She knew she shouldn’t be arguing with him right now. It didn’t matter what he said. The important thing right now was that she somehow kept him from discovering that Connor was here.
“You’re too sensitive,” Leo said dismissively, He walked around her, and a desperate panic gripped her as she realized he was heading in the direction of the study.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, quickly moving to block his path while her mind scrambled to come up with a way to stop him from going in there.
“It’s none of your business. You’re too damn pampered to be a part of the organization.”
“You know that I’ve never wanted to be a criminal.”
“Oh, I know, princess. You like to come around just to look down on us from your high horse.”
“You sound jealous. It’s not my fault that Dad groomed you to be his second-in-command.I’mnot the one that makes you do this.”
“Makes me?” He let out a cold laugh. “I’m a powerful man. And one day, I’ll run the whole organization. You won’t be able to bask in the glow of being the only daughter of the don when that happens. You’ll be nothing.”
It amazed her that he thought she wanted to be associated with this at all. He was completely wrong, but she had a feeling he was too full of resentment to believe anything she said.
Suddenly, he was shoving her to the side. It was so unexpected that she stumbled and had to regain her balance before she could follow him.
He was already pushing open the study door when she reached him.
No, no, no.
What was she going to do? If there was a physical altercation between the men, she’d have to step in, which would mean choosing a side. Her brother was a total ass, but if she turned on him, that was it. There would be no going back.
But it turned out that the room was empty. There were no papers strewn across the desk, and when Leo marched around behind it, he didn’t say anything about the locked drawer being open, so she assumed that it wasn’t.
She sagged against the doorframe as her panic drained out of her body. Leo turned back around and glared at her.
“What are you still doing here? Go.”
His barked command would normally piss her off, but she was more than happy to listen to him today. Shutting the door, she rushed back toward the foyer, hoping that Connor had somehow made it back to the car. But as she passed the dining room, a strong arm shot out, looping around her waist and pulling her into the dark room with a hand over her mouth to stifle her startled yelp.
“It’s me,” Connor said, turning her around.
Alessia relaxed, and he removed his hands from her body. She had the fleeting thought that she wished his touch lingered, but that was crazy. They were still in danger here.
But then she met his eyes. Even in the dim lighting, the burning intensity affected her. Warmth and longing rushed through her. He was standing so close to her, only inches separated them. It would be so easy to step into him, to press her lips against his.
“We should get out of here,” Connor said, and she dropped her eyes so that he couldn’t see the disappointment there.
“Yeah, right. I just wish Leo hadn’t shown up. All this risk, and we didn’t even get what we came for.”
Alessia was shocked when Connor grinned. “Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”
8
CONNOR
The last thing he expected this evening was to end up at Alessia’s apartment. She insisted that they come here when they left her parents’ house. He thought he might have gotten some information about the trafficking ring from the pictures he’d taken quickly after Alessia left the room. He was in a hurry, so he couldn’t be sure, but now that they were at her apartment, they could review the pictures and see what they had.
Her apartment was so different from the large and impersonal house they just left. It was the perfect size for a single woman, with warm colors and personal touches everywhere. There were romance books on a shelf in the living room, which surprised him, and candles all over the place. That, along with a warm fleece blanket on the back of the couch and a mug left on the end table with half-drank hot tea, told him that she liked things cozy and comfortable above all else.
He felt like he was learning more about her just from stepping into this apartment than he’d picked up in the last few days that he’d known her. He took a seat on the couch and an especially fluffy cat hopped right into his lap.
He handed over his phone to Alessia, petting the cat absentmindedly as she scanned through the pictures. He continued to look around, and it struck him that he was comfortable here.
He trusted her now.
