Page 24 of Corso DeLuca

Corso hasn’t released me. When he tenses, I feel it. Shifting, I move to sit beside him, but he stops me with a hand to my thigh. I should ask him to remove it. Do I want him to? Suspicion, trust, longing, twist around us. They are my own feelings, not his.

“Continue,” he orders.

I shrug. “There’s not much else. Years later, I came back home to DC. I joined the FBI with an agenda.”

“That being?”

“My sister, Josie… she vanished sixteen years ago after a suspicious fire that killed my mother. Mattia Esposito wanted us to help him launder his dirty money. We didn’t have much, but Mom could weave magic with numbers. She taught us both all that she knew. When she refused Mattia, I think he had mom killed and Josie went missing, but…”

The energy in the room shifts as if someone cut the power on a furnace.

“Gregorio knew this… about your sister’s connection to the Espositos—and the disappearance?”

A coldness has entered his voice. I resist the urge to stroke the chill away from my skin.

“Yes,” I whisper. “He was helping me find answers to what happened to Josie.”

“Then I will do the same,” Corso says, but a hardness has entered his voice.

“For real?”

His features soften, that steel jaw relaxes once more. The air seems to follow his lead, warming with his mood.

“You trusted Gregorio. He trusted me… you can, too.”

Greg, what have you done? I can’t decide if being here with Corso is a new beginning or the beginning of the end. Is he the worst person with the best breakthrough to avenge Greg’s death and find my own peace regarding the loss of my family?

A lifetime of unanswered questions… a new flame of hope that Corso could open doors that have been invisible to me. I have the sudden urge to kiss the man who saved me more than once in a twenty-four hour period. Who could’ve guessed a DeLuca, a notorious criminal, is a hero, a healer? A giver of life hidden beneath a soul snatcher. And he likes to talk. Our conversation flows naturally, an easy rhythm that even Greg and I never mastered.

“No more detective work. Ask me, only me, what you want to know. Joseph would’ve killed you,” he says, tucking an errant curl behind my ear, “and then, I would have slit his throat with his own knife.”

I gasp at his declaration.

“You wouldn’t?”

Taking my chin between his thumb and forefinger, he stares into my eyes. “For you… I would.”

Corso watches me, his expression neutral. Despite the calm exterior, his color is heightened, his muscles tight. I feel like I’m in a chess match and the next move between us hinges on me. What to do? What to do, Jessie? It’s been so long since I had a choice. I’ve been reacting to life, even with Greg. He was there every day, an easy partner—in and out of bed.

Before I get too far in my head, I lean forward, pressing a kiss to Corso’s lips. It’s tender, but sure. His arm around my waist squeezes me. The added stimulation is the push I need to deepen the kiss. But he stops me, nipping my lower lip with his teeth. I grin at the playfulness.

Corso tugs my chin up until our gazes lock. “Question.”

“Answer,” I shoot back, teasing him. There’s no humor in his eyes. In fact, he looks edgy. I know it’s been seven months, but that kiss was pretty damn good. So, what’s his problem?

“Did you love Gregorio?”

Okay, not the usual, I’m clean, who has the condoms, conversation I expected. This must be a bro-code thing. He and Greg had a close bond, so naturally, his inquiry is understandable, though his timing sucks. How should I describe a friend who became a caring lover? But, his question is, did I love Greg? A dichotomy of responses flash before me, yes… no, yes, but… I settle somewhere safe.

“I loved parts of Greg. Why do you ask?” If he’s having second thoughts, I’m going to kick him in the balls, hard.

“You can stay with him in the past. But, if you come to my bed… I don’t share my woman, Jessie. Not even with a dead man.”

“Corso,” I say incredulously. “You can’t ask this of me.”

“I must,” he sobers, running his finger along my cheek.

“Life never afforded me the luxury of futile games, Jessie. If you want more, then you have to give more. Decide if you want to know all my secrets. Decide if you want to get thoroughly fucked by me, a criminal. If you still believe the dark knights in my world are incapable of being the white knights in yours, then own that shit. Are you his? Or do you want to be mine?”