Page 84 of Curse

Once we level off, Kayla reappears, handing us fresh glasses of water garnished with slices of cucumber. Olivia slurps onhers as the engines quiet down.

“Why not just drive?” I ask, breaking the silence. “It’d be cheaper and way simpler.”

Olivia shrugs, scrolling through her phone. “No clue. But hey, I’ll take any excuse to hang out with you.”

Her lighthearted tone does little to make me feel better. Olivia is ten years younger than I am, and though she’s never shared about her life before the Demonio estate, she did say that the family took her in after her parents died. It’s understandable if she has an allegiance to them, but that doesn’t exactly make her assessment of the situation reliable.

Looking up from her phone, she catches me looking at her and slaps my arm playfully. “Stop. You’re fine, okay. Nothing bad is going to happen. I really am just taking you home. I’ll be with you on the plane, and then Grit will pick you up on the tarmac and drive you to your house.”

“Grit?”

“Matti’s head of security.”

“And then?” I press.

“And then? I don’t know. I’m on a need-to-know basis, and no one has filled me in.”

When she sees the anxious look on my face, she leans over and squeezes my arm. “Hey. I don’t know what happened between you two, but whatever it is, there’s no way Matti is letting you go forever. He’s way too into you. Do NOT tell him I said that.”

I pull my necklace out of my shirt and slide the pendant back and forth along the chain nervously. It doesn’t feel like the pendant I usually wear, and I look down: it’s some saint that I don’t recognize. It looks familiar, but I can’t place it. “What the fuck?” I mumble.

“What?” Olivia sees me staring at the pendant and leans in. I look up at her as her eyes widen and her eyebrows shoot up. She jerks her gaze up to meet mine.

“What?” I ask, my brow furrowed. What is this thing? I start to take it off, but she claps her hand over mine, stopping me.

“No!”

“It’s not mine. I don’t know where it came from.”

“It’s… It’s mine. It’s a Saint Michael the Archangel necklace. It’s for protection, and it’s bad luck to take it off!” She slowly takes her hand off mine and leans back in her seat. I frown. She gives a dismissive wave of her hand. “It’s a Catholic thing.”

“Thank you?” I let go of the necklace and sit back in the chair, surveying her and biting in a breath. “So… you’re really not with Matti?”

She chokes on her water, coughing violently as she swings her legs off the arm of the chair and slams herself on the chest. “What?! Oh, fuck no. Gross. He’s like a brother to me. They all are.”

I sink back into my seat gingerly and rub my forehead. “You and Matti never were… What about the fuckboy comment?”

“I just meant he gives total fuckboy energy. And he does, doesn’t he?” She giggles and sits back in the chair, kicking her feet up on the table. “Or he did until you came along.”

“Olivia, I don’t know what you think is going on, but it’s not like I’m his girlfriend or anything. Whatever he wanted, he clearly doesn’t anymore. At least not enough to keep me around.”

She shakes her head. “You don’t know the boys like I do. I’ve known them all my life, been living with them since I was 12. That’s 10 years of watching the bitches they fuck come and go—but not Matti. I know he fucks who he wants, butI never see them and as far as I know, he’s not the sleepover type. But you’re different.”

I give a short, humorless laugh. “Different isn’t necessarily better.”

“Maybe. But in this case, different isveryfucking different. He texted me every day, multiple times a day, to find out what you were doing and how you were when he was away. It was really annoying. I’d bet anything he was watching you on the cameras every chance he got, too.”

“They have cameras in the rooms at the Edge?” I gasp. I don’t want to think about how many times I touched myself thinking about him. Shit, did he see that? I’m horrified, but… the idea that Matti was watching me touch myself like he did in the shower…. Did he get himself off while he watched? The image sends a shudder of heat through me.

“Of course there are cameras,” she snorts. “These guys are fucking control freaks. And he didnotwant to be gone for as long as he was. I’m surprised he stayed away as long as he did.”

“What, he didn’t have a choice?” I take a sip of my water, careful of the cut on my lip.

“Not this time. Aurelio was fucking with him,” she says, stabbing her cucumber slice with her straw. “I heard Aurelio on the phone at the estate. He was pissed that Matti stopped AJ from killing you, but he really lost his shit when he found out that Matti killed AJ for touching you.”

I choke on my water. “Wait, what? Matti did what? Who’s AJ?”

I don’t know if I’m more shocked by Matti murdering someone because of me or by Olivia’s matter-of-fact tone, like she’s talking about him grabbing takeout on the way home.

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