If the copswereto come looking for me, that is.
It’s not like my extended family would notice my absence from this world. And with my parents and sister gone, I’m alone.Except for Luna. She would miss me. And possibly Cid, but that one’s still up in the air, and besides, it’s not like he knows how to work a phone or speak in anything other than demanding meows.
“I’m not killing you,” Alessio says, his tone businesslike as he releases my arm. His ocean-blue eyes flick back up to mine. “‘O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts, and men have lost their reason.’”
It takes me a second to realize that he’s quoting part of Marc Antony’s soliloquy fromJulius Caesar. Something new to add to my list of unusual nerd kinks: a sexy mobster reciting William Shakespeare. Because maybe it’s the intensity of his stare or the fact that he’s close enough to touch and dressed all in black like some kind of Mafia god, I don’t know, but my panties are completely soaked right now.
“‘Bear with me,’” I add, picking up where he left off. “‘My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar, and I must pause till it come back to me.’”
He gives me a slow clap. “You get an A, Miss Austen.”
Damn it, I could almost forget everything he is, everything he’s done. The gangster charm he turned on me that night in St. Thomas is back, and it’s pretty irresistible.
I clear my throat and rub the ointment into my arm, needing a distraction. “Thanks. You get an A for effort too, even though I don’t teach English Lit at the moment. I’m impressed you remember those lines after all these years.”
“Eh.” He shrugs. “I only liked high school English for one reason, and it didn’t have anything to do with Shakespeare. Miss Esposito was a babe.”
“Ew.” Thankfully, my ovaries choose to recall why this man is all wrong for me in every way and settle back down. I can think again. “Thanks for the first aid, but I’m sure you probably have better things to do than tend cat scratches. Feel free to go.”
“Pack up your things,” he orders me, like I didn’t just basically tell him to get lost.
“I already told you, I’m not packing up anything because I’m not going with you. I’m staying right here.”
“It’s not safe for you here,” he says like he’s reasoning with a small child who won’t let go of her favorite toy.
“I have guards. I’m in a building with its own security.”
“You don’t know Mikhail Sidorov like I do.” A muscle ticks in his jaw. “Now go and pack your fucking shit or I’ll pack it for you, and I have a feeling you won’t like that.”
He’s right. I definitely won’t like that. The last thing I want is for Alessio Andriani to be rooting through my bras and underwear and piling them into a suitcase.
“Who’s Mikhail Sidorov?” I ask instead of obeying his edict. “Is that the guy who was following me yesterday?”
“Yes.”
A chill goes down my spine. “What was he doing following me around the city? I’m just a creative writing professor who’s here temporarily to cat-sit.”
“Unfortunately, we don’t know anything more yet than what I’ve told you.”
Icy dread settles in my stomach. I really don’t like the sound of this.
“You know, if you had led with the whole Russian Mafia thing, I might have been more amenable to going wherever it is you want me to go.”
“The less you know, the better.”
I wince. “See, that doesn’t work for me.”
“It doesn’t matter what works for you. I’m my brother’s second-in-command, and it’s my job to make sure nothing happens to you. There’s no way he’d want you to stay here, knowing that Sidorov has been sniffing around.”
I bite my lip. “Maybe I should call Luna and run this by her.”
He raises a brow. “And ruin their honeymoon? Go for it. They’ll both be back here as soon as they can get the jet up and running.”
Damn it, he’s right. If I tell Luna, she’ll be here in a heartbeat. And that will defeat the purpose of my coming here in the first place. I can’t do that to her.
“Valid point,” I allow slowly, still thinking my way through the info dump he’s just thrown at me. “But where do you propose taking me that’s going to be so much safer than here? Won’t this Sidorov guy be able to find me anywhere I am in the city?”
Alessio cracks his knuckles. “We would take precautions, and we have multiple locations that aren’t common knowledge.”
