6. — the only one on time. #2
He understood exactly what Salvatore had meant by saying Carina was looking like that. She covered her obviously braless chest, mostly exposed by a low-cut silk camisole, with her oversized trench coat at the sight of Nico. Her knee-high leather boot snapped against the floor.
“Goddammit, what, were you just going to let me get naked?” she hissed at Salvatore.
“I told you he was coming. I literally said that five minutes ago!”
The two glared at one another.
Nico just cleared his throat and waited.
“You’re a dirty prick,” she tossed at Sal on her way past the desk.
Nico stepped aside to let his sister pass without comment.
“Please, that’s fucking foreplay for you,” Salvatore said under his breath. “Crazy bitch.”
The man in the chair acted as if he hadn’t said a thing and gestured toward the seating area of the study.
Nico found his way into a chair as Salvatore came over and did the same with the loveseat.
He placed three folders onto the glass coffee table between them, and produced a few items from his pocket, laying them on the folders.
A phone. Nico’s keys. Cards. Bank and credit. His IDs.
A gun.
Nico met Salvatore’s eyes when he said, “You know, you were the only made man I knew growing up that never carried a gun.”
He always wanted to know why.
“I thought it was because you were the most dangerous one of them all for a while. Like you were their worst nightmare on a good day, and you didn’t even need one,” Nico admitted.
It earned him soft laughter from Salvatore.
“Truth is,” Salvatore replied, “in a way, I am. I can be their worst nightmare. You have to be all of that and more, or you’re just fodder to a bigger plan.”
Nico understood.
Kind of.
“I don’t make that mistake anymore,” Salvatore added after a moment. “Not carrying a gun, I mean.”
“When did that change?”
“I’ll answer that question if you’re honest about everything we’re going to discuss regarding what’s in those folders,” Salvatore told him, pointing toward the table. “Deal?”
“This again?”
“Deal?”
Nico’s gaze dropped to the folders, but also the things.
It had been almost two months since he even looked at Google.
Not to mention, the five hundred dollars he kept hidden in a large cross necklace just in case had come in handy to buy smokes or put gas in his Ducati.
Salvatore let him leave the property and ride occasionally, but no one asked how he made it possible.
Or why he always had a pack of cigarettes, for that matter.
Also, he just didn’t have a life right now. Nico might take up DIYing in the next week if he didn’t get something to fucking do, and soon.
“Deal,” he said finally.
Salvatore nodded. Leaning forward, he picked up the first folder and the cards and ID on top. “First, the Secret Service, and your father, have released your accounts. Now, here’s the caveat and some things we need to talk about.”
Nico chewed on his bottom lip, suspicion itching. “Uh-huh.”
“Giorgio took back control of your stipend from the trust, and filed new directives that you should only gain access again at twenty-five or immediately upon his death.”
Nico scoffed, falling back into the chair. “That’s fine. I used the trust to pay my speeding fines and uni. To him, that’s what I really want. The money. What a joke. So can you just destroy the card for that, then?”
“I will,” Salvatore agreed. “The trustee will contact you upon your twenty-fifth birthday—”
“Or when the asshole dies, got it.”
“Nico.”
He scowled. “Sorry. How’s the four hundred k?”
Salvatore’s brow jumped higher. “Okay, so he really doesn’t know about that, does he?”
Nico gave his warden a pointed look. “You mean my bank account? Fuck no. That had nothing to do with him anyway. Not a cent came or was made from my inheritance. I made that—”
“Hustling molly and coke through your cousin’s connection to Big Mike in New Jersey, right?” Salvatore interrupted.
Oh, okay.
Nico saw right where this would go.
He loosened up a bit, crossed his ankle onto his knee, and used the armrest as a spot to prop his elbow. His tilted head found his waiting hand, and he eyed Salvatore down.
“So what? I profited a few hundred thousand dealing drugs to university-aged students. Big deal. It wasn’t serious money, just play.
And that’s exactly what I did with it. If not me, then someone else would’ve supplied.
Plus, I know where that shit comes from and apparently, so do you.
It’s clean, real drugs. Do you know how many of these kids are ODing on bad cuts? ”
“Two things. One, I’m impressed at the profit. Second, that’s going to have to stop. At least, the way you were doing it. We’ll get back to that. Moving on.”
Salvatore tossed the folder and cards Nico’s way, keeping the one meant to be destroyed. He then reached for the second, and it’s accompanying key, fob and charms.
“Moving on?” Nico asked, confused. “What did you want to ask?”
