“What is it?” I ask him, no longer concerned with teasing him.
He shakes his head. “Nothing. You should be talking to more people here, not hanging out at the bar,” he tells me simply.
“Since when is your job deciding what I should and shouldn’t be doing?” I raise a brow. “You’re here to watch over us, not dictate my movements.” The words some out of my mouth slightly slurred. I’m realizing just how intoxicated I’m getting.
“You’re drunk,” Damian accuses me. “Someone has to keep an eye on what you’re doing.”
I frown at him. “You’re being…sketchy,” I accuse him in return.
“How so?” he asks.
I scoff. “You’ve barely said a word to me since you got back from your ‘talk’ with Eivor. You won’t even tell me what it was about. Now the first thing you actually say to me is that I should be talking to more people…after you break up a perfectly good conversation.” My own jaw clenches.
Damian looks into my eyes with a pensive expression. “It was about the shooting, that’s all,” he tells me.
“Somehow I don’t believe you,” I say. “I think it was something else. I just don’t know why you won’t tell me.”
Damian sighs and looks to the side. “It’s…not something to talk about here.”
“Then let’s go somewhere else,” I say and reach out for his arm. I grip his sleeve and start to step away from the bar, but he doesn’t.
He’s quiet.
I look back at him. “You’re really not going to come with me?”
He doesn’t say anything else. Quiet and brooding like he’s been the last couple days.
I huff and let go of his sleeve. “Fine.” I brush my hands down the front of my suit jacket. “If you won’t tell me what this is about, then stay away from me. Next time you don’t like how a conversation I’m having looks, stay the fuck out of it.” I sneer at him, my words snappy and sharp.
I swear Damian flinches ever so slightly.
Good.
I turn away from him completely and take my inebriated self as far away from him as possible for the rest of the evening.
All the while thinking about what it could possibly be that he won’t tell me.
12
Chapter Twelve
Damian
Keeping my distance from Alessio while also watching over him has been difficult. Not just logistically, but it’s been hard mentally on me. Knowing what I know about him and Carmine but being unable to talk to anyone about it has been weighing on me heavily. Not to mention how suspicious I’ve become to Alessio. He knows that I’m hiding something, but I don’t think even he knows just how personal it is.
When their honeymoon is over, Rosalie and Alessio part ways as soon as Rosalie is home, and because my main priority is her—especially with her having the biggest target on her head—I’m forced to stay at the Fiorelli estate and wonder where Alessio is off to. If he’s going home to the Dresvanni estate or somewhere else.
“Don’t worry about Alessio,” Rosalie says, clearly tuning in on some of my concern. “He’s not the one they want to kill.” There’s a bit of callousness in her voice.
It’s 8:31 p.m., and everything in the house is far quieter than I can handle. It’s almost easier to manage big events than an empty house where anyone could be hiding.
The fireplace is burning. Patricia and Rosalie sit in the family room each reading their own book. If it weren’t for the fact that this house was the home of a man who would kill just about anyone to get what he wanted, it might actually be a quaint domestic scene.
“Where is he going for the night?” I ask slowly, trying to seem casual about it.
“Oh, I think to his penthouse. Don’t worry, he’ll have guards there watching over him,” Rosalie explains offhandedly, not seeming very concerned. Though when our eyes meet after a moment in the fire-lit room, there’s more worry there than I expect. She doesn’t voice it though.
“Good,” I say simply, and then keep quiet.
