Page 113 of Empire of Seduction

I doubted it, but now I was curious. What had I missed? “How much money?”

“A lot of fucking money.”

“Like, how much?”

“Nine hundred and forty-five thousand dollars.”

I nearly dropped my sub. “You asked Vito for almost a million dollars?”

“Yep—and he paid it like that.” He snapped his fingers. “Dude’s fucking loaded.”

“No wonder she’s worried I’m a gold digger. What was on your list?”

“Everything Bruce, Celeste, and I have ever wanted. And Vito knows your list is coming when Carlo finishes his assessment.”

This was all making my head spin. “I don’t care. Paloma had no right to attack me the way she did. And if she tries it again, I don’t care if she’s sleeping with you or not. I will take her down.”

Mikey put up his palms, but he was laughing. “Fair enough. Feel like celebrating with me?”

“Celebrating, what? Your windfall or the fact that you got laid today?”

“Both?” I made a face, and Mikey continued. “Come on, Mags. Normally, I would open the betting app to reward myself. But they said to start making new routines. Let’s go do something.”

“Are the roads even clear?”

“Yes, the plows came through hours ago.”

“What are you thinking? Nothing’s open.”

“I was going to drive to a meeting. And yes, they are having it. I already called to double check.”

How could I turn down going if it meant getting him to a meeting? “Fine.” Holding my food, I pushed to my feet. “But I will be eating all of this in your car.”

My brother’s enthusiasm dimmed considerably and he tried to take the bag from my hands. “No way. Come on. You know how I feel about my leather upholstery.”

Edging away, I stepped into my boots and found my coat. “Too bad. I have my period, remember?”

“You don’t get a period. You have an IUD. Doesn’t Vito know that?”

“He knows about the IUD, but not that I don’t get a period. And don’t you dare tell him, either.”

“Why not?”

“Because I need to have some secrets left. You never know when you might need to use one.”

Vito

I was nervous. It was a rare, unsettling condition, and it caused me to second-guess myself.

But as I went to find Maggie, I decided a date didn’t hurt anything. She deserved to be pampered and spoiled, and I was in a position to do it. No one needed to make more of it than that.

I hadn’t seen her in two days. Beppe kept trailing her, though, so I knew what she was doing as the snow slowly melted.But she wasn’t responding to my texts with anything more than one or two-word answers. To distract myself, I kept busy. I brought Paloma up to speed on my business dealings. I met with the security company about upgrading the security of the entire winery property, including Maggie’s home. I caught up with projects in Toronto.

And I organized everything for the date. Today was the day. It was time.

I found the door to the second floor unlocked, so I began climbing the stairs. Michael’s bedroom was there, bed unmade, clothes strewn about the floor. The bathroom hadn’t seen a good scrub in months, obviously. I held my breath as I continued past.

“Hey!” Maggie’s voice called from down the hall. “What did you want to do about dinner tonight?”

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