The Masked King (The Sabatelli Empire #3)

1. Enzo

ENZO

“Same again?”

The bartender takes my glass and reaches for the bottle of brandy before I give him the nod. I don’t even have to remind him it’s on the rocks. He’s been adding doubles to my check all evening.

He slides a fresh glass back across the counter towards me, and I down it in one.

It stopped touching the sides a long while ago.

Twelve months ago, to be exact. When Demi Payne walked out of my apartment and didn’t come back.

Didn’t kiss me goodbye. Didn’t even pack her toothbrush or the vibrator in the top drawer of her nightstand or the oversized hoodie she always wrapped herself up in when we spent the night on the rooftop watching the stars and singing old 80s songs out of tune.

The images of us in my head barely crack a smile these days.

Like old black and white photographs, they’ve been erased by twelve months of thumbing through them trying to find the moment it all went wrong.

Fifty-two weeks of crumpling them in my hand and straightening them out again to see her smile. More days than I care to count of—

“Do you think she realizes how lucky she is?” The question jolts me out of my reverie and back into the arena of too-loud laughter and voices jostling for attention.

The speaker is attractive, blonde, her wild curls clearly on a lifelong mission to never be tamed.

Her eyeliner is smudged, her smile is wide and genuine, her flannel shirt open to reveal a white tank, the outfit thrown together almost as an afterthought, giving her the look of an adventurer fresh in from her travels.

My initial reaction is that she smells like Demi.

But she isn’t her.

No one else ever will be, and this is the reason why I’m at least a dozen shots down and still stone-cold sober.

As pick-up lines go, it’s one of the more original ones I’ve ever heard. Maybe I’ll store it for later. Maybe.

“Sorry, I’m not interested.” Because, sure, the brandy might not be hitting the dull zone, but it’s gone straight through the asshole check-in and is waving its passport at me like it just got released from jail.

She shrugs. “I’m not selling anything.”

She doesn’t come any closer. She doesn’t allow her arm to touch mine or give me a sideways glance to see if I’m checking her out or tuck her wayward hair behind her ear. She keeps her gaze fixed on the bartender who finishes serving a customer and comes straight over.

I swallow the rest of my brandy. I’m not ready to leave, but I’m not ready to get drawn into a conversation I’ll forget the instant I step outside either.

I sigh. Seriously. I let out a fucking sigh as the liquor goes down, like a homeless guy sleeping in a cardboard box who has nothing else to live for.

She hears it too. “Whatever he’s drinking, Andy,” she says to the bartender, “I’ll have the opposite.”

Two things hit me at the same time.

One: she knows his name. I’ve been sitting here for a couple hours, and I never even glanced at his gold name badge, but she strolls in and they’re on first-name terms.

Two: drinks have opposites.

Like night and day, I guess, or hot and cold.

I’m struggling to think of more elaborate opposites because my brain cells are a little woozier than I gave them credit for.

And because my lips are curving upward into a small smile as Andy the bartender prepares a rainbow-colored cocktail for the woman on the bar stool next to me, complete with a paper umbrella, a twisted lemon slice, and colored sugar around the rim.

Then I hear it. The name. Someone says, “Demi,” somewhere else in the bar, and I can’t help it, I’m craning my neck trying to find her even though I know there are other Demis in the world, and no shit, my stomach drops like a fucking aircraft with engine failure when I don’t see her.

Andy places another double brandy on the rocks in front of me.

“Cheers.” The woman raises her glass in the air and sips her cocktail through a paper straw.

I don’t return the toast. The asshole in my head is still watching me from the security gate, his smile a little less sure of itself now. I stare at the amber liquid, listen to the ice splitting, and try to remember a time when I felt less like myself.

I can’t.

“You came straight from the studio.” Andy’s smile travels directly to his eyes and produces the kind of crinkles that will linger in old age, as he leans across the counter and touches the woman’s chin. “Paint.”

“I lost track of time.” She instinctively leans into his touch.

They know each other. It should make me feel better that she wasn’t trying to get my attention, but it doesn’t. I recognize that familiarity they have. In a parallel universe, this could’ve been me and Demi.

I mean, fuck, it was me and Demi. We had that same easy relationship right from the outset, gravitating towards each other like the world was tilting our paths together.

Talking like we had everything in common, laughing, touching, breathing each other’s oxygen like it was natural to be that close to one person.

Was it all Demi? Did I even contribute to the relationship, or did I simply follow her lead?

