Page 11 of Chaos & Corruption

Is he fucking serious? Like he cares. He barely said two words to me when I went over to say hello to him. I get we didn’t exactly hit it off with my uncle being a clown and all, but I was trying to remedy that. I figured I’d go over and apologize, offer to buy him a shot and hopefully we could have a redo. But Alex had no interest in new beginnings or getting to know me. Hell, he probably wouldn’t have said anything at all had it not been for his drunken friend mentioning my brother.

“Oh, don’t pretend like you give a shit,” I spat, blowing the wayward locks out of my face. I don’t know if I’m all that pissed at him for giving me the cold shoulder, or if I’m projecting my anger toward Mila onto him, but I snap. “Carry on, Mr. Personality. Nothing to see here.”

My phone slips from my hand and I scramble to catch it before it hits the floor, but my coordination is off, and my heels are too damn high. The phone goes sailing and so do I, but a pair of strong arms wrap around my waist before I can go down.

“Easy,” Alex grunts against my ear as he pulls me toward him. My back hits his chest and his hands move to my hips, steadying me. “That face is too pretty to hit the concrete.”

The scent of his cologne wafts past my nose and for a moment I forget he’s been an unpleasant prick. I mean, he did stop me from a mortifying faceplant. That should count for something, right? Redemption at its finest.

I pry his hands away from my hips and turn to face him. I should probably thank him, but I my tongue is tied.

“Yeah, way too pretty,” he mutters as his eyes rake over my face. I can feel my cheeks redden at the compliment. Alex Reggiano may not be much for words but when he does speak, he seems to say all the right things.

Forcing myself to pull it together, I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear and open my mouth to thank him, but before I can get out the apology, Robinson cuts in, holding my shattered phone.

“Your face may have been saved, but your phone wasn’t so lucky,” he says.

“Shit,” I hiss, taking it from him. I stare at the broken screen, silently willing it to power on so I can at least order the Uber, but that’s clearly not going to happen.

“It’s only a phone,” Alex says, forcing me to lift my head. “You got insurance, no?”

“I couldn’t care less about the phone,” I tell him. “But my roommate left without me and before you came outside, I was about to call an Uber.”

“Typical Mila,” Webber mutters from behind Alex. I narrow my eyes at him.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask.

Granted, she’s not my favorite person at the moment. That doesn’t mean I’m going to sit back and let people talk about her. Webber doesn’t get a chance to respond, though, because Alex cuts him off.

“We can give you a ride.”

I eye him skeptically. First, he rescues me from falling, now he’s offering me a ride home, all after I confirmed Luca is my brother— how convenient and so damn predictable. My mother warned me this kinda thing would happen once Luca started to gain attention. Before I left the island, I was constantly fielding messages from girls who went to high school with me. It’s funny, back then they wouldn’t be caught dead walking the halls with me, but my brother signs a contract with MGM and suddenly they want to catch up over drinks.

Keep your fancy martinis, girls.

I’m a Malibu kind of chick with zero tolerance for fake ass bitches.

Same goes for guys.

Stop sliding into my DMs, asking to take me out to dinner. Although, I’ll admit, I’m guilty for accepting one of those invites. It ended horribly, though. Instead of walking me to my door and kissing me goodnight, he asked if my brother was home and if he’d be willing to spot him tickets to his upcoming fight.

Total jerkoff.

I may have left Staten Island, but it seems like I haven’t shaken my brother’s shadow. I’m not really sure why I’m surprised. My grandfather has been dead for twenty years and my mother still can’t shake his shadow. I guess it’s the nature of the beast for us Bianci girls.

Sighing, I shove my phone inside my purse and cross my arms against my chest, bringing my gaze back to Alex.

“Just to be clear, I don’t have tickets to the fight, I can’t get you backstage passes, and I most certainly won’t give you my brother’s phone number.”

“Until twenty minutes ago I didn’t even know who your brother was.”

I raise an eyebrow. That might be true, but the other two stooges made it abundantly clear they had heard of Luca.

He swipes a hand over his face and sighs.

“Look, it’s just a ride.”

Pulling my lower lip between my teeth, I weigh my options, but seeing as I really don’t have any and my heels were not made for walking, it doesn’t take me long to accept his offer. It takes a couple of minutes for the Uber to arrive, much of which is spent watching Robinson scold Webber for pissing on a plant. Don’t worry, I’ve already added that scene to the list of things I never want to witness again.

---