I smile back. “Grazie mile,” I reply in Italian then take a nosedive into the best pizza of the country.
Chapter Twenty-Two
CARTER
We can still hear Sarah’s voice coming out of the speaker along with the background noise one would expect from a public restaurant, the clinking of silverware and men being loud. The normal.
Yeah, she’s in Italy, all right.
Rage has been keeping his thoughts to himself ever since Sarah ran away from the train station. He has silenced our microphone and made a few phone calls, too. He talked in front of me instead of walking away from the office for privacy, which can only mean one thing – he trusts me a little more now.
A glass shatters in the background and brings me back to reality. I unmute the mic and ask Sarah, “Is everything all right there?”
“Yes, a customer ran into a waiter, and he dropped a glass from the tray. We are good.”
It’s early morning here, and this place is still alive, blasting music and people everywhere. No surprises there, though. Clubs are like this, they survive because of the nightlife.
Rage suddenly kills his call and stands up. He takes a few steps to the left of the room and comes back with two glasses and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. He pours the liquid in the two glasses and hands me one. “Here, drink. You earned it.”
Sarah’s sexual joke made an impact on him. It’s that or the wholefrustrated-train-kidnappingsituation, but I’m pretty sure he’s been through worse than that in his life. It has to be the joke, plus I’ve never seen Sarah joking like that with anyone else but Bruno…
Is Sarah really thinking about keeping this guy? Maybe she would just help Bruno and come back to Rage.
I could never tell this to Bruno. It would shatter him.
No, stop it, Carter. She’s doing this for Bruno.
But, is she doing this out of a moral reason, or because she loves him?
Maybe she does, maybe even joking about sex is nothing compared to how much she loves Bruno, and that’s why the man in front of me is sad, because he knows he doesn’t have a shot anymore.
I grab the glass, raise it, and using myI still need to work onAustralian accent I say, “Cheers mate,” and drink the whole thing.
We both lean back on our chairs. Rage puts his boots on the desk, and I don’t because, well, I still want to keep my head above my shoulders.
“You should go, get some shut eye. She’s going to stay at the diner a few more minutes before heading to the hotel,” he says, tension written on his face. “There’s no need for you to stay for that. Come back in a few hours.”
I try, but I can’t detect any harmful intentions in his tone.
To be fair, this isn’t be the first time he wants me gone so he can be alone with her, but like I said, his tone is clean, truthful, and to be honest, I’m spent. I could really use the break.
“Tell me something.” I put down the empty glass. “You know she will find him, right? I get that you two are getting along really well and all, but still, remember she was drugged when she said all those–”
“What? When she said what?” He says, as if pretending he isn’t obsessed with that.
“You know what. What I’m trying to say here is, why put yourself through all this when you know she’s going to throw herself to him the second she finds him?”
Rage looks at me for a few seconds, moving the glass in a circle. “Because I’m an idiot,” he finally answers then sips his whiskey.
That is, believe it or not, another sincere comment from the president of this MC.
He slams the glass on the desk and adds, “You know about that, right?” We both laugh, but I can see the pain he’s trying to conceal from me.
Our moment is rudely interrupted by the ringing of my cellphone on the desk. Rage and I both look at it with certain intensity, like somehow, we both hate the callers’ timing. It doesn’t matter who they might be. I pick it up and show it to him. The screen reads BRUNO.
Rage stands up, circles around the desk and before walking out, he says, “I’ll be back in ten minutes, pretty boy. You know your way out.” Then he closes the door behind him.
I answer the call. “Hey, what’s up?”Shit, I put too much energy on that line. He’s going to notice.
