By the time I saw Alessio again Christmas was in full swing around here. Rather than the typical lingerie choices we usually had, everyone matched.
A small red skirt with white feathers all around the bottom and a red bra with feathers around the top of the bust. To complete our outfit we all wore long red gloves up past our elbows, a choker with a jingle bell dangling from it, and a Santa hat.
"Have you seen Nicolo lately?" I asked the girl, Rita, who was behind the counter.
"Who?"
"Nicolo." She gave me a blank stare and I rolled my eyes. "Verme."
"Oh honey this is the VIP. You need to be checking other rooms, we don't let any worms through these doors."
"Yeah, you're right." I agreed and started out.
"Hey wait! You can't go now! You're on the clock!" She called after me but I ignored her.
I hadn't seen my cousin for over a week, nearly two of them. I knew he didn't go to the mattresses, I'd seen him after Alessio had left. So where could he be now?
"Excuse me Destiny." I called out to one of the girls. "Have you seen my cousin? His name is Nicolo but he goes by Verme. He's really young, really timid, if you give him so much as a dirty look he'll practically shit himself. Used to blush at an exposed ankle, stammers around pretty girls."
She shook her head and kept moving.
"Shit."
"Katherine!" I heard a sharp tone.
"Oh good! I actually wanted to see you!" This was the first time I had seen him since that night. I had expected things to be awkward with him, but now I was so worried about my cousin the memories of that night were long gone.
"What are you doing? You're supposed to be in the lounge! You can't just walk out!" Alessio said as he stomped over to me. I glanced down to his chest, covered in his perfect suit, and then back up to his angry face.
"Where has Nicolo been? I haven't seen him in almost two weeks."
The anger drained from his face abruptly. "Come on." He said taking me by the elbow.
I pulled my elbow away sharply. "You know where he is?" What a stupid question. He knew everything. Nothing got past him. Nothing.
"Come and talk to me."
"No." I said as firmly as he always did. "You know where he is. Tell me. Why isn't he down here? He wouldn't just leave me alone for this long."
"Just come talk with me. You can call it a day early."
"I've only been working for like an hour."
"Then a vacation day." He shrugged. "Come on." He grabbed my wrist and tried to pull me with him but I wouldn't budge. "Per favore."
(Please)
I glared at him but finally started with him. He dragged me back to his office and sat at his desk. I stood with crossed arms. "Well?"
"Cigar?" He offered.
I momentarily recalled fighting over a cigar in the hotel room but pushed the flustering thought aside. "You know where he is?" I reached across the desk and plucked the cigar from his mouth as he was getting ready to light it, knowing that if he did he would sit and puff on his cigar for at least half a minute before speaking to me again.
"Buon' anima."
"Alessio, I'm seriously not in the mood. Where is my Nicolo? Is he hurt? Did you let him quit? Was he arrested? Just tell me."
"Buon' anima is a pretty common phrase around these parts." He stood up and walked around the desk to be closer to me. He leaned against the desk. If I would have wanted to I could have reached out and felt his chest again, he was that close now. "It means rest his soul." He said simply. Casually.
So casually in fact that it made me furious. In a moment of stupidity I tried to slap him but he caught my wrist easily. "Let me go. Son of a bitch."
"Katherine." He sounded annoyed as he grabbed my other wrist too before I could try to pull away. "Calm down."
But I couldn't. My head was spinning. I wouldn't accept this, there was no way. "Fúck you! What happened?"
"It was supposed to just be a drop. But they knew about the war. That I wasn't even in the state. That our forces at home were weak. They saw it as an opportunity to make off with the drugs and not drop the dough."
"You don't even care! You talk about it so casually!"
"He knew the risks when he joined. We all did. It is unfortunate, and we have the utmost of respect for Nicolo."
"Oh so he's Nicolo now." I spat.
"Katherine-"
"You're disgusting." I tried to pull away. "This is all your fault!"
"Calm down-"
"Tell me." I demanded.
"Tell you what?"
"You have to tell me. To actually tell me. I won't believe it until I actually hear it. You have to say it." I needed to hear it.
He watched me for a few moments. The clocks ticked loudly in the background as we stood in silence. He kept his eyes focused on mine. "Nicolo is dead."
I pulled away from him and this time he let me. I stumbled backwards away from him as if I had been shoved. "This is all your fault."
He didn't say anything, just continued to watch me with a cautious edge.
"You may see death everyday but I don't! He was damn near all I had left and you took him from me you bastard!"
"I didn't-"
"I hate you- you- you-"
"What Katherine? What am I?" He snapped suddenly.
"You're a murderer." I yelled. It sounded like the worst possible thing I could accuse a person of but he rolled his eyes.
