Page 70 of Filthy Little Lies

“Lucian’s Gabriel’s cousin. He’s got his own business or crew or whatever,” I explain.

“Ah, so too good to babysit the boss’s girl?”

I roll my eyes. “I don’t understand the whole hierarchy of it all other than Damien works for Gabriel, and Lucian has his own thing.” I lick the strawberry cheesecake ice cream from my spoon. “Why? Were you hoping Lucian would be here?”

“No.” She snaps, then shoves a spoonful of her mint chocolate chip into her mouth.

“Hmm. You sure?”

“I’m sure. I was just asking because you have a babysitter again.”

“After the other night, he’s put someone with me all the time now. It’s overkill, but whatever. It’s not like I’m going to be able to talk him out of it.”

She laughs. “Or maybe being his good girl feels too good?”

“I shouldn’t have told you anything,” I say wiping my mouth with a napkin.

“You definitely should. And keep telling me. It’s been months since I’ve even been kissed. I need someone to live vicariously through.”

“I’m not telling you anything else.”

“So you won’t tell me what happened before you came over to make you all aglow and happy?”

“Shut up.” I toss my crumpled napkin across the table at her.

“Okay, okay. But to be serious a second, does he think Ricci will come after you? Maybe it would be smarter for you to come with me than to stay here with him.” She drops her spoon into the empty cup.

“Ricci’s not any threat to me, unless he thinks I’m important to Gabriel. Which I’m not, so⁠—”

“How can you say that with a straight face? I mean, I know you’re great at running cons, but Sav, this is me. You can’t con me.”

“I’m not.”

“Then you’re purposely not seeing what’s right in front of you. That man wants you, in every way a man wants a woman. Not just for sex. I saw how he looked at you when he dropped you off earlier.”

I drop my eyes to my ice cream, taking my time scraping every last bit from the container. “He probably looked stressed. He was going to another meeting for the hub he’s trying to build on the Southside. I don’t understand what it all means, but I guess there’s another company that wants to merge with his. It would give him the ability to double the space. I don’t know.”

“One, no, he looked like he’d rather gnaw off his foot than leave you behind. And two, he told you all of that?”

I shrug. “Yeah. It’s all legal,” I add, so she doesn’t think he’s getting me involved in his other work. Not that either of us have a moral compass that wouldn’t allow it, but it would definitely make things more complicated when I’m done working for him.

“Sav. You’re telling me he doesn’t want you for anything other than sex and your forgeries, but he had someone doing his paperwork before you came along, and a guy who just wants sex doesn’t chitchat about the stresses of his day job.”

“You’re reading too much into it.”

She rolls her eyes. “You’re being obtuse on purpose.”

“I am not.” I groan. “Let’s talk about something else.” Just as I get up to throw away our trash, my phone pings.

“Tony?” She frowns when she sees me reading the text messages.

“No.”

“Then what? You look like you’ve been told you’re meeting the executioner tonight.”

My throat dries, and no amount of swallowing is helping.

“It’s from Gabriel. There’s some big party he has to go to tomorrow night, and he wants me to go with him.” I keep reading. “No, he has demanded I go with him.”