Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 75748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Huh.
That was odd.
Suddenly, something came back to me that I’d overheard at one of the many Ferraro family gatherings.
They’d been talking about Nico, which hadn’t really caught my interest at first. Why would I care about gossip having to do with my husband’s “best friend” who I’d literally never seen again after my wedding?
But something about the excited, hushed tones had me more curious than I wanted to admit to.
“Mimi was shocked,” one of Ronny’s sisters said.
“About what? Him having a gun?”
“Yeah. She said she thought he was such a fine, upstanding young man.”
Both women tittered at that.
“Well, that’s how men like him get away with their crimes, isn’t it?”
At the time, I thought maybe she was using “crimes” colloquially.
Something about how these three men were discussing security, though, had me stiffening, had me paying closer attention.
I mean, who the hell were these men I let into my home?
“You okay?” Nico asked, watching me with his head tipped to the side.
“What? Yeah. Fine. Sorry.”
I felt immediately guilty for thinking negatively about the man. I mean, he’d been nothing but good to me. So what if he had a gun? Millions of people had guns. It was a personal protection choice. It didn’t mean Nico was some kind of bad guy.
I mean, did bad guys make you an omelet and pancakes?
Still, even long after my cameras were set up and my apartment was empty, I couldn’t seem to get the ideas out of my mind.
Who the hell was Nico Costa, really?
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Nico
It had been three days since I’d slept on Blair’s couch, since I’d woken up to her right beside me, her heated, hungry gaze staring at my cock that was—once again—not behaving. Three days since I’d told her she could touch me… and then she did. Three days since I cursed Zeno’s terrible timing seven ways to Sunday.
I’d yet to come up with a good enough excuse to try to see her.
I’d been trying to come up with reasons that I should keep my distance. Though, I was coming up with fewer and fewer of those each time I spent any time with her.
There was the issue of the safe.
It had been gnawing at me since my brothers and I made our way out of her apartment once the cameras were all up and she knew how to use the app.
Why would someone try to take the damn thing?
Anyone who knew Matt knew he never had anything of worth.
Though, was that true?
Did either of us actually know Matt at all?
He’d been lying to both of us for years.
And if the money I’d given him for the ring and shit like that didn’t actually go to those things, where did it all go? What had he been up to?
Maybe if I figured out that, I could figure out who’d killed him, who might be harassing Blair. Then put an end to it, once and for all.
To do that, though, I felt like getting into the safe might be necessary. But how could I possibly broach that with Blair without making it weird, without her asking a million questions?
As if thinking about her conjured her up, I glanced over at the stairs of The Met to find her sitting there in one of her elegant black dresses, looking effortlessly sleek. Enough so that a group of teen girls kept looking over at her, then making comments to one another about how they wanted to have style like hers one day.
As great as she looked externally, though, I could see something troubled behind her eyes.
“Hey,” I called as soon as she spotted me.
“Oh, hey,” she said, giving me a smile that didn’t quite meet her eyes.
“Surprised you haven’t gotten enough of this place,” I said, walking up a few steps to speak to her. The teens had a lot to say about that as well. It ranged from Ugh. Can’t a beautiful woman just exist without a guy thinking he can take her time? to I would be totally fine with a guy like that wanting to take my time.
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
“No? Then why do you seem a little down?” I asked, moving to sit next to her.
“Have you ever been told that you’re almost unnervingly perceptive?”
“My siblings have told me that a thousand or two times. Everything alright?”
“Yeah. I’m actually just frustrated with trying to get some fresh content for my blog,” she admitted, waving her delicate hand back toward the doors. “I feel like I’ve done everything I can do to give a different perspective. Without being one of those obnoxious people who set up tripods in public spaces to make content.”
“Hm. What about if someone else took pictures of you looking at art or standing next to art?”
“No one wants to see me.”
“Says who?”
“People who are on my blog are there for art.”