The Pagano Brothers were the majority owners, with the head chef, Dominic Cuoco, holding a thirty percent share. It was the most elegant restaurant in Quiet Cove and for miles up and down the coast. The dining area was built out over the water on stilts, the walls on the water side made of glass—bulletproof glass. Hurricane Sandy had destroyed the place, and when they’d rebuilt, they’d done so with an eye toward a particular kind of security.
Julie and Dom had done their reporting. By their accounts, business was steady again and even improving. In the several weeks since Alvin Church’s demise, order and balance had been restored to the underworld, and the Paganos were again its undisputed leaders. Maintaining that balance kept violence low and settled the concerns of all their friends in business and politics. Rhode Island ran smoothly when its underside was settled.
The Council alliances were strong, too. Turning back the Zapatas in the way that they had had settled flare-ups in all of the Council neighborhoods. Ben had been right to choose that connection, the cartel and Jackie Stone, as the place for open battle. All the dons knew that there was no way to keep drugs out of New England, and in fact there was movement in from New York already, but they could keep the power out of the dealers’ hands. Power was key. And the Council families had it.
J.J., being the least senior capo, was last to report. His crew, which now included Matty, was in charge of enforcement and security. With the Church organization gutted and the survivors having paid their tribute, they’d had less to do lately, other than the normal guarding and driving that had always been the case. A few stragglers had rebelled against the Pagano rule. They’d been corrected.
Matty had reported to Nick that J.J. was becoming fairly competent. ‘Fairly competent’ was no ringing endorsement, but this time of peace was a good time for him to learn. Nick was reserving judgment, but he was prepared to handle a problem should one arise.
The biggest thing on J.J.’s plate was Chris Mills—and that was a significant job. Nick had wanted to handle it himself, but it was no longer his place to do so. He was the man who gave the orders, not the man who pulled the trigger. Not any longer.
J.J. refreshed his glass of moscato and took a long drink. He looked directly at Nick. “We got confirmation on that pest problem.”
Ben responded. “Confirmation?”
“Steve did a trace. Right place, right time, right guy. Should I call it in?”
Though Dominic’s was a safe zone and protections had been built in to prevent surveillance, they all knew careful was better than not. Nick nodded. “Yes. As we discussed.”
He felt no qualms about ending Mills. Letting him continue breathing put people Nick cared about at real risk. But he still had not decided whether to tell Beverly the truth about what would soon happen. He almost had—he’d brought her to the lighthouse to explain—but then his uncle’s words had trumpeted in his ear. His world was a world of secrets, of things better left unsaid. Knowing the truth would only hurt her, and it wouldn’t change the outcome for Mills. So, then, what would be the point of telling her?
It shouldn’t have been a difficult decision. It should have been one Nick could make in a blink and with certainty. She had no need of this truth. She would grieve, and he would console her, and he would know the truth.
His conscience would eat at him. And that was new.
In response to Nick’s confirmation of his order, J.J. nodded. “Same timeframe?”
Nick cut the last piece of steak off the bone and ate it. “Yes. Report to me when it’s done. And J.J., be on top of this. This is not B-team work.”
“Got it, boss. I’m on it.”
Nick hoped to fuck he was.
The capos left before dessert, and Ben, Nick, and Fred compared notes on the various reports. Business as usual—there was something calm and yet surreal in returning to normalcy after so many months of cycling turmoil.
Fred reported on his work backing Agent Amy Cavanaugh down and smoothing over any feathers she’d ruffled while she was digging around. Nick wasn’t sure they’d heard the last of Miss Cavanaugh, but she’d been muzzled, and they knew to keep an eye on her. As Ben and Fred indulged in dessert, and Nick stuck to coffee, Ben gave him an appraising look. “You’ve handed off an important job to J.J.”
“It’s his job. And I told you I’d fasten my cuffs when Church was no longer a problem.”
Ben waved his hand. “Don’t mistake me, nephew. I think you made the right choice. But it’s not the choice of a man with reservations. You’re feeling better about J.J., I take it.”
“I think he’s arrogant and inexperienced, and those are dangerous traits, especially in combination. But I’ve seen some competence, too. Some learning. So I’m willing to give him a job in his purview and expect him to do it well. But if he fucks it up, I will handle the job and J.J. both.”
“Fair enough.” Ben smiled and had a spoonful of spumoni. “You know, when you were made capo, you weren’t much older than J.J. I heard the same kind of protests about you.”
“I wasn’t inexperienced.”
“No. You’d made your bones. But you were young for a capo. And you were thought of as arrogant.”
Fred laughed, and Nick turned a cold eye on the consigliere. “You have something to say, Fred?”
Grinning, Fred answered, “Only that the difference between arrogant and confident is success.”
“Then let’s see which one J.J. is.”
