Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
Addison’s hand is firmly gripped in mine as we walk up to the front door of my cousin Lorenzo’s house.
He moved to Melbourne after running off and marrying Kyla McKinley on a family trip to Italy a couple of years ago.
A family trip I skipped out on, because at the time, I was at boarding school and I wanted to hang out with Addison way more than I wanted to be around my family.
“If you want to leave, we can,” I tell Addison.
“No, we can’t,” she says. “They already know we’re here.”
“You’re uncomfortable. I don’t like it.”
“I’ll be fine. I’m never going to get better if I don’t push myself outside of my comfort zones, Lex. Besides, I can’t just hide away in a bedroom with you for the rest of my life.”
“I disagree. We can most certainly do that,” I tell her as the door opens.
“Lex.” Lorenzo stands there with the very typical scowl he always seems to have. “You break it, you buy it,” he says before he steps aside. “Come in.”
“What the fuck do you think I’m going to break?” I ask my cousin.
“No idea. But fair warning: My wife doesn’t like her shit broken or blood on her floors… or her walls, for that matter,” Lorenzo says.
I make a point of looking upwards, pointing a finger towards the ceiling. “What about the ceiling? She care about blood up there?”
“Don’t be an ass,” Lorenzo says. He turns to Addison. “Hi. Lorenzo. You must be Addison. Welcome to the family.” He holds out a hand.
Surprisingly, Addison lets go of my arm and places her palm in Lorenzo’s briefly before pulling away again and reaching for me. “It’s nice to meet you. Thanks for inviting us.”
“Anytime. Come on in.”
We follow Lorenzo through his palace of a house. My focus is on Addison, though. Her hand is trembling.
“You got a bathroom?” I ask Lorenzo.
“About eighteen of them,” he says. “Down there, fourth door. I’ll take Addison through to Kyla.”
“Yeah, no,” I grunt, pulling Addison down the hallway with me as I count the doors.
Reaching the fourth one, I open it and pull her in before shutting it behind us.
I tug her against my chest, wrapping my arms around her as tight as I can without hurting her.
“You’re safe, Addi. I would never let anything happen to you. ”
“I know.” She sighs. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” I kiss the top of her head.
“I don’t like touching men.”
“I don’t particularly like men touching you either,” I grunt. “Even if they are family.”
“They’re going to wonder what we’re both doing in a bathroom, Lex.”
“Lorenzo will just think I brought you in here to fuck you.” I laugh.
Addison pulls back. Her eyes widen in horror. “Oh, god, no.”
“Relax. He won’t care.”
“I care, Lex. I don’t want people to think that of me.”
“I just wanted to give you a moment,” I tell her.
“Thank you, but let’s go before they really do get those ideas.”
I lead her back out. Lorenzo is waiting at the end of the hall. He eyes Addison up and down briefly before he flicks his glare to mine, a silent question he’s not going to verbalize. I give a slight nod, and he clears his throat. “All right, this way.”
When we reach the dining room, Kyla is fussing with flowers in the center of the table. Not sure why. Everything is fucking impeccable in this house.
“Oh, you’re here. Welcome.” She comes up to me. “Lex, it’s been a long time,” she says, kissing my cheek. “And, Addison, I’m so thrilled to meet you.”
“Thank you,” Addison says.
“Come sit down. I didn’t know what you would like, so I had the chefs prepare a variety,” Kyla says, leading us to the table. There are two extra place settings.
“You expecting other people?” I ask Lorenzo.
“Zara,” he says.
“Zara eating for two these days?” I question, nodding to the plates.
“God, I hope not,” Kyla groans. “She’s dating Ares De Bellis. He’s coming with her.”
I turn to Addison and explain, “Zara is Kyla’s sister. Ares is Marcel and Zoe’s nephew.”
Addison nods her head. “I think I’m going to need a map of your family, Lex.”
“You and me both.” Kyla laughs. “There’s so bloody many of them.”
“I’m here.” Zara walks in with Ares. I’d heard through the grapevine that they were dating. It’s fucking weird to see them together and him still breathing, though. Zara and Kyla’s father is a psychopath, and I would know, because I have the same murderous tendencies as him.
Kyla introduces them both to Addison.
“I would shake your hand if I didn’t think your boyfriend would cut it off,” Ares says to Addi.
“I’m going to cut your fucking tongue out if you don’t shut the fuck up,” I grunt at him.
“He wouldn’t cut it off. Lorenzo already told him he couldn’t get blood on the floors.” Addison smiles.
“I can do a lot of damage to a hand without spilling a single drop of blood,” I warn Ares.
“Oh, I know.” The asshole smirks and walks around to the other side of the table.
I sit down next to Addison and start counting down the minutes until we’re alone again.
“So, Addison, how did you meet Lex?” Kyla asks.
“We went to boarding school together,” Addison answers. “He was the only person in that entire school who was nice to me when I first started.”
“Lex? Was nice?” Lorenzo frowns.
“Uh-huh, I was… ah… I had a scholarship and, well, the school was full of pretentious rich kids who didn’t want to know me. But Lex, he sat with me and we became friends.”
“You should have seen the school I had to go to before I got expelled and was finally allowed to attend public school. Talk about rich, privileged asses.” Zara smiles.
“You are one of those rich, privileged asses,” Kyla reminds her sister.
“Yeah, but she’s charitable. I mean, she has to be. Look who she’s dating.” I laugh at my own joke and the glare on Ares’s face.
Lorenzo’s phone vibrates. He looks at it and then smirks. “I have an errand to run.” He pauses and turns to me. “You want to come?”
“Nah, we have plans.” I gesture to Addi. We don’t, but there is no fucking way I’m leaving her alone to go and do god knows what with him.