Page 32 of The Best of Us

I went over to Constantine, curious about what was going on. Why’d it feel like they were keeping a secret from me? “There something I should know?”

Constantine dragged a palm over his mouth and down his tanned throat. In a low voice, he admitted, “This is going to take some getting used to.”

Chapter8

Constantine

My sister wavedher hand back and forth, her engagement ring nearly whacking my nose. “You okay?”

“Yes,” I answered flatly. “Why’s your hand in my face?”

Izzy stepped back and pointed at something. Coffee spilled from my mug onto the counter as the dark liquid continued streaming from the Nespresso machine.

“Did you forget you already put a pod in, filled it up, and went for a second? Heck, maybe this is a third?” She picked up a hand towel and began cleaning my mess.

“I, uh.”I have a son.I kept that to myself, not yet ready to share those words with anyone. I needed to fully absorb their meaning and for Colin to learn the truth.

“First time I’ve seen you get your own coffee, and now I see why you shouldn’t,” she said with a laugh.

“I make my coffee all the time.”

“Sure you do.” She playfully side-checked me with her elbow while continuing to clean up.

I didn’t need to remind her I had a machine in my office. She’d ask why I was in the breakroom, then, and I didn’t have an answer for her. I’d wandered in there at some point in a daze.

“Every woman with a pulse in this building loves you and will do anything for you,” she went on because she loved pushing my buttons. “Coffee, lunch, your special vitamins, dry cleaning. You name it, they get it for you.”

Wash blood from my clothes. (No questions asked.) Yeah, maybe.“I compensate for the extras, by the way.”

“Oh, I bet you do,” she said in a teasing, amused tone. “And look at you rolling your eyes at me. A rare sight.”

“When it’s well-deserved, I do.”

“Mm-hmm.” She tossed the towel on the counter and swapped my cup for a new one, starting the machine from scratch.

“That for you or me?” I smirked.

She folded her arms, resting her back against the counter. “It’s for me. I have no plans to fawn all over you like everyone else.” She winked.

At least she’d help adjust my mood a little.

She must have assumed I didn’t catch her drift because she morphed into Google Translate: “Fawn. Affection to gain favor. Not a baby deer.” She grinned. “Not in this case, at least.”

“You’re hilarious, and my English is better than my Italian, by the way. And don’t you have a husband to bother instead of me?”

She bracketed her hands around her mouth to whisper, “Hudson’s doing recon of the site for us.”

Something I’d be doing later as well before we infil’ed the rave.

“And aren’t you supposed to be in a meeting with Dad? Another hundred million to make?” She snatched her full coffee cup, offering it to me anyway.

I declined, deciding I was better off getting my coffee from somewhere else where she wasn’t there to make fun of me. “You heard about that deal the other day?”

“When Dad is impressed, which is rare, the world hears about it.” She added sugar and milk to the coffee I’d turned down, and I fixed my tie under my suit jacket while mentally mapping out my exfil plan to escape the building without our old man noticing.

“Mind covering for me so I can skip out early?”

“You? Play hooky. Such an Alessandro thing to do.”

---