Page 12 of Third Degree

“Fun?” He chuckled, letting his deep tone echo into the crashing of the waves. “I don’t do fun.”

“Ah, that can’t be true!” I playfully slapped his arm with my hand that wasn’t linked with his. “You must do something.”

“Ah, I like to garden a little bit.” He quickly added, “I am terrible at it, though. Don’t take away my man card just yet.”

I brought my hand to my mouth while letting out the largest laugh. “Ilovegardening. I prefer planting flowers to any sort of vegetable, but the house we’re staying at has a large vegetable portion of their garden, so I have really been able to work on those plants.”

“You do a lot of gardening in the Chicago winters?”

I’d forgotten I had told him I wasn’t from here.

“Yeah.” I nodded. “My papa built me a greenhouse in the back so I can make most of my florals survive our winters in there.” We walked a few steps in sync.

“Papa?” he asked me curiously.

“Oh yeah, sorry. Dad. We are Italian.”

“Interesting,” was all he said. Then, “If you were a plant”—he looked at me with those piercing green eyes and pouty lips—“what plant would you be?”

“That is a fun question.” I tugged on his arm playfully, and his lips turned up at the corners, offering me a small smile. “If I were a plant, I would be a rose.” I nodded, seemingly satisfied with my response.

“Why?” His head turned in question.

“Roses are a classic beauty.” I beamed. “They get slack for being an old-school flower, but they can transform a bouquet into something beautiful and modern, and they come in all colors. They do require a bit of coddling and help, sure, but once they start growing, they really expand quickly.” I sighed. “Plus, they smell good too. My favorite scent.”

We continued talking about some of our favorite things to grow in our gardens before I realized that we were only a couple of houses away from my cousins’. Nerves made my stomach turn.

If Elio lived here, then he must know about the reputation my cousins had in this sleepy town, and I wanted to not associate with them, so we walked to the neighbor’s house, and I stopped.

“This is me.” I gestured noncommittally in the direction of the two houses. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Elio.” I pulled my arm away from his elbow and felt his thick hand lace with mine as I walked toward the house.

“I didn’t get your name.” His voice wafted like thick raw silk into the air, wrapping around my neck as it took the air out of my lungs.

“Gianna,” I croaked into the night.

I cast a fleeting glance back, only to see him framed by the dim moonlight, an enigmatic silhouette against the darkness that concealed me, leaving an air of anticipation and unanswered questions in his wake.

5

Elio

37 years old

I think my new favorite smell was the scent of fresh-cut roses. I didn’t sleep much yesterday after I got home from my evening walk, especially after running into Gianna.

It was unexpected, yet my curiosity the moment she stepped into my path took over any logical portion of my head.

And all I could think about when I got home was the way her silky skin felt against my rough hands. The cool yet comforting touch of her fingers against my own. The way her curves dipped into each other as if someone had sculpted her from the Roman goddesses themselves.

Yet somehow, the moment I came home and needed to take a very cold shower, I felt like I was somehow cheating on my wife. Like I needed to scrub the indiscretions off me. It was an automatic mood killer.

Plus, she was eighteen! Nineteen years younger than me. Two fucking decades. She was someone’s daughter.

Not to mention Bea. God, though, it was so hard not to think about the fire and energy Gianna had last night. It even sparked something under my ass to want to look at how the club was doing.

So this morning, I decided to forget about the woman and pulled out my laptop to read some of the reports from the club.

They were fucking terrible. The club was losing business quickly because my associate, Tony, refused to modernize anything inside of it. He had been using the same DJ for the last two years, and no one went to a club if the DJ sucked and wasn’t rotated out. There hadn’t been any themed nights since I left. It was all bad business in general.

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