Page 22 of Corrupted Deception

“So, are we going to talk about it?” he asked.

I raised an eyebrow at him, waiting for him to elaborate, half-wishing he wouldn’t.

“Matteo was here before he went back to his dorm last night. He mentioned running into the hot little disappearing act from high school. I’m thinking you might have something to say about that.”

Matteo needed to learn to keep his mouth shut. Yet another thing he and I were going to have a conversation about.

I sighed and scrubbed my fingers through my hair. “Is this the part where I’m supposed to pour out my wounded heart? Maybe we should light some candles and grab the tissues?”

Deo scoffed. “You were pretty pissed when she left.”

“It was a long time ago,” I said aloud.

He shrugged like it was irrelevant. “Some things don’t have an expiration date,sì?”

“And you’re an expert now?” I asked, shaking my head disbelievingly.

“Hell, no,” he replied, laughing. “If I had a hundred years with Heidi, I still don’t think I’d be an expert.”

My brother had fallen hard for a doctor with a convoluted family history, and she was now his fiancée. He hadn’t just gotten a fiancée out of the deal, though. They were now foster parents—nearly adoptive parents—to Grayson, a fifteen-year-old boy and Alice, a six-year-old girl.

As if on cue, a knock sounded on the door, and the little girl came running in, not waiting for an answer.

“Buonasera,ZioCielo,” she said, pronouncing each syllable carefully while she smiled shyly.

When she’d first arrived here, she’d thought Deo was pretty much the greatest thing since sliced bread. Since Deo and Heidi announced their engagement, though, Alice had decided to shift her attention elsewhere.

“Buonasera, Alice,” I said, glad for the interruption.

She’d had a bath recently, and her long, dark hair was dripping a puddle onto the hardwood floor.

“Will you read me a story?” she asked me, eyes hopeful.

I didn’t have to look at the clock to know it was precisely 7:55 PM. It was the exact time she went in search of a story partner every night, which made her the best six-year-old I’d ever met—not that I’d met a great many of them.

“Of course,” I said, getting to my feet. “It would be my pleasure, Alice.”

If it saved me from a conversation about Charlotte at the moment, all the better.

She smiled brightly then turned to Deo. “And you too, Amadeo,” she said like she worried he’d feel left out.

He clasped a hand over his heart. “Second choice,” he said, mock-wounded. “But for you,principessa, anything.”

She smiled even brighter, revealing the gap in her teeth where she’d recently lost a baby tooth. Then she grabbed hold of both our hands and led us out of the office and up the stairs to her room.

When Deo opened the door, Heidi was standing next to the bed, shaking her head and smiling in amusement. With her dark hair and pale skin, she looked like a porcelain doll to me, pretty but too breakable.

“You’re going to have every man in the house doting on you pretty soon,luv,” she said to Alice.

“I think she already does,” I said right before Deo kissed his fiancée and Alice hopped into bed.

“And what are we reading tonight?” Deo asked her.

“Cappuccetto Rosso,”Alice replied in near-perfect Italian.

I laughed. Deo said she’d requested the same story—in Italian—every night. Soon, she’d be speaking more fluently than the rest of us.

Unfortunately, in less than thirty minutes, Alice was fast asleep, and Deo and I had returned to the office.

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