Page 16 of Where Wild Hearts Dance
His brows draw together a fraction—perhaps he doesn’t get my reference to the fact he closed down the Falconis, the reason I will always despise him—and he slowly shakes his head. “I came to open one, actually.”
Italian opera music and the deep baritone of male banter draws my gaze to the right. Every chair inside the barbershop has been filled and the waiting seats are spilling over with wrinkled suits, errant stubble and cigar-ravaged laughter.
I can’t conceal my grimace. “This place isyours?”
He shrugs and a conceited smile dances across his lips. “Sure.”
Footsteps approaching on the sidewalk draw my attention from the window. I roll my eyes, about to walk past Bernadi, when his arm whips out to the side and a loud pop makes my ears ring and my head spin.
The force of the gunshot makes me stumble into the road but Bernadi’s hand wraps around my arm, keeping me from falling.
The Italian banter stops instantly and footsteps emerge from inside the barbershop. It takes a few seconds to catch my breath before I can right myself and turn my gaze to the ground.
And there he is.
My stalker.
Long, thin, younger than I thought. Eyes wide open, whites gleaming. Hands splayed at a contorted angle. Blood running from his open mouth.
Then the world carousels and my legs give out.
I open my eyes stiffly and look up at a mirrored ceiling decorated with branding from the fifties. It’s clear from my reflection that I've been deposited on a reclined chair in the barbershop and it looks like everything around me is business as usual.
How utterly embarrassing.
My first thought as I come round is, “This chair is so comfortable I could get used to it.”
I wiggle a little, then remember why I’m lying here, then a combination of fear, disgust and relief mingle at the base of my throat. Bernadi just shot a guy dead on the street, right in front of me. The audacity! Wait until I tell Cristiano about this. Maybe he’ll fire Bernadi. Better yet, maybe he’ll send Bernadi off to the west coast, never to be seen again.
My thoughts are quickly drowned out when the back of the chair rises slowly upright and a face moves into my field of view, and it’s one I’ve hated for exactly three years, six months and eight days.
“What the fuck thinking were you?” I spit.
His lip curls up at one corner. “Have some of this, then try again.”
I frown and drop my gaze to the glass of water he’s holding out. “Arsenic?” I deadpan.
His face is serious. “One hundred per cent.”
I end up gulping half the glass.
“What thefuckwere you thinking?” I repeat.
He straightens and puts his hands to the back of his head. Then he barks out a short laugh. It sounds like relief.
“Fuck me, Contessa. I would have given you a warning if I’d known you were going to pass out.”
“Given me a warning for what? That you were about to shoot a passerby in the neck? You were about to murder a civilian for no reason at all?”
Not only am I still lightheaded from the shock of seeing a dead body at my feet, I amfuriousBernadi did that to myinnocentstalker.
He narrows his eyes. “First of all, I didn’t shoot him in the neck. I would never shoot someone in the neck. I shot him in the skull.”
He shrugs like it was the kind of move that in school would’ve got him a half hour detention.
“Second, what do you mean ‘civilian’? This is New York, not the front line.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” I mumble, knowing with some irritation he heard me clearly.