"I am the head of a fúcking mafia. Of course I'm a murderer!"
"Oh God." I groaned and put my hands to my head. "Oh no. Oh God." I looked up sharply. "When?"
"About a week ago. No more than eight days...nine at most."
"You don't even know when?" I gasped. I hated him. I really did.
"I wasn't here Katherine. And I'm sorry for that."
"I'm going to be sick." I groaned holding my stomach and bending over.
His hands were around my waist, holding me upright.
"I have to, my uncle, I need to...I need to be there..."
"Calm down. Katherine you need to breathe."
I pushed and swatted at Alessio's hand, the feeling of someone else touching me just felt wrong. It made my skin crawl. I need a few moments to just crouch over with my hands on my knees and hyperventilate. Every time Alessio would put a hand on my back to try to comfort me it seemed to make things worse. It felt like forever. I repeated in my head over and over again to calm down but the tightness in my chest wouldn't stop. I finally managed to calm myself down, only to start up again, and then had to force myself to calm down again.
When I finally stopped hyperventilating I stayed bent over for a few more moments, waiting to see if another panic attack would hit me but it didn't. When I stood up the world looked like it was jumping and I was immediately light headed.
Alessio tried to help me but I pulled away quickly. I was too proud. I felt exhausted in every way possible. Mentally, emotionally, physically. For a few moments every thought in my mind subsided and the only thing I could think of was Alessio's bed and how badly I needed to just sit or lay down. I was lightheaded but with focusing every fiber of my being, I was able to walk almost perfectly. Slowly, but mostly in a straight line.
I sat down on Alessio's bed and a moment later he followed me into the room and handed me a bottle of water and sat beside me.
I didn't even argue with him, didn't care to glare, to refuse the drink out of spite. I took a drink and after closing the bottle again fell backwards on the bed.
"The funeral?"
"Is over."
I let out a shaky breath. "You didn't think maybe that was something I deserved to be able to attend?"
"Katherine, I'm sorry it just...it wasn't possible."
"It was you just didn't want me to." I snapped and rolled onto my side to face away from him. "You're like a magician, you can make just about anything g happen. Everything is possible. You could have brought me there easily. You should have brought me to him. You should have at least told me."
He put a hand on my shoulder and forced me to roll over to face him. He was laying down on the bed on his side facing me. I was angry. So, so angry. But also, I was hurting. Hurt so, so, badly. And I scooted up further onto the bed and he pulled me into him.
"I didn't want to see you like this."
"Why." I grumbled into his chest. He clearly hated me.
"I'm not heartless. Despite what you may have heard or believe. I'm not cruel."
"How many people have you killed?"
He stiffened. "I wasn't expecting a question like that."
"How many people have you looked in the eye, and then shot between their brows? How many times have you laughed at someone begging for their lives, or pushed someone who was still living into a body of water with their body weighed down? You're honestly going to sit here and tell me you're not a cruel or heartless person? I'll bet you don't even know how many lives you've ended. Nicolo? He's just another notch on the bedpost, a notch you won't even care to carve. He was a nobody to you but not to me."
"He wasn't a nobody to me Katherine, and neither are you. Yes, I have killed a lot of men. And I've done so most times without a second thought. But you have to understand who those people were to me. The members in this Mafia? They are my family, the people that I have killed are people who have hurt my family, have killed my family, cheated my family, betrayed my family. I have never just killed for no reason. Maybe I don't kill in the most merciful of ways, but I don't kill for fun and pleasure. I'm not going to lie and say I don't get pleasure out of taking someone out when they deserve it, especially those people who have taken out my own."
"Did you take out the guys that killed Nicolo?"
"Katherine, I may not have known you for long. But I think I'm starting to understand you. And neither answer I give you is going to make you happy. Both would probably make you feel worse. If I did, then you're probably going to sit here and wonder how I killed them, and if they had a family of their own, if they begged for their lives, if Nicolo would have wanted them dead...but if I tell you I didn't kill them you're going to get angry. You're going to say Nicolo was a nobody to me, that I care about everyone else in this family except for him. That it isn't fair. So I'm not going to tell you. Because I'm not cruel. And I don't want to make this any worse for you than it already is."
I buried my face in his chest and he ran his fingers lazily through my hair.
"Did you attend the funeral?"
"Of course. Does that make you mad?"
"A little." I admitted.
"Does it make you feel better too?"
I pulled my head away from his chest so we could actually look at each other. "A little." I admitted.
"Do you feel better now?" He asked almost gently.