~oOo~
Two days later, it was done.
The scene had been set for the story to be that on his way home after closing his shop for the night, during a light rain, Chris Mills hit a turn on the coast road, not far from the lighthouse, and went through the guardrail and over the side to the rocks below.
He was reported dead at the scene.
Nick got the call from J.J. while he and Beverly were watching a movie, sitting together on her white sofa against her magenta wall. Used to Nick getting calls throughout the day and evening, Beverly made no note of the interruption at all, and Nick settled back with her without comment, pulling her close.
He took what closeness she could give him.
The next morning, he stood on her balcony and watched her swim her laps. She was a strong, lithe swimmer, her lines perfectly straight, her rhythm like clockwork. Watching her body in its strength made him hard. He missed that body, the way it felt in his hands. The way he felt inside her.
Her return to the routines of her life gave Nick hope that she would someday reclaim her bright peace. He saw signs that she was getting better. She was eating better, working out, filling back out. She was freer with physical contact than she had been in the first weeks after the attack. She no longer hid her body from him—though that made some things more difficult for him, he was glad to see her trust strengthening again.
Her trust.
Behind him, her phone rang. It rang until it went to voice mail, and then, a minute or so later, a voice mail alert chimed. He stepped back through the open balcony door and went to the kitchen counter to check it.
Bruce. Calling so early, it was no social call. This was Bruce sharing news he’d just learned, that Mills had had an accident. That he was dead.
And now Nick would live his first lie with Beverly.
~oOo~
She came in wearing her white terrycloth robe, a purple towel draped over her shoulders and her wet hair free from the rolled braid she wore when she swam. She smiled her beautiful smile at him, and she looked like his Beverly, almost as bright as ever.
“Hi! I thought you’d be gone already. You’re still in your track pants.” She walked over around the counter and into the kitchen, and he kissed her.
“No meetings today until later. I thought I’d have a slow morning.” He put his arm around her waist and held her to him. “You seem good this morning.”
“It was a good swim. My head feels straighter this morning. I think it’s the weather, too. I like the first sunny day after a rai
ny spell. Everything smells good, and the air has weight.”
He laughed. “Most people hate humidity, you know that.”
“I like it. The world feels more real.”
He loved this woman with a depth he hadn’t yet fathomed. Setting his coffee aside, he wrapped her in both arms and kissed her, clutching her tightly to his bare chest. When she kissed him back, sincerely and without hesitation, her tongue alive with his, he groaned and pulled back. “I like seeing you like this, bella.” In fact, he wanted to throw her phone over the balcony and into the pool below, and keep her here, innocent of anything but their love.
Smiling shyly, she pulled away. He let her go—she wasn’t ready to give him more of her body.
As he watched, she turned and went to her phone. “Huh. Bruce called. I hope he’s okay.”
“Why would he call?” Nick didn’t like the way his pulse had picked up speed, and he strove for, and found, control over it.
“I don’t know. I just talked to him a couple of days ago.” She tapped the screen, going to voice mail. While she listened, Nick rinsed out his cup. When he turned back around, Beverly was staring at her phone.
And it was time.
“What is it, bella? You look upset.”
She lifted her eyes and stared at him, speechless.
“Beverly?”
She swallowed. “It’s Chris. He…he…died last night. He ran off the road in the rain. He’s dead.”
He went to her and took the phone from her hand. “I’m sorry.” That was a truth that he could say. “What can I do?”
Standing motionless and silent, she didn’t respond at all.
Again, he said her name, and again she responded to that, her eyes shifting to him. “I don’t…understand.”
“Would you like me to call somebody, see what I can find out?” Nick felt like he was reading from a script. He was not unfamiliar with lying; it was a part of his world. But lying to someone whose trust he valued—that was foreign to him.
But the truth would hurt her more.
“No. I don’t—I—I don’t need to know more. My God. Chris is dead.”
He led her to sit on the sofa, and she went, docile and pliant. “I’ll cancel my day and stay with you.”
Still with that look of dazed absence, she shook her head. “No. I’m okay.”
“I’m staying, bella. I won’t leave you today.”
At that, she smiled a little, one side of her lovely mouth lifting a fraction. “Do you ever take no for an answer?”
He smiled back and brushed her wet hair back from her face, the pressure in his chest increasing at the sight of the trust in her tiny smile. “Depends on the question.”
“Okay.” She stood back up, and he followed. “I—I have to…to…”
“What?”
“Take a shower.” With that, she walked through the apartment and to the bathroom.
Nick stared after her. He had not expected this reaction from her, but now, as she closed the bathroom door between them, he understood that he should have. She had been on autopilot for weeks, describing herself as numb, and her responses to anything had been accordingly flat. Only recently had she begun to break through that. She was reverting to robotic flatness, and that scared Nick more, made him feel more guilty, than a deluge of tears would have.