“You answered it all. The bank account is explained, it matches what I know from the Secret Service information that came through. Simple. Moving on now.”
“Right,” he replied.
Salvatore held the keys up higher. “These are yours again.”
“Without restriction?”
The other man nodded once. “You can freely come and go, but you should know, if you are not back at the gates by three A.M., you will not be allowed inside the estate and if you are living on my property, you will be home at the time you are expected to be.”
Nico leaned forward to grab the offered keys. “Got it.”
Salvatore handed over the folder. “All paperwork for the vehicles. Something else I had to wait for from the Secret Service.”
He kept mentioning that.
Nico cringed. “So, you know?”
“I know.”
“They did get the livestream replay down within an hour,” Nico offered, hoping that helped whatever this might be. Salvatore did not look impressed. “I mean, it takes a second for a screenshot. A few for live recording a clip. How long did it take them to scrub it off the net?”
“Two weeks. Algorithms were built overnight for it, apparently.”
“Damn.”
“And even if it is gone,” Sal started to say.
Nico laughed. “It’s somewhere. Deep net. Dark web. Somewhere. People are downloading ZIP files right now of crazy shit that’s been on the internet, and I bet that clip of him tied to that bed, telling everyone he’s a rapist is at the very top.”
He swallowed the pride that edged his tone. “I should be sorry. I probably traumatized him like he did them.”
“You think?”
“Oh, definitely. Did you see it?”
“I did not,” Salvatore replied calmly. “I was advised on the contents.”
“Never saw my face on it. I might wear that mask next Halloween.”
“I can’t decide if you think it’s funny what you did, or something else.”
Nico shrugged, uncaring. “He deserved it.”
“He’ll probably never face any real penalty for what he did, though.”
“You’re wrong,” Nico returned. “Everyone that looks at him sees it now. It’s written in every line on his face.
Rapist. That’s what my friend’s girlfriend wanted to do.
She said it the morning she came back black and blue.
Take a knife, carve it straight across. So, then everyone would know. Now they do. I did that.”
Salvatore stayed quiet.
“I know it was wrong,” he continued, “but I’d do it again.”
“You would.”
“I’m telling you.” He leaned forward, staring hard and unflinching. “I’d do it again. To anyone that needs it. Any fucking day.”
Salvatore blinked, and his chin tipped up so he could look down a bit at Nico. Study him again in that strange way. “Just...unreal.”
“What?”
“In ten years, you’re going to be the kind of man who says that sort of thing to someone, and they’re going to feel it somewhere they can’t protect. Look at them the way you did me right then and say that—say I’d do it again. And mean it the way you do. Terrifying, Nico.”
“It was terrifying to him, too.”
He didn’t need ten years to make it scarier.
Salvatore shook his head as if answering Nico’s unspoken thoughts.
“You’ve got a lot of anger and bitterness driving the way you say it and feel it right now.
Trauma, too. But you need life behind it, Nico.
Real grief. True joy. Loss and love. Experience that only aging brings.
When you say that same thing ten years from now, with all that behind it and what you’ve already got going on, the world is going to move for you. ”
Nico didn’t know what to say.
Salvatore added, “You need to start realizing what power that has.”
And they needed to move on. Nico couldn’t think about tomorrow, let alone ten years down the road. He was still trying to work on getting through today.
“What’s in the third file, or do you have more questions?”
Salvatore wagged a finger at him. “You hate being made to think. Last folder. Any guesses?”
Nico couldn’t think of any. “Is it bad?”
“You tell me.”
“I mean, I only go to the convenience store and get smokes. I used to give money to the guard at the back of the property to get me some, but I take the Ducati now. I had a bit of cash stashed. Uh, what else?”
Salvatore remained impassive while Nico rambled.
“Oh, I did go to the hospital after the accident. I stayed out of sight and went right back to the estate. I even passed them on the way. They didn’t realize it was me. Just to check on...” His voice trailed off, and his gaze started to Salvatore. “Frankie.”
Oh, he finally got a trickle of something.
Salvatore’s mouth pursed with a swallow. “I bet she needed that.”
“Are you going to tell me something about her?”
“Do I need to?”
Nico shook his head. “She’s seventeen. I stopped messing with girls that were under eighteen as soon as I turned eighteen. Is that the problem? Were Larkin’s guys keeping notes or something? I just talked to her outside, too. For the record.”
“That’s enough,” Salvatore replied. “It’s not about my daughter. Yet.”