“I’ll be there in an hour,” I say, frustrated, dreaming of my high thread count bedsheets.
“I’ll be here.” Nico hangs up without so much as a thank you, and I roll my eyes, finally pushing the push start of my car and backing out of the driveway.
I’m hoping Father is asleep, because if he’s not he’ll interrogate me about the fight last night. He’s had a bug up his ass about the missing money off the books, even though it’s pocket change compared to our other dealings. He wants Nico to succeed, and he can’t admit to himself that it’s simply not happening.
I love Nico, too, and I want him to do better, but I’m beginning to think he won’t. After all, he’s pushing thirty-five. He’s no spring chicken anymore, and he’s risking everything trying to keep up with the nineteen- or twenty-year-old girls he keeps on his arm.
I punch in the code at the gate to the mansion in just under an hour, driving up to the main house and parking behind Nico. I hope to get in and out of here as quickly as possible.
Cecilia, my father’s eye-candy of the week, answers the door. She’s twenty-five and looks like a Swedish model even though my father swears she’s part Italian.
Stick-thin, white-blonde, lip filler, vapid personality. All the things I hate about women in this lifestyle.
“Luca,” she coos, wrapping her thin arms around my neck. “It’s been so long since you’ve come to visit.”
Her words are slurred and there’s an empty wine bottle on the coffee table, probably mixed with a handful of pills.
“Hi, Cecilia,” I mumble, extracting myself by removing her arms from me gently. I don’t hate the woman. She’s gotten swept upin this lifestyle and I can’t exactly blame her. My father buys her anything she wants, keeps her in wine and pills. The thing I don’t like about her is the way she acts like my stepmother.
Part of me wants to tell her she’s part of a revolving door of women my father takes care of, but I’m not cruel.
“Your father is in the dining room, having breakfast.”
“I’m here for Nico.”
She pouts. “Stop by and see Lorenzo, at least. He’s missed you."
Fat chance.
I don’t think Father would care if he never saw me again, as long as it meant I was still keeping up with business. It’s Nico he loves, Nico he wants to succeed. I just do all the hard work.
Instead, I just nod and kiss her cheek. I don’t hate Cecilia. I mostly feel bad for her, stuck here because of the booze and the drugs and the lifestyle. I hate the way my father treats women since my mother died, but I don’t hate her.
She gives me a big, watery smile and I walk past her up the stairs, looking for my brother.
I find him in the library, throwing books over his shoulder, clearly looking for my stash. I cross my arms over my chest and bark out his name.
Nico freezes, turning around slowly with a sheepish grin on his face.
“Looking for a book,” he explains, even though I haven’t asked.
“Didn’t know you could read,” I drawl, and he snorts out a laugh.
“Yeah, yeah. You got my money?”
“I gotmymoney. I’m loaning it to you. I expect it back in a month. With interest.”
He puts a hand over his heart dramatically. “You’d charge your own brother interest?”
“Ten percent. Better than you’re going to get from Joey Stacks.”
Stacks is the loan shark most all of the mob uses. I never have, but I know how he operates, and if you don’t pay him his forty percent interest, he takes it out on your body. On your family.
Nico groans. ”Alright. Fair enough.”
I raise an eyebrow while he keeps staring at me. “You think I keep twenty stacks in my wallet? Get out and let me get it.”
“I should know the safe combination,” he mutters.