At this point, who knows?

“I’m Gina,” she says as Andy moves on to the next customer.

“Enzo.”

“Enzo,” she repeats my name as if trying it on for size. “Does she know how you feel about her?”

“Are you a therapist in your spare time?” I raise my glass to my lips and think better of it. I’m already riding the slippery slope to dick-land; another couple shots and I’ll be a lost cause.

“Nope. I’m an artist. I pay attention. And that mask you’re wearing—” she draws a circle in front of my face with her index finger “—doesn’t quite fit.

I know you don’t want to hear it, but she’s probably wearing the same mask in her corner of the world, but instead of drowning her thoughts in brandy, she’s working her ass off to fill the void with her job.

When all you really need to do is talk about it. ”

“Ha!” The sound escapes my lips before I can stop it. “You got it all figured out, huh?”

She smiles. “Nope. I just read a lot of romance novels.”

I swallow. Nothing has changed, but I feel a little lighter somehow. “I tried. But I couldn’t find her.”

Gina sips her cocktail, holding the straw carefully between her thumb and forefinger to keep it steady. For a long while, she’s pensive, then, “She didn’t want to be found, and I think you know why, which means you tried to find her, but you didn’t move mountains.”

“I rearranged the whole fucking city.”

Her eyes sparkle. “That’s better. Maybe she had some stuff going on that she couldn’t tell you about. I’d bet my next masterpiece—well, my only masterpiece if I’m being honest—that you’d know all about keeping secrets.”

“You’re back in therapist mode.” And I’m still listening like she’s got me strapped to the bar stool with a gun at my temple.

The reason: she’s right. I did try to find Demi, but if I’d called in every connection known to the Sabatelli family, there would’ve been nowhere for her to hide. And part of me didn’t want to confront the very real possibility that she didn’t love me the way I loved her.

“Maybe you needed to hear it.” She sucks on the lemon slice without even a grimace. “You seem like a nice guy. Try taking your finger off the self-destruct button and see what happens.”

I smile. I had to navigate anger and loss first before the adrenaline of self-destruct became the obvious way to handle things. It’s taken me a while to cultivate, but I think I’m pretty good at it now.

“Andy’s a lucky guy.”

I clink my glass against hers, take one small sip, and don’t like how it tastes. It isn’t the drink, it’s me. Sounds like a copout for ending a relationship; maybe I’m ready to move on.

“Yeah, I remind him every day.” Gina finishes her drink and stands up. “Well, it’s been—”

Before she can finish her goodbye, I swivel my gaze around to follow the sound of a raised voice.

“…hands off me!”

A young woman shoves a guy in a formal white, button-down shirt away from her.

He stumbles backwards, caught easily by a man in a pinstriped suit, clearly part of the same group, who steadies him back onto his feet.

I wait for his friends to tell him to back off, but instead, they all stand there smirking behind their beers, watching the scene pan out as if it was orchestrated for their enjoyment.

“What’s your problem, sweetheart?” the guy says. “You’ve been staring at me all evening. We both know where this is going.”

One of his friends curls his top lip into what might pass for a smile in any other scenario. Right now, it flips a switch inside me, and the asshole in my head jumps out yelling a battle cry.

I’m already on my feet. I would probably be swaying if I wasn’t so focused on reaching the slimeball before he can lay a finger on the young woman who clearly doesn’t want his attention. Adrenaline carves a shortcut through the bar, people parting to give me access like Moses crossing the Red Sea.

Silence drops like a bowling ball at my feet.

“You’re the problem, asshole.” I keep my voice low.

The asshole in question turns to face me slowly, mouth open, eyes like dull bullets. Not his finest look, I’m guessing, and his so-called friends don’t step in to point this out either.

“What the fuck has it got to do with you?”

Spit clings to his bottom lip, and my fingers twitch inside my fists. I’m not averse to teaching the guy a lesson, but the thought of getting his spit on my hand makes my flesh crawl.

“The lady told you not to touch her.” Maybe it’s the liquor sloshing through my veins, or maybe Gina’s therapy session was more effective than I realized, but I feel lighter and calmer than I have in the last twelve months.

“Hey, I’m not touching anyone.” He raises his hands, palms facing outward, as evidence. “So, why don’t you crawl back into your hole and leave me to enjoy my evening?”

I ignore him and address the woman whose personal space he was so keen to invade a few moments ago. “Are you alright? Did he hurt you?”