“I’ve already given my order to Caitlyn,” I reply, watching as my little sun walks around the counter. She looks at the other waitress with disdain. There she is, the woman I knew was in there somewhere. There’s a jealousy in her eyes that she can’t hide.
“Just coffee?” Caitlyn says.
“Yes, thank you,” I tell her.
Caitlyn places a mug in front of me and then fills it with black liquid I’m sure is meant to be coffee. She’s right. I won’t like this shit, but I’ll swallow it down. I figured I had to order something while I wait.
I sent a message to my cousin, who should be here any minute. I’m going to have someone stationed inside this diner for Caitlyn’s entire shift. We’re in one of the worst parts of the city, and I’m not about to leave her without security.
About fifteen minutes later, Dante walks in with his wife. He leads her over to a booth. I’m still trying to figure out how that smart-ass managed to snag her. Josie’s way out of my cousin’s league.
I approach his side of the table and greet him in Italian. “Hey, Thanks for coming.” I don’t care if Caitlyn realizes I’m having her watched, but I don’t need her to know that the people doing the watching are family. Not yet.
“So, you went and found yourself a wife. Alessandro owes me five grand. We took bets on how much longer it would be until you fell. I won.” Dante smirks. “Then again, I always do.”
“Whatever. Not a single hair on her head is to be touched,” I tell him.
“This isn’t my first rodeo,” he says, switching from Italian back to English. “Have you met Josie? She’s a student at NYU, studying to get her PhD. It’s our first date.” Dante smiles at his wife.
These two have some weird game they like to play where they pretend to be other people. They’ve always done it.
“Keep me out of your fucking foreplay, Dante. And don’t leave until Orlando gets here,” I tell him.
“Done.” He nods his head.
I return to the counter and drop a hundred-dollar bill in front of Caitlyn. I lean over the top till I’m a breath away from her. “I’ll be back at seven. Have a great day.”
“Wait! Let me get you change,” she says, grabbing the cash and stepping towards the register.
“Keep it. You do take tips here, right?” I smirk and walk out.
Once I’m back at my car, I head towards the Petrov building in the city. I have an office there, and the computer systems I need to find out everything there is to know about Caitlyn. I have the photograph I took of her driver’s license and the address listed on it. It won’t take me long before I find out who she’s running from. Who is going to find themselves in my fucking basement.
It’s like taking candy from a baby. I have her entire life in front of my eyes within twenty minutes. Most of it, I’m not interested in.What I am interested in is the man she’s been living with for the past three years. And why the fuck she didn’t leave him sooner.
Henry Sawyer, twenty-five years old. A lawyer, working at a firm in California. She came all the way across the country to get away from this asshole.
My office door opens, and my father walks in before taking one of the chairs opposite me. He doesn’t say a word. Just stares, waiting for me to fill the silence.
After a good two minutes of neither of us speaking, I get annoyed and grunt. “Mom told you, didn’t she?”
“Youshould have told me,” he says.
“It’s new.” I lift a shoulder. “I just fucking met the girl yesterday, and Mom has me married off already.”
“You had a woman in your home. What are we supposed to think, Neo?” My father knows I don’t take anyone to my home.
“She had nowhere else to go.”
“You and I both know there are at least three empty Petrov apartments in this city you could have put her up in.” He smirks. “So, what do we know about her? I suspect that’s what you’re doing here?”
“She was mugged yesterday, smacked around a bit. She just moved to the city from California. A fact she hasn’t shared yet. And she’s running from what I suspect is an abusive ex.”
“Baggage,” my father says.
“Could be worse. She didn’t stab me and leave me for dead.” Which is something my mother did in fact do to him whentheyfirst met.
“Good times.” My dad smiles like it’s a fond memory.
