Chapter 219: No Secrets
- RORY -
Luciano opens one of the larger bandaids and puts it on my foot. Everything he just said is distracting me now from how awkward this actually is.
"Wait. I’m confused," I tell him.
"What are you confused about?" He finishes up, and I swing my legs off the bed.
"I just don’t get why it has to be someone who knows who you are since they were in my place. What does the fact that they were in my cabina even have to do with you?"
His hands slow while he’s putting the first aid kit away.
"And how do your guys have any idea who they’re looking for? I didn’t see him. I don’t even know if it was a ’him.’ For all I know, it was a woman."
I think of the size of the faceless, dark figure in the kitchen and shiver. No, something tells me it was definitely a man by the build and the size.
"It will be obvious when Dom and Sonny see him, trust me." He sighs and tosses the first aid kit to the side. "If it’s a guest here at the resort, we’ll know quickly. The guest list here isn’t that long, and this is the only place for tourists in the area. Like I said, it’s not a local. There’s just no way."
"You have the guest list?"
He doesn’t answer, but I get a devious smirk instead. Luci’s in the mob, of course he has the guest list. Whatever he wants, I’m sure he gets one way or another.
I think back to the woman we passed coming out of the office and how nervous she looked. I was ready to apologize about the mess we left with papers strewn all over the floor, but she didn’t even look at us once.
And that’s also why he thinks this is about him. Because of his business and his position in it.
"You think someone is targeting me to get to you? An enemy of some kind or what?"
His smirk vanishes with these questions, and he stands up.
There was a part at the end of my dream when Luciano assured me that he is just as dangerous for me as I am for him, but he said he would protect me from it. Is this the reason the dream version of him said that? Was that also a warning about what was literally waiting for me at that very moment in the next room?
"How would anyone even..." my thoughts are trying to connect all of this, but it’s not adding up. "I have nothing to do with you. I’m just this person in the next cabin over who has been staying at your cousin’s. Why would they think..."
"You may not think you have anything to do with me," he interrupts, "but there are very dangerous men who have recently made it their job to get to me. If I show interest in a woman beyond something fleeting..."
He sighs and runs a hand over his face before both hands find a home at his waist. The bulk of him—those broad chest muscles and shoulders—tapers at that point.
Suddenly I’m really curious about what’s beneath the shirt. What those muscles look like. If he has that ’V’ that cuts straight toward his groin that women find so mouthwatering. Is there a small trail of dark hair that disappears below his waistband? Is he just as tan under the shirt as he is everywhere else?
Before I can ask the questions that his mention of interest in me has just provoked, he paces toward the bag he was carrying from our little shopping trip today and removes a package of socks.
"Here," he tosses a pair of white ones across the bed toward me.
"You bought socks?" I ask dumbly, picking them up and staring at them. "Tube socks? What are these for?"
"Your feet," he chuckles, tossing the package of socks back in the bag. "Your feet are cold."
"I still don’t understand..." I say, pulling on the socks and trying to ignore the warmth of this care that he’s showing me. "How have you shown more than a fleeting interest? We text and you brought me lunch."
My ears are gifted with a short staccato of his laugh again.
"This is like..." he shakes his head, "I thought I was going to be able to keep things from you for at least a time, but it’s obviously not happening. I guess I put my foot in my own mouth, huh?"
"You’re keeping things from me?" I frown, a small dart of worry piercing the comfort that he’s cloaked me in with his presence.
"Can we get something to eat before I tell you about it?"
"No." I cross my arms. "What are you talking about?"
Luci studies me for a moment, dark eyes sweeping over my face, silently debating something again.
"Just tell me, Luci. I don’t like secrets."
"You don’t like secrets," he repeats, raking a hand over his face again. He’s doing that a lot, and it seems out of character. Luciano is always so composed and confident. But all of this seems to have him questioning himself.
"No. No secrets. I told you I trust you, but I don’t want to learn about things I should have known after the fact."
He nods, like he’s accepting that. "Okay. I’ve had guys watching Dex’s house since his dad’s funeral. Day and night. There’s always someone keeping an eye on you. New top-of-the-line security system in his house... all for you, Lorelei."
