Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77344 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 387(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77344 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 387(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
Alone, I couldn’t bring myself to move yet. I knew that as soon as I did, the real world would come rushing back, and I would lose whatever this feeling was.
The closest thing I could compare it to was the first night that Megs and I could afford a hotel room. With a lock to keep everyone out. With a heater to keep us warm. With running water to wash away the filth.
It was comfort and security.
I never wanted to let it go.
But by the time Miko came out of the shower and got himself into his usual suit, I knew it was time to face reality.
“Stay,” he said, still slipping in a cufflink as he approached the side of the bed, leaning down to press a kiss to my forehead. “I’ll bring you some coffee.”
But as soon as he was gone, I grabbed my last set of fresh clothes out of my duffle bag and made my way into the bathroom.
“Can’t follow a single instruction, can you, sugar?” Miko called a few minutes later, making me jump and turn to find him leaning in the bathroom doorway, a cup of coffee in his hand as his gaze roamed over me.
“We have shit to do today,” I said, shrugging as I leaned back to rinse the conditioner out of my hair before squeezing out the strands, then reaching for a towel.
“Unfortunately,” Miko agreed as I dried off, then wrapped myself in the towel so I could approach him and take my coffee.
“Have you heard from Zeno?” I asked.
“No. But I didn’t expect to. I get the feeling that he’s not the best at getting back to people. I figured that once we ate and made sure Megs and Nicole were on their way, we could pop back over.”
“What about Chuck?”
“Chuck made slightly burnt scrambled eggs and definitely burnt toast for us to choke down. Then he’s going to spend the day here.”
“Is that safe?”
“I’m gonna have Venezio come and babysit.”
“That… probably won’t go well,” I decided. I didn’t know everything about Venezio, of course, but Miko had talked about him a bit on the ride upstate.
From what I could gather, Venezio was a man of few words. Chuck had enough for ten men. Venezio was serious and reserved. Chuck was slightly absurd and extroverted.
“I know,” Miko agreed, reaching out to catch a bead of water that slipped from the edge of my hair and was about to slide down between my breasts. “But Venezio is the only person I can call on to do a job and not have him ask me a single fucking thing about it. And if Chuck does something stupid like spill the beans, he also won’t feel compelled to call Cosimo or Lorenzo either.”
“Because he’s just an associate?” I asked, starting to get a hang of the mafia hierarchy.
“Because he’s used to being on his own. It doesn’t come naturally to him to run to someone else. I imagine that will come eventually as he works for us for longer. But this works for me for right now.”
“If Zeno hasn’t found anything, what is the plan then?” I asked.
To that, he exhaled hard. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Maybe check in with Lil; see if she heard anything.”
“We can do that,” I agreed. “I’m going to need to stop home at some point.”
“Why?”
“I’m out of clothes.”
“Not seeing a problem there,” he said, eyes warm as they moved down my barely covered body.
“So, you want me walking around naked in front of Chuck?”
I swear to God, a sound that was damn near a growl escaped him at that. It was way hotter than it had any right to be.
“Fine. We can grab some more clothes and anything else you might need for the near future,” he agreed. “Meet you out there?” he asked as I set down the mug and reached for my hairbrush.
“Yep. Five minutes,” I told him, then rushed through getting myself dressed before sharing a terrible breakfast with the two of them.
Venezio showed up not long after, giving Chuck a curt “Fuck no,” when offered rubbery eggs and burnt toast.
“We shouldn’t be more than a few hours,” Miko told Venezio as the two of us reached for our jackets.
I didn’t know about Miko, but I was eager to get the errands part of the day over with simply because I wanted to be back in bed with him sooner rather than later.
We hadn’t exactly discussed what was clearly going on with us. But it seemed we were both silently just agreeing to… go with the flow. Let it happen. Whatever ‘it’ was.
We grabbed more coffee on the way to Zeno’s, then spent a solid twenty minutes knocking and calling to him before he finally pulled the door open, bleary-eyed and wearing a pair of watermelon-print sleep pants and a massively oversized blue hoodie.