Chapter 6
Frederica heard her mother's laughter before she reached the bottom of the stairs. It wasn't the polite chuckle Despina used for people she was tolerating, or the sharp one that came before violence. It was her real one—short and surprised, like something had caught her off guard.
The kitchen door was ajar, and Frederica could smell garlic and something herby. Dario said something she couldn't quite hear, and Despina laughed again.
What the hell is going on? It was bad enough that Dario was in her house. Now he was getting along with her mother? This was going too far.
She pushed the door open further and was struck dumb by the sight of Dario at the stove with an 'I Love Rhodes' tourist T-shirt on that was a size too small for him and showed off all the tattoos running over his brown forearms and biceps.
He had a dish towel tucked into his waistband and a small crease of concentration between his brows while he handled a pan with ease.
Despina was at the kitchen table with her afternoon coffee, watching him with approval. She pointed at something in the pan, said something in Greek, and Dario adjusted without arguing.
Neither of them had noticed Frederica in the doorway. She watched him taste from the wooden spoon, frown slightly, reach for the salt without being told, and add a few shakes.
Dario said something in Italian about getting the flavor right, and her mother responded in Greek again, saying not to add too much pepper.
This was what passed for a conversation in the Alesci house, with her father Italian and her mother Greek, but Frederica had never seen an outsider do it.
She didn't even think Dario knew Greek, judging by how badly he'd butchered it the night before while joking with the police on Crete.
It had all been a part of the act. Of course it was. Dario had fooled the cops and her at the same time. Now he was turning all that charm onto her mother, and it was actually working.
Frederica had brought only one boy home before when she was about eighteen.
He had lasted dinner, which was how long it took Despina to form and communicate an opinion that he was a piece of shit, and kicked him out of the house.
She had been right, but Frederica had learned not to bring another boy home ever again.
Dario had been here twelve hours, and now her mother was letting him use her kitchen.
"You're awake," he said, without turning around. "The floorboard outside the kitchen creaked and gave you away." He glanced over his shoulder and grinned at her. "Go sit down. This is almost ready."
"Don't tell me what to do. This is my mother's kitchen," Frederica said, and then felt like an idiot.
"And your mother is right there letting me use it, so she doesn't care," Dario said and turned back to the stove. "Sit down, Spartana."
Despina looked at her over the coffee mug with an expression that said, 'I have decided he is allowed to cook for us. Sit your ass down.'
"What are you making?" she asked, flopping down at the table. She could argue with her mother later.
"Pasta al pomodoro. Simple. Your mother had everything I needed."
"Frederica didn't mention you can cook," Despina offered helpfully.
"She's never bothered to ask," Dario replied.
Frederica rolled her eyes. "We aren't friends, Mama. I just worked a job with him and Kon. The Colleoni villa has people who just bring you food when it's time to eat. He doesn't need to cook."
"He's not a friend, but you called him to bail you out of jail?" Despina asked.
Dario drained the pasta over the sink. "I think she just wanted to use my plane."
"She's definitely learned her lesson about ever calling you again, that's for sure," Frederica grumbled under her breath.
Despina made a tsch sound with her tongue and gave Frederica a disappointed look.
Frederica was debating walking out of the house and not coming back when Tore appeared from his study.
"Excellent, you are awake finally," he said and kissed the top of her head.
Despina made her set the table, and within ten minutes, there were plates of pasta, bread, and a bottle of wine from Tore's better shelf. He sat, had a mouthful of food, and said, "Good job," which, from Tore, was a standing ovation.
Frederica ate half her plate before she realized how delicious it was.
"Your cooking doesn't suck," she offered, not knowing how to compliment him.
"Thank you," Dario replied and topped up her wine.
"Not a skill I thought you would have."
"It comes in handy," was all he said. He was more careful and guarded in having a conversation with her than with her mother. Typical.
Frederica had thought Dario was charming, capable, difficult, and occasionally useful. Not someone who stood at a stove with quiet concentration and made something from scratch.
"Who taught you?" Despina asked him with a smile.
Dario broke a piece of bread. "I taught myself mostly. We had a cook when I was growing up. She would let me watch sometimes if I stayed out of the way. My mother didn't see much value in it. She wanted us focused on other things."
