“Well, in that case, I am glad his aim was on point.” I collect my phone from the table and stand. “Next time, I hope you send the same guy.”
“Or you could just text me in advance. Give me a heads-up that you’ll be in New York.”
“I will think about it.”
Ajello gives me a look that holds a bit of surprise. “You’ve never been unreasonable, Adriano. Is something going on with you?”
Yes. Messing with the don of New York to distract myself from a certain woman and an ill-advised kiss might be construed as unreasonable. “See you around, Ajello.”
Rather than calling my driver to pick me up, I want a few minutes of fresh air. Well, as fresh as it gets around here. So instead, I turn left after exiting the café and head down the street toward the underground garage where my limo is waiting for me.
The last couple of weeks in New York have been one headache after another. And not my usual migraines. I’m still trying to come to grips with the almost complete waste of time this trip has turned out to be. I don’t do well with any kind of failure. My planned meeting at the annual Best In Business Gala with a potential new associate never happened. The guy simply didn’t show up. That pissed me off, but not half as much as getting another text from the gloating, rhymey bastard on the heels of learning that one of the offshore rigs in the Gulf of Mexico I invested in went up in flames.
17:23 Unknown:
Weigh the risk, invest with grace.
For though it shines with rich affair,
Oil’s a fire, buyer beware.
To say I was in a bad mood yesterday when I arrived at Naos would be an understatement. Then, a fucking gang stormed the club right as I was finalizing a transaction to have a bothersome Massachusetts senator eliminated. My retained hitman ended up dead in the crossfire, which sent my mood straight to hell because finding reliable killers in this day and age is not easy. Getting shot myself was just the icing on the shit cake.
Yet, with all that crap happening around me, I can’t get my mind off Little Iris.
Bartholomew was right. Distancing myself from my cookie girl was essential, especially after our encounter at the nightclub. After that kiss that never should’ve happened. As such, this New York trip, as catastrophic as it has been, is a godsend.
During the initial week, I managed to control myself and not ask Brahms for additional updates on Iris’s activities and whereabouts. His regular daily reports were enough. Although, with each hour that passed, it became more difficult for me tofunction. I wasted an obscene amount of time blindly staring at my laptop screen while I sat in the courtyard of the clubhouse at the golf resort I had purchased. I wasn’t doing any work. My head was pounding like the damn thing was going to explode. And all I did was wait for the ping of my phone. All so I could read a meager few lines of text from my chief of security. To find out what she was doing. How she was.
The situation with this woman is getting way out of hand. I hoped leaving Boston and putting a couple of hundred miles between us would somehow reboot my system. That I would be able to regain my sanity. That it would cure me of this…this ridiculous obsession I’ve developed.
It. Has. Not.
I crave her presence like a drug. I need my next fix, and soon. Without it, I’m going to descend into madness.
Chapter 15
Dr. Bartholomew Shaw’s office
Barty watches me pace his office, spinning his pen on top of his notebook in the process. That shouldn’t bother methismuch, considering that he always plays with one fucking thing or another. But today, every single scrape of plastic against the leather cover is like nails on a chalkboard. Fuck! I should have headed straight home from the airport and gotten some fucking sleep. Instead, I barged into Bartholomew’s office like a goddamned bull in a china shop. It was either that or stalking a certain woman again. Something I promised myself I would not do. Again.
“So? Will you just keep pacing around in silence?” Barty prods. “I don’t mind, of course. But you look like you might need to get something off your chest.”
“You were right.”
That incessant scrape finally ceases. “I was? About what?”
“My migraines. They got worse.”
“How much worse?”
“Let’s just say I was considering smashing my head into a bloody wall this morning in hopes of stopping the pain.” I halt in the middle of the office. “You need to tell me how to fix it.”
“It may not be so easy. You need to allow yourself to reflect on the likely cause of your migraines, Adriano. To understand the mechanics of what’s urging your body to react in this manner. Without that, any solution I recommend won’t bear fruit.”
“Save me your shrink talk, doc. I need an answer, and I need it now, or I’m going to lose my damn mind.”
“You stopped stalking the girl, I presume?”
