Page 60 of Pretty Poison

She might not know it yet, but after this, there is no going back. There is no pretending to hate each other anymore. Now, she’s mine… for good. She’ll forever be the light to my darkness, and I’ll be the moth to her flame.

Twenty Six

DARIO

It’s been almost two hours and she’s been asleep ever since I kissed her forehead and laid her down in my bed. It’s like she belongs here on the left side; she moulds into my bed perfectly. She belongs here in every single fucking sense of the word.

I don’t want to leave. I want to keep watching her as her lips pout out and her body drowns in one of my shirts… but I can’t. I’m needed elsewhere. If I could forget about my responsibilities for just one night, I would.

Peeling myself off the sheets, I throw on a pair of joggers and a T-shirt before heading out of my room, destination: my office. It’s amazing how a few hours spent with her can accumulate so much work, but when the fun is over, I have to address it all.

As I stand outside my office, I retract my phone from my pocket, ready to send the guys a message, but as I enter, they’ve overrun my office like they own it.

“Would you get off my damn chair, Red?” I sigh, exasperated.

He rolls his eyes at me as he stands, making his way over to the couch that’s already overcrowded. “It’s not like you needed it.”

“I do now,” I snap back. “What was so urgent that this couldn’t wait until the morning?”

“Aldo Ferarri,” Ciro starts, striding over to me with a file in hand. “I found the bastard, and he isn’t a ghost. He’s just really fucking good at what he does.” I take it from him as he sits in front of me. “Aldo Ferarri, better known as—”

“Son of a bitch,” I seethe under my breath. “Antonio’s father is Aldo? How far back does this fucking file go?” The anger I thought I had under control, comes back in waves of boiling blood and relentless thoughts.

“There are dozens of aliases in there, each one directly tied to him, Antonio, and people he’s worked with or worked for. And before you ask, no, I don’t know why there are that many.”

“I wasn't thinking that,” I admit. “The only thing I care about is why the fuck the son of a bitch is back in New York now and why his father was ever involved with Liana’s family.” I close the file again with a loud thud, my hand slapping it. “I mean, he’s been gone for seven years and all of a sudden he’s back? There has to be something here he wants. He’s not here for a fucking visit and everyone knows it.”

“Do you think there’s something he wants from you?” Silas asks from the corner of my office. He’s twisting a blade between his fingers as per usual, letting the blood trickle down onto the floor, oblivious to the self-inflicted pain. “Think about it, you’re a loose end. We’re all loose ends to him.”

“If that’s true, why has he left it so fucking long? He killed two Vitales. Why did he stop there? Why not wipe us all out completely?”

Silas shrugs like he has nothing more to add to the conversation.

I should’ve known there was more to his visit. Antonio is a man of many things, but being in a place where he doesn’t havebusiness isn’t one of them. And if I know anything about him, he’ll be gone the second his business is completed.

“Until we know what his exact need for being here is, we’re no closer to finding him than we were before.”

“Maybe not, but we have his aliases now,” Ciro says, his face and eyes void of emotion. “All we have to do is search for reservations, bookings and anything else that would need a name and form of ID, and we’ll find the bastard. It’s not as much of a dead end as you think it is, Rio.”

I breathe out deeply. “I know this is a lot to ask, Ciro, but I wouldn’t if there were any other options—”

“I’m not going anywhere until we find this bastard,” he interjects, answering my exact question as if he already knew it. “I’ll set up shop in the soldiers’ house so I can be closer to his two little failed protégés.”

“I don’t think you’ll be getting much from them… They’ll only talk to her.”

“Then bring her down. They might think they only know him as Aldo Ferarri, but another name may jog their memories.” His words are stern and a sense of hope erupts from him.

He wants this as much as I do, maybe even more for all he’s had to endure ever since. He’s forced to live with the pain and will do anything in his power to prevent my sperm donor from hurting more people. It’s like he feels more pain than Maze and I do, like he somehow feels responsible for what transpired five years ago.

“Okay,” I state. “I’ll bring her down in the morning with breakfast. You get everything sorted, try and find out what you can about his aliases and what they’ve done, and we’ll see if she can get any more information.”

He nods, accepting my answer with a weak smile.

∞∞∞

As I enter my room again, I stop in the doorway, watching Liana sleep.

After a few moments, I continue through to her, take off my shirt and climb into bed beside her. I wrap my arms around her, pulling her close, and she nestles up against me, burying her head into my neck. It’s a foreign experience to me, but I’ll embrace it if it brings me closer to her.

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