"I feel horrible." We fell into silence for a few minutes and I slowly laid my head back on his chest and he resumed running his fingers through my hair. "He was my last cousin you know." I said finally. It wouldn't surprise me if he did know, but for some reason I still wanted to tell him anyway. "He had a brother and a sister, and I had a brother. It was all of us, our grandma, and both of our parents all in one three bedroom place. Well, technically it was two bedroom but it had this huge attic. They stuffed all us kids into the attic together. Both our moms bailed, both our dads were bops, both of our brothers got involved in rival gangs, and as soon as his sister hit seventeen she ran off with some boyfriend of hers. Then...it was just me and Nicolo. Gosh, did he take it hard when I moved out." I sighed and closed my eyes. "He wasn't supposed to go down this path. The same path our brothers went down. He should have known better...I should have been there to watch him-"
"You're an adult. In your twenties. You couldn't stay there forever."
"I could have taken him with me." I sat up and covered my face with my hands. "I should have taken care of him."
He scoffed. "You could barely afford to feed yourself."
I dropped my hands. "I was doing just fine thank you. We would have gotten by." I had no clue whether or not he knew I was lying. He probably did. For all I know he could have had a copy of my bank statement or my 'last warning' utility bills.
He grabbed my wrist and pulled me down and into him again, immediately encircling his arms around my waist. I rolled over so my back was to him and he propped his chin up on my shoulder. I closed my eyes and let memories of Nicolo fill me. He was a good cousin, and a good person.
Just as I was starting to feel myself drifting I was jerked awake by Alessio moving away from me. I sat upright immediately. "Where are you going?" I asked almost frantically as I turned around to face him.
He was sitting on the edge of the bed unbuttoning his shirt and had already kicked off his shoes and removed his jacket and tie. "Relax. I'm not going anywhere." I hated the fact that that eased me so much. "I'm just getting more comfortable." He said easily.
"Oh." I said feeling a blush creeping up. I laid back down on my side again.
"Are you staying in that?"
I closed my eyes and ignored him. I felt a flutter in my chest when he pulled the duvet from under me and threw it back over my body. Moments later he was pulling me back against his bare chest. My God, was he hot. Literally, he was practically radiating heat.
Everyone handled death differently, but personally, I'd never been the "let's jump into bed and celebrate our life" kind of person because of it. Yet, here I was. Not that we were celebrating or anything...but...
"You can wear my shirt if you want it." He offered.
I rolled over to face him, the bell attached to my choked jingled as if to try to remind me who he was and what we were doing. "People are going to start talking."
"About what?" He asked carelessly and rolled away from me, when he rolled back he was holding his shirt.
"Me in your room. Your clothes. Your bed." I muttered and took the shirt. I sat up.
"Everyone knows I don't stay here." He shrugged.
I watched him, waiting for him to look away so I could change, when he didn't I laid back down and pulled the blanket up to my chin and scooted over to the very edge of the bed to avoid him while I took the lingerie off and pulled his shirt quickly around me. "What do you mean you don't stay here?"
He chuckled. "You can't honestly think I actually live down here? I disappear for days, weeks even sometimes. I don't live here. I have a home, I have several homes even."
"Well la de dah." I muttered with an eye roll.
He laughed again. "I can't believe you'd actually think I would live down here. You crazy silly girl."
"Well I'm sorry. When someone has a bed, a wardrobe, an office, a fridge, I sort of start assuming-"
"Should I ever need to...disappear. This is one of a few, I guess you could say, hide outs, I have. I've never even slept in this bed before, nor have I let anyone else." He added just before pulling me back across the bed to meet him.
"Other than me?" I muttered giving him my back again.
"Obviously." His hands pushed past the half buttoned shirt to rest on the bare skin at my hips.
After several long minutes of silence I finally spoke again.
"You know I still hate you right?"
"Mmm." He moaned and dipped his face into the crook of my neck.
"And I still blame you for this."
"Mmmmm."
"I'm never going to forgive you for this one."
"Vai a dormie" He muttered and I shuttered at the feel of his breath shooting across the nape of my neck. I felt the tightening of the skin on his face and his cheekbones raised into a smile. "Sei fredda?" He asked in a teasing tone and turned his head so his lips pressed lightly to my neck making me jump which in turn made him laugh. "You're too much sometimes." He whispered against my neck. "Now sleep."
(Go to sleep) (Are you cold?)
"O-okay."
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Surprise! A double update! Only because the last chapter was so short, didn't even break 1k and I HATE when I see one of my favorite books has an update and it's super short, it's even worse when my favorite character isn't even in the chapter...so I present you with a second update, and a much longer chapter <3
I actually like this chapter though. Alessio and Kate seem to be coming together more and more on an emotional level but Nicolo's death is going to shake things up a bit in a way I'll bet no one can predict ;P
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