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RHAIM

I normally didn’t watch the news, muchless the Morning Moment—but I couldn’t not watch if Lia was going to be on the air.

I texted her, Break a leg, and then drove into work, timing it so that I could be running on one of the treadmills in the gym when she came on, giving me plausible deniability for watching morning TV.

I made sure that I was already in a lather before the show started, and was doomed to run through the entire thing. It was only a local show, for half-an-hour, but I knew it was St. Clair testing safer waters with Lia first, before he chopped her up for chum.

Katerina made it to the first commercial break, and then Lia appeared, pulled together as ever, in a form fitting cream sweater, and neutral make-up that toned down her sexuality, but hid it from no one.

“I’m so happy to get to be the first to talk to you, Lia!” Katerina exclaimed, the second Lia sat down.

“Thank you, me too,” Lia said, giving the other woman an easy smile, keeping her hands folded in her lap.

“This is such a scoop—” Katreina went on. “And now that you’re here, I want to know everything. How long have you and the senator been an item?”

“Ever since I got back into the country, a few months ago. We met at one of my father’s parties, and we hit it off.”

“And no one ever saw the two of you together? Before your very public engagement on Friday night?”

Lia let nothing on. My girl was made of ice. “The timing wasn’t right.”

“Well,” Katerina said, tapping her cue cards on her knee. “I think we both know your father can afford to buy off a few paparazzi.” Lia laughed, until Katerina continued. “Or,” the host said, giving Lia a knowing look.

“Or…what?” Lia asked back, once it was clear that a response was required.

“Well—you know. The rumors,” the morning host said, before mugging for the camera.

I turned off the treadmill immediately, as Lia blinked.

“I’m sorry, are you implying that everyone with an Italian last name has mafia connections?

Next you’ll be warning your viewers about the dangers of Chef Boyardee,” she said, leaning back into her chair.

“And—isn’t this what America always does to immigrants?

You hate us when we arrive, love us when we work for you, and hate us again the second we succeed. Next question?”

Katerina looked trapped. “After a commercial break!” she announced—and I sprinted for the elevators.

Thank God the keycard that let me make it up to Nero’s penthouse was in my pocket—I emerged onto his floor, and found him, also watching his daughter, on a TV that was usually hidden behind a painting.

“What the fuck?” I asked, the second I stepped out of the door, startling him.

“Rhaim?” he said, looking back. “Come watch Lia!”

“Yeah—I know—” I said, stalking up to his couch. “Who is this asshole?”

“No fucking idea—but Lia’s doing well,” Nero said—with absolute pride.

I also noticed he was drinking, based on which bottle was beside him, at seven-seventeen in the morning. “It’s early for gin.”

“Not when you’re taking it with painkillers—now shut the fuck up, I’m listening to my daughter,” he said, waving away my concern, as the TV show returned.

“And we’re back!” Katerina began with a recap. “We’re here with Lia Ferreo, daughter of Nero Ferreo, CEO of Corvo Enterprises, discussing her recent engagement to a certain older man, Senator Marcus St. Clair!”

Lia speared the poor woman with one expertly groomed eyebrow.

“Is he really a sugar daddy if we’re both equivalently wealthy?

” she asked, folding her hands together and holding her knee, before staring directly at the camera.

“What’s so wrong about two consenting adults wanting to be happy?

” she said—and for a heart-blinding moment it felt like she was talking to me.

“Look at that, Rhaim,” Nero said, as the hostess desperately segued to her next segment. “Face that launched a thousand ships.”

“Oh yeah, this is great, she can campaign for his seat once he’s dead.” The after I kill him was left implied.

Nero scoffed. “No. She’s not meant for politics.” He reached for the remote, turned off the television, and set down his empty glass. “Somedays she reminds me of her mother so much it hurts,” he said, staring at the empty screen.

I took a moment to watch him. “How so?” My circles and Lia’s mother’s hadn’t overlapped. While I was working for Nero at the time—hell, I’d even gone to their wedding—there was never any cause for me to go over to their house, and Nero kept her nose clean.