"What other things?" Despina pressed on, and Frederica was glad she was focused on interrogating him, not her.
"The family business, what else?" he said simply, without bitterness, which somehow made it worse. "Everything that she could use for her empire. She had other people to cook."
Despina didn't push, because she had years of knowing exactly when to let silence do the work. Frederica had grown up watching her do it to other people. It was deeply unpleasant to watch her do it to Dario.
He looked at his pasta. He didn't need to give them any more information. They all knew Gabriella had measured her sons by what they could do for the family, not by who they were outside of it. She had no use for a son who found peace in a kitchen. Peace was not their business.
Frederica ate another forkful and said nothing. She would just cause an argument without meaning to, because that was how all of her conversations with Dario went.
"So," Despina said pleasantly, "I want to know how you two actually met. You said it was work, Frederica, but I want the story."
Frederica's fork stopped halfway to her mouth. "It's not an interesting story."
"All your stories are interesting. You just decide which ones I'm allowed to hear." Despina looked at Dario. "You tell me."
Dario looked at Frederica across the table. She gave him a warning glare. Don't you dare tell them.
"We met in Rome," Dario said cheerfully. "I was providing security for a client, and Frederica was hired to kill him. She did it while I was in the bathroom."
Despina turned to Frederica with wide eyes. "He is the Rome guy?"
The Rome guy. Frederica had only mentioned that job once to her parents because she had found it funny.
"You told them about it already," Dario said slowly and smiled like he was genuinely flattered.
"I lodged a professional complaint about how sloppy you were."
"To your parents?"
"They were available."
"She talked about it for a week," Tore said, grabbing a piece of bread. "She was very annoyed and said you were incompetent."
"I had to pee," Dario said in self-defense.
"That was the complaint," Tore confirmed.
Frederica stared at the ceiling and prayed it would fall on her.
Dario was watching her like he had been handed a gift and was already working out where to keep it. He would tease her about this for as long as he could make it last, like the asshole he was.
"You talked about me to your parents and even gave me a nickname? That's cute."
"The Rome guy is impersonal. It refers to a location."
"It refers to me. Specifically." Dario smiled at her parents.
"She came and worked with the Edgeworths at our place for weeks, and I swear she uses the Rome job against me just to pick fights.
The guy I was protecting was such a low-level politician that we had no idea he had an assassin of Frederica's caliber after him.
I thought taking a bathroom break wouldn't be a problem.
God, was I wrong. My mother gave me so much hell for it, but even she didn't think he had pissed off someone high enough in the political food chain to warrant such a professional hit. "
Frederica picked up her wine and drank it. There was nothing useful to say, so she let him enjoy the thirty seconds she was willing to give him.
No, fuck it. She set the glass down. "He raped and murdered a fifteen-year-old girl."
Dario's grin went out like a light. "Excuse me?"
"Your client in Rome." She kept her voice even.
"The girl was the daughter of a woman who cleaned his office building.
He had government connections, and the investigation lasted four days and went nowhere.
He had one interview with the police, and it magically went away.
He was free to do it all again. Her mother came to me with fifty euros and a photograph. I took the job."
Nobody around the table spoke. Frederica charged on, too pissed off to stop.
"I deemed it good enough because I saw what he had done to her. Your client was underserving of your protection. He bought his way out of consequences until he ran into someone he couldn't buy. You were lucky I didn't shoot you, too, for protecting a piece of shit like that."
Dario looked like he was rearranging other information behind his eyes.
"Gabriella told me he was a low-level government official," he said finally. "Protection detail. Standard. Pissed off a rival."
"I know what she told you, which is why you didn't get a bullet that night, too."
"If I had known—"
"Your mother still would have made you do it."
He shook his head. "No, I wouldn't have taken the job. I would have shot him myself."
Frederica stared into his dark eyes and said, "It's probably why she never told you. She did the job to get him in her back pocket."
Dario didn't look away. Didn't fold. "When we were in Italy, you told me to ask the people who hired you why they wanted him dead instead of being pissed off at you. This is what you meant?"
"Yes."