He said. “I am sure he did not intend for you to find yourself caught between two stubborn old men.”
I stared at the offered arm.
Then, slowly, I took it and he helped me to my feet.
“Don Ferraro,” I heard myself say. “Nicola is middle-aged, not old.”
Internally, I began screaming.
What the fuck are you doing, Aubergine?
Do you want to die?
Lorenzo paused for only a second, then let out a surprised laugh– almost a snort. “Adorable.”
His hand rested lightly against my shoulder as he guided me toward Nicola. Then, with one gentle push, he let me go.
I stumbled forward in my ridiculous stilettos.
Nicola shot forward and caught me.
One arm wrapped firmly around my waist as he positioned my body behind him.
Michael and Gio burst back into the room, weapons raised.
Ferraro’s men answered in kind.
Nobody moved. Nobody spoke. A complete stalemate.
“You should go,” Lorenzo said quietly. When Nicola didn't react, his thick gray eyebrows lifted. “Oh, you still don’t trust me?”
“Should I?” Nicola asked.
The old man smiled. “No.”
Nicola backed us toward the doorway, keeping his gaze fixed on Lorenzo.
Just before we crossed the threshold, he spoke one last time.
“Don Moretti.”
Nicola stopped, but he didn’t turn us around.
“I do hope the person you’re protecting is worth a war.”
Cool air hit my face as I was guided outside.
Morning had begun creeping over the city, everything was washed in a dull gray light.
One of Nicola’s men opened the back passenger door to their black SUV. Nicola ushered me inside before climbing in after.
The second the door shut, the convoy pulled away from the warehouse.
“A war, Nicky?” I whispered.
He kept his eyes fixed on the warehouse growing smaller through the rear window. I wondered if he wasn’t yet convinced Lorenzo was actually letting us leave.
A moment later, he did finally look back at me. “Seems that way.”
“Are you hurt?” he asked. His gaze swept down my body, searching. Then, his hands gently grasped mine and he checked the marks on my wrists and turned them over.
I shook my head. “He was actually really polite.”
“Don’t let that fool you.” Nicola’s expression didn’t change. “He’s a conniving old fucker.”
Then, as something dawned on him, he glared at me. “What was that part about me being middle-aged, Aubergine?”
"Me?” I pointed dramatically at myself. “You announced to a warehouse full of mobsters that I was your platonic, generic, sexless friend! Biiiiig emphasis on the ’friend’ part!”
Nicola blinked, appalled.
“I was protecting you.” He leaned toward me, throwing his hands up close to his face in true Italian fashion. “The more important he thought you were, the more likely you were to die.”
I nodded slowly in mock understanding. “So, now I’m important. When nobody else is around to hear it.”
"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph." His hand dragged down his face. “You just had a gun to your head. How about you try getting some perspective on this situation?”
“Oh, goodness.” I turned toward him and smiled sweetly. “You’re right, how inconsiderate of me. I am grateful you took the time from your busy life and came to rescue me, Don Moretti.”
I reached over and squeezed his hand in the exact same way he’d done at Dad’s apartment. “Never mind that this is all your fucking fault. But thank you all the same.”
“What do you want from me, Abby? Huh?” He was genuinely flabbergasted. “Would you like me to call Don Ferraro and tell him that we’re actually engaged? That you’re the love of my life? You’re having my baby? Would that have improved this kidnapping ordeal for you?”
I bit down on both lips to stop myself from smiling. “I mean, it wouldn’t hurt.”
When it hit him, Nicola slowly lowered his head and pressed his finger tips over his eyelids. “You’re fucking with me.”
“And I really had you going for a minute there.” I looked down at the angry red marks circling my wrists.
For the first time since we’d left the warehouse, neither of us spoke.
The city rolled by outside. I rubbed my thumb over one of the deep indentations left by the zip ties. It still hurt.
Just not nearly as much as everything else. I stared out the window.
What exactly did that say about me? That a gun pressed against my head, being dragged into a warehouse, thinking I was going to die– somehow hurt less than Nicola walking away from me?
“I’ll have the doctor meet us at the estate,” Nicola said, typing on his phone. “I think you should be checked out just to be sure.”
“Wait, the estate?” I turned in my seat. “I need to go home. Take me to my apartment.”
“No.” The answer came back immediately. “Did you not understand what happened back there? A war just started, Abby. And it started with me making my weakness abundantly fucking clear. You need to stay somewhere secure. The estate is guarded. You’ll be safe there.”
“Any chance this war ends in like, twenty-four hours? I have to go to work on Monday.”
“Take leave. Or work remotely. Figure it out."
I scoffed at him, but he threw up his palm before I could interject.
“You think I’m trying to control your life.” His voice was alarmingly solemn. “I'm not. I’m just trying to keep you alive."
His expression softened. "If this wasn’t happening, I would drop you off at home and leave you alone like you wanted.”
“I’m... stuck in your house until this war is over?”
For the first time that morning, Nicola smiled. It was a tired, small one. Apologetic. “Unfortunately.”
I looked back out the window. The city skyline was slowly disappearing behind us.
And far in the distance… the iron gates of the Moretti estate would soon come into view.