She did. And the need to pull him into her arms took her breath away in a whoosh of anticipation.
“Are you playing with my emotions?” he asked.
His trust issues were beyond anything she could comprehend. Someone must’ve hurt him bad. Real bad.
“Of course not,” she replied. “Why would you ask me that?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Are you playing withmyemotions?” she asked.
“Never,” he replied.
She peered into his eyes wondering what demons haunted him. Rather than push for answers, she dragged her gaze back to her laptop, refocusing her attention on the long list of ALPHA employees.
There were twelve people who had been with ALPHA during the first attack that were still working there today. She could eliminate Dakota and Slash, but she still needed to vet ten employees.
Throughout the afternoon, Luciano’s phone buzzed with incoming texts or pinged with a never-ending string of emails. But he stayed focused on his search.
At six o’clock, as they were packing up, she asked, “Are all those messages from work?”
“I haven’t looked.”
“Aren’t you concerned?”
“I’m concerned The Bomb Maker is going to take out those federal buildings and kill thousands of innocents. Santini International can’t fall apart in a day. Most times, it’s little fires. A million unexpected things. I’ve got smart, hard-working employees?—“
“So you trust them?”
His eyebrow arched ever-so-slightly, then his cheek muscles ticked in his jaw.
Of course he doesn’t.
“I expect them to do their jobs.” He slid his laptop into his leather satchel. “Are you free for dinner?”
“I’m having dinner with my brother and his husband,” she replied. When disappointment flashed in his eyes, she blurted, “Come with. My brother and his husband will love you.”
“Another time.”
For reasons she couldn’t begin to understand, she didn’t want him to spend his evening alone. “No, Luciano, you’re coming with me.”
“Grazie, Simone.”
In the hallway, they were met with an eerie silence. Side by side, they made their way through the cavernous building and into the hangar where he led her to his Range Rover. After driving out, he tapped an app on his phone, then waited for the giant door to close before leaving.
The gray autumn day had bowed to dusk.
“What did you find out today?” he asked as he turned onto the main road.
“Don’t you need directions?”
“I’m stopping at my house for wine,” he replied. “Do you want to ask your brother?—”
“It’s fine, really,” Simone insisted. Plus, she wanted to see the look on Gary’s face when she introduced him to Luciano.
Within minutes, he pulled up to the iron gates of his property. The security guard greeted him, then asked for an eight-digit code, which Luciano gave him. The guard thanked him, then opened the gates.
As Luciano drove up the tree-lined driveway, she asked what the code was.
