Page 28 of His Wicked Wants (West Coast Mobsters #6)

CHAPTER 25

GAbrIEL

I try to raise the issue again in the car, but he silences me with an abrupt and rude command. The mood in the car after that could only be described as icy. By the time we get back to Redwood, it’s almost lunchtime, and the estate is quiet as we drive up to the main house and the garage. Nero and I still say nothing to each other as we walk from the house down the path that leads to both our places, and when we hit the fork in the road that should take him one way and me another, I stop dead.

“I’m not letting you ruin this,” I tell him.

“Be quiet,” is all he says, and he takes my arm and moves me down the path to my cottage.

At my door, I make another plea. “If you do this, you’ll be forcing me to tear it down myself before it can be destroyed by something worse. Don’t you understand?—”

“Don’t you understand a simple instruction?” he hisses. “Be quiet . And get inside.”

I open the door and raise an eyebrow at Nero. “After you.”

He stalks in after giving me a look that tells me I’m exasperating him. I’m pleased about that, but only for a second. If I want this to work out my way, I’ll get further with honey than I will needling him.

“It’s lunchtime,” I say, shrugging off my thin coat. “You hungry?”

He’s busy turning a slow circle in the middle of my living room, and when he finally meets my eyes again, he says, “No.”

“Well, I am. So I’m going to make something to eat, and you’re going to have it with me, and then we can talk.”

“We have nothing to talk about. But I will have something to eat.”

I’m about to protest when he quickly puts a finger to his lips, his eyes furious as he glares at me, and I realize, finally, what he’s been doing.

Nero has been keeping me quiet. In the car. Across the grounds. And now in my own home.

He thinks there are bugs in here.

“You go and busy yourself in the kitchen,” he tells me, voice so casual I could almost believe I’ve misunderstood, except for the tension in his frame. “And I will amuse myself.”

By amuse himself, he means sweep the place for surveillance devices. Because that’s what he starts to do right now, going in a methodical circle from the door. He gestures at me to get into the kitchen, and I head there on nervous feet.

I shouldn’t feel as surprised as I do. It’s not as though it never occurred to me that my employers would be watching me. Listening to me. I just…

Forgot about it.

He glances my way and waves a hand at me, a silent instruction to get on with whatever I’m doing. So I turn around to the countertop and mechanically get out the bread—yesterday’s, baked fresh daily by Chef Laurent but still good today for toasting—and begin slicing it up with shaking hands. I watch Nero in the window, a pale reflection as he prowls around my small home. And then he comes into the kitchen, close behind me, his hand sliding around my waist in an embrace. He presses up close behind me, so that I feel his warmth from shoulders to calves, and I hold my breath as he leans over to press the button for the automatic blinds outside.

The blinds descend slowly, and I watch them go, acutely aware of every breath I take, every beat of my heart, especially as Nero turns his face so his lips brush against my ear. And even once the blinds are totally down and we’re safely away from prying eyes, Nero doesn’t move.

I can smell him, his heady cologne, and the more primal scent of him underneath it. His hand splays out over my solar plexus, and he must be able to tell that my breathing has picked up.

“I have checked the obvious places,” he murmurs, so low I can barely hear him. “But I cannot be sure. So come with me.”

I drop the knife and let him pull me away from the counter, back into the living area. He sets me in the middle of the room, another cautious finger to his lips, before he heads over to the stereo and turns it on, finding a classical music station, and then turning it up so loud I wince.

“I don’t want to disturb the neighbors,” I tell him wryly as he returns to me. But it’s a pointless protest. Nero knows as well as I do that the cottage is far enough away that sound from here would never reach the main house.

He doesn’t reply. He just pulls me close again, face to face, hard up to his body so that I gasp, and looks into my face. “Dance with me.” It’s a command, not a request, but I have no reason to resist. I put my arms around him, just as he does to me, and I find myself locked in a strange slow dance with Nero Andretti.

But his reasons become clear after a moment. “You have no idea what fire you’re playing with,” he mutters in my ear.

My mouth is just below his ear, too, so I tell him, “Are you talking about the garden? Or you?”

That only makes him yank me harder against him, and his leg slides in between mine, so that I can feel him—hard—against my thigh. “Perhaps both. But you shouldn’t be so curious, Gabriel. You also have no idea who I really am.”

His words are cold, but his breath is warm and comforting as he speaks, flowing across my neck and making me want to snuggle closer, somehow. And it makes me bold. “Then…tell me.”

For a moment I think he’s just going to dance with me, build my frustration. But then he starts talking in that same low voice, so that I have to concentrate to hear, which is difficult when he’s holding me so close.

“You think I don’t understand the importance of this garden of yours, but you are wrong. I grew up on the streets, begging and stealing food wherever we could. If my friends and I had had access to such a thing…my life might have been different. But I can’t change the past. Yet in the present moment, if I don’t tell Sandro about this endeavor of yours and he finds out, then I will appear disloyal.”

This is maybe the first time Nero has approached some kind of negotiation about the community garden, so I think carefully before I respond. “I can’t bring danger into these people’s lives. I can’t be a party to that.”

“You are bringing danger to them now—just because you don’t see it, doesn’t mean that’s not true. And…you are wrong about Sandro. He won’t look to recruit in such a place. He doesn’t run his business that way.”

“Can you promise me that?”

“No. But I can promise you that he would donate to the project. He would find a way to make it semi-respectable. Keep it safe not just from enemies, but from councils and cops. And he would be glad to do it, because it would increase his reputation. His soft power.”

I try to pull away, but he just grabs me harder. “You can’t promise all of that,” I say, frustrated. “He’s just as likely to tell you to shut it down.”

“Once again, you misunderstand the way Sandro runs his business. I will give you my word, if that’s what you want. Your garden will remain untouched. And it will be protected.”

I still don’t like the idea. But I know Nero plans to tell his Boss about the garden one way or another. “Let me think about it,” I ask reluctantly at last. “Until after the next distribution day, at least? We have one this Sunday.” I try to pull back a little and he finally lets me, so that my face is inches from his. “Please.”

I still can’t read his eyes. Still can’t tell what he’s thinking. But at last he says, “I will give you until after your next distribution day.”

“And do you…” I pause, wondering if I dare. “Do you still expect payment from me?” He searches my face, and if he doesn’t say something soon, I?—

“You really don’t know me at all,” he says with a sneer, and lets go of me. “I have no interest in an unwilling partner.”

He tries to turn away, but this time I’m the one who tugs him back. “What about a willing one?”

“Didn’t you learn your lesson last time, little gardener?” he hisses, all viciousness on the surface. But I can see a new light in his eyes. And I think I know what it is.

Desire.

He wants me. But he’ll never admit to it now that I’ve called him on it, because to Nero, admitting to actually want something from me—maybe even need something from me—is anathema.

So I’ll have to make the first move.