Chapter 18 #2
“I never said I did. You’re the one who will call her.”
“Me?” he places his hand on his chest. “You want me to call Anna?”
“Yes. I thought that was obviously clear.”
Raffaele stares at me with that fucking pleased smile and then says the word I knew would slip out of his mouth. “No.”
“I’m asking nicely, Rafe.”
I give him time to reconsider, because despite what my kid brother may think, I know how he operates. He enjoys giving me grief first before accepting my demands. Of course, he’ll probably bargain something for himself, but he’ll end up doing what I need, one way or the other.
When his eyes begin to shine, I already know what he’s going to say before he even opens his mouth.
“Wait. I changed my mind. Consider my answer a maybe.”
It’s like clockwork with this kid. “What do you want?”
“First of all, I want a phone that my big brother isn’t tracking all the time.”
“No. You haven’t proved your loyalty to the family yet.”
Raffaele’s nostrils flare, but he’s smart enough not to press the subject.
“Fine then. If you want me to call Anna, I get to call her anytime I like from here on out. I’ll even use your phone to do it.”
“Again, my answer is no.”
“For a boss, you sure suck at negotiating.” He huffs out, disgruntled.
“I don’t negotiate with terrorists.”
He smiles at my statement. “Is that what I am? A terrorist?”
“When it comes to Anna, yes,” I state plainly.
Raffaele’s smile drops, his jaw clenching, the steel in his blue eyes turning a dangerous shade of gray.
“I get to call her once a month, or I don’t call her at all. Final offer.”
Porca miseria!
“One supervised call, no longer than five minutes,” I offer.
“No supervised call and ten minutes,” he counters, but like hell I’d ever concede to that.
“Now it’s one supervised call every two months, three minutes, tops.” I smile, calling his bluff.
“Fine. Whatever. Give me the damn phone, then,” he grumbles, extending his hand.
“Wait. Let me see if she’s somewhere private to take the call now.”
“It’s the day after Christmas, Matteo. She’s probably holed up with her family at Big Sal’s mansion. I doubt she’s even out of bed at this hour,” he points to his watch, showing it’s not even nine in the morning.
I don’t know what upsets me more, that he knows her schedule so well, or that he’s memorized it by heart.
I take the phone out of my jacket pocket and send Anna a text.
Me: Good morning, sweetheart.
Me: Can I call you now?
Anna: Yes!
I hate how my heart kick-starts into high gear at her excitement, all while my brother watches from just a few feet away.
“Call,” I order coldly, handing him the phone.
Raffaele takes the phone from me and FaceTimes Anna.
“Hi there, angel. Long time no see,” he says, his voice softening the second his eyes land on her.
“Hi to you too,” she answers.
I can’t see her face from where I’m standing, but I can hear her voice. She still sounds groggy from sleep, and when she can’t help but let out a yawn, I think it’s the cutest sound I’ve ever fucking heard.
“I’m glad you called. I was starting to wonder if you didn’t want to see me again.”
“Not possible,” Raffaele replies, a bit too sweetly for my taste. “Who wouldn’t want to see that pretty face?”
Anna doesn’t reply, but by the smile stretching Raffaele’s face, she must be smiling back at him.
My hands clench into fists, my knuckles cracking under the pressure. This was not how I expected to react to a simple phone call, but here I am, fuming with jealousy.
Her smile should have been for me, not him!
“So how was your Christmas?” Raffaele asks, moving the conversation along.
“Oh, you know. It was great. Even better after your thoughtful gift.”
“You liked my gift, huh?” Raffaele parrots, but I don’t miss how he glances above the phone to stare at me.
“Of course I did! I can’t wait to go downstairs and play it again. Stella had to pry me away from it last night, or I would have probably slept over the piano. It’s beautiful, Rafe. I have no words.”
Raffaele’s eyes harden, but I doubt Anna sees it.
“I’m glad you liked it,” he says, playing the part.
“I loved it. So much.”
“Better than the necklace I gave you for your birthday?”
Now it’s my turn to stare daggers at the fucker.
He gave her a birthday present?!