He heard the water in the shower running.
And then he heard something else. Moaning.
There were her tears.
Knowing full well that she’d closed herself in the bathroom for privacy, Nick went to the door. He tried the knob—it wasn’t locked. So he opened the door and went in.
In lieu of a bathtub, Beverly’s bathroom had a large, walk-in shower, tiled in iridescent glass tiles. All of her towels and bathroom accouterments were in pinks and purples. Surprisingly, Nick had grown used to living in such a feminine environment. In the past two months, he’d spent easily ten times as much of his down time in her apartment as his own. Even the magenta wall didn’t bother him as it once had.
She was sitting on the floor of her shower, her arms wrapped around her folded legs, sobbing. He was glad to see it. Despite his regret for the cause of her tears, the show of emotion gave him hope. Real hope.
What he did next, he did on instinct, operating on a level beyond rational control. He pushed his track pants off his hips and stepped into the shower with her.
“No! Get out!”
He bent down, ignoring the spray of the shower, and grasped her arms. “I’m not here for that, bella. I’m here for you. Come up. I’ve got you.” He pulled her up. She fought halfheartedly, sobbing harder, but stood, and he closed her in his arms. She put her forehead on his chest and wept. “I’ve got you,” he murmured into her hair.
Again, his world had crashed into hers and left her suffering.
Since she’d been attacked, he had not had her nude body so close to his own, and his body reacted immediately and strenuously to the contact. It was fucking torture, and his mind twisted into a roiling snarl of need and regret and love.
But it truly had not been his motivation in entering the shower with her. His instinct had been to protect, to console, and, above all else, to keep her close. But as badly and incessantly as he wanted her, he wouldn’t push her. This no, he did take for an answer. Of course he did.
His erection was pressing into her belly, though, and she felt him. Of course she did. Still crying, she leaned back, pushing on his chest, trying to make room.
“Easy. That’s not why I’m here. I’m here for you. I can’t control that reaction, but it doesn’t matter.”
She shocked him then by hitting him, slapping both palms hard on his chest. “Why not?! Who the fuck are you?”
“Please? Beverly, calm down.” He tried to pull her close again, but she stepped back.
“No!” The intensity of her tears had warped her face and made shrill each word that she wrenched from her constricting throat. “Who are you?!”
“I don’t understand.” With a sudden concern that her mind had really broken, he added, “I’m Nick.”
Her tears stopped as if she’d turned off a spigot, and her eyes sharpened with anger. Nick was expert at reading people and anticipating their reactions, but from the moment Beverly had listened to that voice mail, she’d had him baffled. “No, you’re not. You’re not Nick.”
“I am.” His worry deepened. “Bella, let me help you.”
As suddenly as her tears had stopped, her anger deflated, making her body sag. He caught her with one arm around her waist, and she leaned into him. “I want my Nick back. I want all of you.”
“Please?” But as the word was out of his mouth, Nick understood. “Are you sure?”
“I feel like half of myself is missing. I don’t want to be half of me, and I don’t want half of you. I want all of you to love me.”
He was actually afraid of what she wanted. “All of me does love you.”
She shook her head. “I don’t feel it. Make me feel it.” In her blue eyes, he saw deep loss—but keen determination.
He turned them away from the shower spray and pushed her hard against the tile wall, making her gasp.
This couldn’t be what she wanted. “Bella…”
“Fuck you.” She slapped him—he’d never been hit by a woman before. As a child, he’d been beaten by his father, and as a boy and then a man, he’d fought more than his share with boys and men, until he’d risen to a level beyond that, but his total control over his emotions had kept him out of altercations with women. There had been the occasional tearful scene, but never fury.
He grabbed the wrist of the hand that had connected with his cheek, and he slammed it to the wall at the side of her head. She had been so badly hurt; it didn’t make sense to him that she would want this. But the flare in her eyes said that she did.
“You want Bad Nick?” With his free hand, he pulled her leg up to his hip, and she reached between them and took hold of his cock. He hissed at her touch.
She guided him to her, and as soon as he felt the wet scald of her, he let go of her wrist and grabbed her ass, lifting her off the floor of the shower until she wrapped both legs around his hips. And then he shoved into her.
She was slick with want, and he slid in smoothly, welcomed into her body after all this time. He groaned, feeling mastered by her need as much as his own.
“Fuck, bella. You’re so wet. You want this. You want me deep?”
“Quit asking and fuck me. Please.”
He didn’t understand, but it no longer mattered. The diner didn’t matter. Chris Mills didn’t matter. His secret didn’t matter. Her grief and loss and pain didn’t matter.
Deep (The Pagano Family Book 4) Page 26