Page 93 of Tide of Treason
“‘Cause I plan on enjoying three full weeks of it,” he added.
Not a joke.
My jaw ticked. The balcony doors caught my eye, and an idea formed. Forty floors down, give or take. Too high to be mistaken for an accident, but just low enough that if I angled it right, he’d land between the valet and the smoking section without too much of a mess. A quick glance at Kayla’s apartment layout told me the wind speed might be an issue. I’d have to time it just right.
Niccolò smirked. “I won’t try to talk you out of murdering me in my sleep, Andrade, nor would I expect anything less. But if you’re planning to push me off thebalcony, you should know your littleprincipessahas more brains than both of us combined, and there is nothing in this world that would stop her from finding you.”
He had a point. Unfortunately, I wasn’t in the habit of letting people make good points. I did step closer. Enough that he had to tilt his head back to meet my eyes. His smile didn’t waver, except I caught the shift in his stance, the way his fingers flexed near his pocket. Smart. He knew I had the capacity to end him where he stood, that I could rearrange the architecture of his face with one well-placed shot.
Reaching for the suitcase at his feet, I popped the latch and lifted the lid. My gut sank to my shoes. A neat row of shirts, slacks pressed with that stiff fucking starch the Italians loved. A breath escaped, slow and reluctant, sliding past clenched teeth. I shut the case.
Three weeks.
Keeping him here for three weeks.
I felt Kayla’s gaze before I looked up. An uncharacteristic plea lingered in the depths of those eyes. I saw it. Crushed it. My pride was a beast, ugly and hungry, and tonight it wanted blood. I let it rise, swallowing what little softness I had left for her, let it fill my chest until I felt nothing but the bitter tear of the phantom bandage coming off, skin tearing away with it.
She’d chosen her side.
Her verdict hung in the hush that trailed me down the hall.
27 | Kayla
30 years old
Present day
Niccolò’s presence inmy penthouse was tolerated the way one tolerated a mild case of food poisoning—unpleasant sweat prickling my neck, stomach twisting, and the creeping dread that it would all come up eventually. Three weeks, he said. He’d agreed to three weeks as a show of loyalty to his family. It’d keep him in the loop, get him off probation with my papà, and inch him closer to laying claim on Braga territory once I handed it over.
What went unsaid was a little harder to swallow.
I made Lucius sad.
The realisation sat in my throat. Heavy. Immovable. Not just sad . . . gutted. The way he looked at me when he saw Niccolò’s suitcase, when he realised I’d made my choice beforehe even had a chance to argue otherwise. I could still feel his warmth, snuffed out in one reckless moment. I hadn’t even reached the bathroom before everything I’d eaten came flooding back up.
That same night, the implication that I’d be in bed with Niccolò had been met with a blank stare and a frosty reminder I stopped screwing him months ago. The ensuing tantrum, which led to him calling me a liar, prompted me to call Vito before the man could test my patience anymore by saying I was infatuated with my sister’s husband. His sulking went on for hours, peppered with threats of turning Vito into a eunuch. I admired the ambition but not the timing.
That’d been on Monday.
Today, Friday, I seriously questioned a follow-through on the castration. With just under two weeks left of tolerating him, my patience dangled alongside every urge to stab him with a fork. Each passing minute he droned on about “improving” my office décor at family dinner, the impulse to sever his carotid artery multiplied. He’d even settled on a color palette. Something soft and gray. Something “calming,” he’d said, to flatter my “dark features and darker tastes.”
I glanced at Papà on the far end of the table, wondering if this was some elaborate SNL skit. But he seemed to be buying every word the di Santuorsro sold. When Niccolò finished, Papà clapped him on the back, the noisy smack hammering against my migraine, dancing in my vision with every irritated twitch of my eye.
That’s when I decided I couldn’t handle another second, let alone another two weeks, breathing the same air as thisman.
“You’re right,” I said, cutting him off mid-sentence.
He paused, brows lifted. “Pardon?”
“My office,” I repeated, “is definitely due for a revamp. Would be wonderful if you could take care of it within, oh . . .” I glanced at the clock. “The next hour?”
His features hardened. “One hour?”
I smiled, all teeth. “If you need shortcuts, please start by dismantling my desk. It’s the worst eyesore, really.”
That, I knew well, was a point of contention.
My desk had been my papà’s before he passed on the torch. It was where he kept his favorite gun and the ashtray I’d made in kindergarten. My first ever ashtray. I’d presented it with all the pride of a five year old, and the thought of Niccolò gutting it to make an IKEA knockoff filled my mouth with acid. I was, however, very much the woman who’d throw out the whole desk to avoid an endless spat with the man currently glowering at me across the table.
