Page 2 of The Contract

When I started looking into the Capellis, I realized that Evan wasn’t coming back. Not this time.

If I just wanted to kill Lorenzo Capelli, I’d get my hands on a gun and take my best shot at the fucker before his men killed me. Maybe if this was really about Evan, that’s what I’d do.

But the truth is … I just want to know where he was all those years. I want to know why he abandoned me with that mean asshole when I was ten years old. Yeah, I get that Evan was only fifteen at the time, but I needed him. I had nothingbuthim. Then I had nothing at all—and I’ve had nothing ever since.

It’s a long shot, working here. The only lead I have is Capelli, but I can’t access him. I already tried getting a job at his company. I didn’t get past reception.

He’s come in here before. This is his type of place, his type of people. So I serve drinks and listen. I wait for a clue, for some crumb of information. It’s better than waiting for someone who’s never coming back.

I scan the room for empty glasses or summoning gestures. There’s a way they do it here, fingers barely lifting, eyes not quite focusing on me. I’m not significant enough for eye contact.

Some people aren’t cut out for this job because they get all twisted up about that shit, but I’ve never been significant, so I barely notice.

Maybe that’s why my pulse jumps when I catch a pair of dark eyes locked on me. A pair of intense, demanding eyes.

On the one hand, that’s not unusual here. On the other … fuck, he’s on a whole different level.

He looks vaguely Italian with his dark eyes and light olive skin. His dark hair is fade cut but way shorter than mine. It works for him, but then anything probably would with a face like that.

He’s got a whole banquette to himself, one recessed into the side wall. I swear there were two blond men there a few minutes ago, and I never saw this guy come in. I would have noticed him descending from the mezzanine.

He doesn’t do the come-here finger flick. All the same, somehow, he summons me.

Those dark eyes remain locked on me as I make my way toward him. I catch myself halfway there. What the fuck am I doing?

My job, I tell myself. I need to see if he wants a drink. But I know, deep down, that something more far instinctive had me obeying the command in his eyes—and it pisses me off.

The way his firm lips tug tells me that my annoyance shows. I smooth my face.

He’s dressed entirely in black, through the waistcoat hugging his torso has subtle silver pinstripes. Against the cream leather of the banquette, his powerful build is obvious. He definitely works out. I can see it even in his legs, one draped over the other.

“Drink?” My sophisticated bartender act has failed me utterly. I’m stiff. I sound sharp. So I tack on, “Sir.”

His eyes travel from my face to my feet and back up as though he didn’t already have plenty of time to take in my black pants and close-fitting white button down. His gaze settles on my narrow black tie. He’s not wearing one, and the top few buttons of his black shirt are open.

I swallow hard then realize it’s my throat he’s watching.

“Sir?” I prompt. “Do you want anything?”

His lips tug again. “Oh, absolutely.”

His voice is deep and rich and does something weird to my body, like it sends an electrical current through me. I’ve never felt anything quite like it, and it’s not pleasant. It’s almost like he physically touched me.

I realize I’m scowling and try to soften my expression, but I don’t say anything more. I’ve already prompted him twice. If he wants a drink, he’ll have to say so.

The moment stretches with those dark, dangerous eyes locked on me. That current in my body travels, for some fucking reason, to my balls. What the fuck?

I’m about to tell him I’ll check back in a minute when he says, “Whatever red Saylor has open.”

It surprises the shit out of me. No one orders like that here, as though convenience matters. It’s always top this or top that and never mind if it takes six minutes to make. Certainly no one mentions staff by name.

Besides, I thought he’d order liquor, not wine. All the men do.

Eager to escape, I dip my chin and turn to go. He stops me with, “You will bring it to me.”

My heart skips. How the hell did he know I was going to chicken out and ask Saylor to do it?

I return to the bar to find Saylor already pouring a glass of red wine like she knew what he would order.

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