"What?" I sputter, the surprise coming out with one short laugh of disbelief. "Why? Because I got kidnapped briefly by some psycho who wanted my sister and ended up with me instead?"
Luci walks to where I’m standing, rounding the bed and stopping right in front of me. I have to tilt my chin to look up at him.
"It might sound crazy. I get that," he says, brushing his hand over my cheek. "But when I heard you screaming that day..."
A shiver runs the length of me, and I drop my eyes.
"I haven’t been able to stop hearing it. When the screaming stopped and I thought you were gone, I knew I had lost something. Something I hadn’t even begun to understand the importance of. But it turns out, I didn’t lose that something. You were still alive. I vowed that no one would hurt you again, and I intend to keep that vow."
"You hardly know me," I whisper, staring at our feet. Feeling the warmth of him—that’s how close he is.
"I know. I’d like to change that," he says quietly, drawing his curled finger down under my chin and tilting it back up so I’m forced to be confronted with the rare flower that blooms out of him in the midst of my darkness.
"Look," I swallow, taking a step back out of his reach and ending up with my legs against the bed. "That’s really... sweet."
I fidget with the hem of the shirt I’m wearing.
"Sweet?" He smirks. "Here I thought you would be mad as hell about it."
"I would have," I nod, thinking back to the time staying with Dex and Raya.
I would have been pissed to learn that there were guys watching the house. It does seem a little overboard and crazy. But now that this has happened, I can understand Luci’s concern.
"But this is life for you, isn’t it? You are always anticipating something going wrong."
"There are a lot of bad men in the world. You and your sister attract your share of the dangerous ones, I’ve come to realize. And there are many like them who also happen to not like me very much." He shoves his hands in his pockets.
"What is your role, exactly?" I ask, trying to imagine him out with the other mobsters doing mobster things. "Are you at the very top? Is that why people are after you?"
"People are after me because I’m an arrogant prick who sometimes makes things my business that shouldn’t be. Like when women and children are trafficked in our city."
My mouth falls open. "What?"
"It’s a reality, unfortunately. One that brings a lot of money for those who do it. I wish it wasn’t. You asked if I’m at the top?" His eyebrows lift. "I’m not, but my father is. He was approached by some men a lot like us. They operate a crime syndicate out of Russia doing a lot of different things, and it benefits them to have alliances in other countries. They wanted to know if my father would help in their trafficking enterprise."
A knot forms in my stomach when the dark underbelly of all that goes on in the world starts to peek into view. How can Luciano be a part of any of it?
"Pa made it clear that not only would we not help them, we didn’t want it happening at all in our city. That desire wasn’t respected, of course. They’ve had it out for us after that meeting, but then I went and made it worse when I ruined one of the shipments. That’s when one of their guys began to take a really personal interest in me."
"God," I sigh, closing my eyes and sitting back down on the bed. "That sounds like a nightmare. And you think it was one of those people who was here tonight?"
"Unless you’ve caught the attention of someone I don’t know about, then yeah. I think it might be."
My eyes flick to the knife on the side table. I almost wish I wouldn’t have run now. I wish I would’ve slashed whoever it was to pieces.
"You’re looking a little pale, Rory," he says, squatting in front of me. "Is there something specific you want to eat? Otherwise I’m just going to order one of everything and let you choose."
I roll my eyes and am rewarded with another small chuckle.
"Why are you always trying to get me to eat?"
"Well this time it’s because I know it’s going to help." He’s staring up at me with a crooked smile.
"Fine." Now that he mentions it, food sounds good. I’m hungry, probably from burning off all that energy.
"Great, what will it be?" He asks. "Should I grab the menu from the kitchen?"
"No, I know what I want. I’ll take the tamales."
He winks at me. "Good girl. I’m going to call and place the order. Anything else?"
God, he really needs to stop praising me like that. I already feel the flush from it covering my face.
"No, that’s it. Thanks."
He gets up to place the order, and I’m left staring at his shirt and his socks that I’m dressed in, our conversation running through my mind. I guess being more than a fleeting interest for Luciano Ricca is a dangerous place to find myself in. So why is it that I feel anything but afraid right now?
Instead, I’m fighting back a stupid grin. If he likes me enough to have his men watch me day after day for weeks on end... I’m not even sure what to call that. A crush?