“I love them both in equal measure,” she giggles, the sound easing the sting of her words, even if only by a little.
“Do you still wear it?” Raffaele insists, as if he knows the subject is physically making me ill.
“I never take it off.”
“Good, Anna. That’s good. I like knowing it’s always close to your heart.” He winks at her. Or is the little shit winking at me? I can’t tell anymore, because all I see is red.
“How was your Christmas? You sounded like you were too busy to talk to me last night.”
I hear how her voice drops, hurt coating the last words, but she is doing her utmost best not to show it.
I understand how she feels. Last night, I cut our conversation short the second she asked to call me.
I don’t like going to sleep without talking to her either.
Maybe that’s the real reason why I tossed and turned all night.
“Yeah, you know how mafia celebrations are. They get a little rowdy. Sorry about that.”
The fucker doesn’t sound sorry at all. And Anna senses it immediately.
“What’s wrong? You don’t sound like yourself today,” she asks, weary, sensing something is off.
And it is. Because Raffaele doesn’t sound like me. And that’s the problem.
“Sorry,” Raffaele quickly says, his attempt at doing damage control. “I guess I am pretty out of it this morning. All that partying tires a guy, you know?”
Testa di cazzo!
I didn’t go out partying last night. I was in bed by ten. He was the one who probably stumbled in during the early hours of the morning, not me. Cretino!
“Oh. Okay,” Anna mutters, sounding more confused than ever.
I signal for Raffaele to wrap it up, before he does or says something I can’t come back from. But instead, the fucker puts on a performance as if auditioning for Broadway.
“Sorry, I’m a bit off today. Matteo and I had a huge fight last night, and well, I guess I still haven’t gotten over it.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Are you okay?” Anna says, her previous wariness replaced with genuine concern.
“I’ll live, I guess. It’s just hard sometimes, you know. He’s always on my case. It’s gotten even worse this year.”
“How so?”
“Well, the idiot fell in love with the wrong girl,” Raffaele explains, sounding almost forlorn.
But the gleam in his eyes tells a different story.
That sparkle spells trouble. “It’s sad, really.
He thinks he’s fooling everyone and that no one sees it, but I know the fucker has fallen deep. It’s pathetic, really.”
“Falling in love is… pathetic?” Anna parrots softly, sounding more confused by the second.
“It is when the girl you fall in love with has already given her heart to your kid brother.”
And there it is, the nail in my coffin. In one single sentence, he manages to kill whatever ounce of affection that Anna might have had for me. I mean, for him. Shit. I’m all turned around and mixed up now.
All I know is that, with just a few carefully chosen words, Raffaele has managed to plant doubt in Anna’s mind about my intentions.
No girl falls in love with a man out of thin air, which means Raffaele must have encouraged those feelings.
In other words, while he’s supposedly been texting Anna, he’s also been playing the field. And I have done no such thing.
As for the implication that I’m in love with Anna, and that she’s already given her heart to him? I call bullshit on that. Whatever feelings were there for Raffaele before, I doubt they can compete with what Anna and I have shared this past year. Right?
Raffaele knows the damage is done just by the way Anna suddenly goes silent.
“I’m sorry that you two are still not getting along. It’s hard when the people who matter most are the ones who hurt us,” she says, her voice so low I almost can’t hear it. “I should go. Everyone should be up by now.”
“Yeah, I should get some shut-eye too,” Raffaele says with a yawn. “Talk to you soon, beautiful.”
“Yeah, okay.” That’s all she says before ending the video call.
Rage floods me as I rush at him, grab the handles of the chair, and lean in close to his face. “Deal is off. If you think I’ll ever let you talk to Anna again, you’re fucking delusional.”
“Keep your fucking phone calls. I don’t need them anymore,” he says, pushing me out of the way and flinging the phone onto my desk.
I let him step away from me, because I might just punch the idiot if I keep staring at his smug face.
“I got what I wanted,” he singsongs. “Good luck on getting Anna to fall in love with you now, asshole.”
Raffaele tosses a middle finger over his shoulder as he struts out, leaving me to deal with the fallout of the atom bomb he just dropped.