From business, at least…but apparently not from other things.

“Beautiful. Headstrong. Hilarious. But—” he began, and then shook his head.

I took a seat down on his couch away from him, the backs of my sweaty thighs sticking to its leather. “But?” I pressed.

“Crazy,” Nero said, tapping the edge of his glass with one finger.

“As crazy as her father? Who is drinking before eight?”

“I’m dying. I’m allowed.”

“Okay—as crazy as the man who I went out with on more than one occasion to do exceedingly dumb shit that I’m amazed we survived?”

“No—crazy in a sad way. Her brain, beastiola—it’s broken.

And I’ve got a sheaf of doctor’s notes to prove it,” he said, finally turning toward me.

“I love her, but she’s a liability. And she’d kill me if she knew I was talking to you about it, so you don’t say a word—what I tell you know—it stays on the inside. ”

I grit my teeth—but not for the reasons he thought.

“Her mother was the same way. I came home one day, and she’d destroyed half our things.

I didn’t know what to do with her. I couldn’t bring myself to send her to the nut house, but she wouldn’t tell me what was wrong—and a week later, she was dead.

” He reached for his bottle and poured himself another glass.

“I largely live a life without regrets, and you know most of the shitty things I’ve done.

But that one…keeps me up at night sometimes.

I never should’ve listened to her. I should’ve forced her to go.

Just put her someplace else for a bit, for safekeeping. ”

“Lia’s just as much your child as she is her mother’s, Nero.”

He gave me a look, tilting his glass my direction. “And you think that helps her?”

I spread my hands. “She has more fortitude than you think—did you not just see her? After this show, they’re sending that woman to the burn ward.”

Nero snorted softly. “Yeah. She’s great. Up until she doesn’t get her way.” I could see him wrestling with himself, and I suspected we’d never be having this conversation without the Christmas-tree flavored alcohol in his hand. “She’s cut herself before.”

“Why are you telling me all this?”

“Because after I go, someone needs to know.”

“And that someone isn’t Senator St. Clair?”

“He got it all in briefings. He’s busy surrounding her in cashmere as we speak. Once this election season’s over, she’ll just do a yearly interview with Town and Country. Run a few charities. Volunteer.”

“And you think she’s going to thank you for that life, after you die? You think that will make her happy?”

Nero gave me a disgusted look with his exhaustion hooded eyes. “You think happiness is important? Please, Rhaim—we’re men.”

“I’m going to need you to be a hell of a lot clearer then,” I snapped. “If St. Clair already knows everything he needs to, then why tell me shit?”

“Because she burned down my mansion!” His gin-holding hand trembled, and he set down the glass—probably because he was tempted to throw it. “It’s why I sent her to boarding school,” he went on, in a quieter tone.

I frowned at him. “That…wasn’t the Cubans?”

I had interrogated some men rather roughly on the matter, after Nero had told me to—roughly unto death—and the entire time he’d been fixated on them, saying they were the cause—and I believed him.

After all, he was the one who’d been burned, hauling Freddie Sr out of the fire.

“No. It was Lia.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I just am, Rhaim,” he said, wearily. “But she’s a ticking time bomb. Just like her mother. And—yes, I’ll admit it—just like me. And no, St. Clair doesn’t know that, he doesn’t need to.”

“But I do?”

“Because after I die, she’ll be your problem. Keep an eye on her from a distance. I don’t give a shit if she’s happy—just don’t let her burn.”

I sat there, my elbows on my knees, wanting to claim her in front of him—but also knowing if I did, he would never forgive my trespass, and he would kick me out of Corvo so fast my head would spin—plus send Rio after me with a Glock.

“Don’t you have a job here?” Nero asked, clucking his tongue at me. “After you shower—you stink?—”

“Yeah,” I said, standing up again. “And I’ve got some contracts I need you to sign.”

“Bring them up this afternoon. Until then, I’ll be taking a nap,” he said, stretching out across his couch.