Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 82847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 414(@200wpm)___ 331(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 414(@200wpm)___ 331(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
“Parents are dead. Only child.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
He gave a shrug. “My dad had it coming. Mom didn’t.”
I wanted to know more, but it felt wrong to ask about it when we hardly knew each other. “How are you liking the winery?”
“Very fucking boring,” he said. “But you’re a pretty nice perk.”
I smirked then looked down at my pasta. I spun the noodles onto the fork and took a bite. I ate so slowly that my food had turned cold. I hadn’t had much of an appetite in the first place. I felt him stare at me while I looked down at my plate.
“You’re really fucking beautiful, you know that?”
I stilled when I heard what he said. It took me a moment to lift my eyes and meet his. He’d already fucked me countless times, so there didn’t seem to be an angle to his words. Just honesty, without a filter, without an agenda. “Thank you.” I wore no makeup and my hair was a mess, so I was a bit self-conscious…but he didn’t seem to care.
My phone started to ring upstairs. It was quiet from all the way down here, but I could hear it. And since it was past midnight, the call must be important. “Excuse me.” I left the table, headed upstairs, and found my phone somewhere on the floor where it had landed. Leo’s name was on the screen, so I quickly answered. “What’s happened?”
“We were fucking robbed,” he snapped over the phone. “Our shipment came from customs. It was logged, but when we went to grab it, it had been swapped for kitchen tools. Jace says it was an innocent mistake, but I don’t fucking buy that.”
I processed all this in silence for a moment. “Does Dad know?”
“Oh, he knows. And he wants to know whose head needs to get blown off.”
“Cristo…” I stood in my bedroom, my arm crossed over my chest as I stared at the rumpled bed.
“It’s just one thing after another, over and over. And everyone is laughing at us, Frankie.” He screamed into the phone, “They’re fucking laughing at us. It’s the fucking Lombardis or the Gallos or fucking Cosa Nostra.”
“Let’s figure it out first before we start a witch-hunt.”
“In what universe did anyone think they could fuck with us?”
“We’ll figure it out tomorrow.”
Click. Leo hung up.
“Everything alright?”
I gave a small jump when I turned to see Wolfe standing there in nothing but his boxers, sexy as hell when he didn’t even try. “Leo just called, and…” I was about to tell him, but then I realized I probably shouldn’t. “Yeah, everything is fine.”
He stared at me with discerning eyes, like he could read the lie on my face as easily as words on a page. “It’s late and I have a long day tomorrow, so I think I’m going to bed.” I walked to the nightstand and plugged my phone into the charger before I got into bed.
Wolfe didn’t ask any questions about the phone call with Leo. He moved to the other side of the bed and got under the sheets before he hooked his arm around my waist and dragged me into his chest, spooning me from behind.
I didn’t expect that.
“Goodnight, Francesca.”
“Goodnight.”
Wolfe and I arrived at the vineyard separately. He started in the warehouse at the crack of dawn and I went into the main villa a couple hours later, so he left without waking me. I was sad our night was over, but I had been ready for it to end before it started. And I was also grateful because he’d scratched an itch that I couldn’t reach on my own. Made the yearning aches in my body fade.
When I arrived at the villa and went up to my father’s office, I could feel his wrath before I even set foot in the room. He stood with his back to the desk, looking out the window at the vineyard. It was a beautiful day, but he fumed hotter than Mount Etna in the distance.
“Five million euros worth of arms—easily.” Leo spoke from the couch, his sleeves rolled up because his anger turned the room hot and humid like summer. “Someone is gonna lose their head, and if we can’t figure out exactly who, then they all lose their heads.”
My father ignored him, probably tuning him out.
“This is the second time this has happened,” Elio said. “Now they’re just fucking with us.”
“They’re totally fucking with us,” Leo said. “The customs officers are getting bribed to pretend to honor our bribes—clearly.”
I wasn’t exactly a part of this world. I treated the wounded and took care of the wine business and strategically washed the money that came from the side business. If the police ever busted us, my hands were dirty enough to serve life in prison.
My father turned around and addressed Elio. “What do our little birds say?”