“I was wondering if maybe I could get your, I mean, Romeo’s autograph?” I grimaced slightly at how it sounded.
He tilted his head; one side of his mouth lifting as a lightness flashed across his silvery blue eyes. “Why?”
“It wouldn’t be for me,” is what I should’ve started with, “but for my friend’s boyfriend. He’s a big fan of yours. Kira asked if I could get it for him.”
“This boyfriend being the smartass dickhead, right?”
I smiled nervously.
He assessed me, as if waiting for me to change my mind, and shrugged. “Let me find a pen.”
I started and blinked. “Wait, really?”
He held his cigarette between his lips and leaned through the front passenger-side window, opening the glove compartment and rifling through its contents. When he pulled back out, he held up an old, cardboard drink coaster from The Den. A pen in his other hand. “Will this do?”
“It’s perfect.” For Aiden anyway.
Using the roof of the car to lean on, puffing freehand on his cigarette, he scribbled across the back of the coaster and handed it to me. I didn’t know what I was expecting his handwriting to look like, but it wasn’t the cursive R and wriggly line.
“Damn. Swapping numbers already?” Our heads snapped to Seb as he approached the car with a bag of snacks, three bottles of soda tucked between his fingers, and a huge grin on his face as he wiggled his eyebrows at us.
“No,” I said too quickly. “It’s just an autograph for my friend’s boyfriend.”
Dean was putting out his cigarette with his shoe when Seb frowned at him and said, “Since when did you start giving out autographs?”
“I didn’t,” Dean said nonchalantly.
Eating salted pretzels and sticks of jerky, while sipping soda from glass bottles, on the hood of a Cadillac with two illegal fighters wasn’t what I had on the cards for this summer, but here I was. It was a strange experience but equally enthralling. Especially as Seb made light-hearted jokes, most at Dean’s expense, and Dean allowed himself to smile a little more. They were lopsided, half smiles that almost let his cheek dimple.
I had to stop myself from staring when the subtle dip in his cheek made an appearance. This hardened fighter with a near-permanent scowl, had a smile dimple even if he hadn’t let it show in full.
I perched myself up on the edge of the hood by the windshield. My ankles crossed over and dangling from the side of the car while Seb and Dean leaned against the front. Both were tall and athletic but complete opposites in personality.
Dean was the Doberman of the two, subtly eyeing off any potential threats in the nearby vicinity, while Seb was the Golden Retriever. Unbothered by anything going on around us. It was hard to believe that he was even one of Antonio’s best fighters, or that he fought in an underground fight club at all. He seemed too kind to exist in a world like that.
“Are you both a part of the Mafia? Like Antonio?”
I had been sitting there so quietly, eating my food and busy with my thoughts, that it was no surprise they looked at me as if they may have forgotten I was there. Or, like myself, they were just surprised that of all the questions to ask about them, that was the one I chose. The one I hadn’t let mull over before opening my mouth.
I looked down, frowning at myself. “Sorry. That’s none of my business—”
“You mean like made men?” Dean asked, pushing off the front of the car with his hip and turning to face me. His expression was neutral as he shook his head. “We’re not even considered associates.”
“I’m definitely not.” Seb had also turned around, taking a bite of jerky before continuing. “You have to be Italian for that, right?” he said to Dean.
Dean nodded and pushed his hands into the pockets of his shorts. “Or at least Italian descent. You’ve also gotta be sponsored by another made member to join.”
Seb looked at me but jabbed a thumb in Dean’s direction. “Which is why he’s being groomed by Antonio.”
My brows shot up and I looked to Dean, who rolled his eyes.
“I’m not being groomed.”
Seb took a step back and widened his arms to gesture at the Cadillac. “He gave you a car.”
“That was a few years ago.”
“It’s still a gift.”
