Page 19 of Damiano De Luca (The Five Syndicates)
There’d only been two and a half weeks left, and the curriculum didn’t exactly pose a challenge. Two great points of justification for someone who loved his daughter and wanted to give her a break; two even greater points of justification for someone who knew how much his daughter loved school and wanted to punish her.
But Papà didn’t control everything, and defying rules came as easily to me as multi-variable Calculus. When the clock crept past two in the morning, I slid my padded socks on and cracked the door to the room open.
This had been my nightly routine since my second week here, when I’d figured enough time had passed since I’d gotten caught in Damian’s room to sneak into the library. Now, months later, it was nearing the start of another school year, and I still hadn’t been caught. I hadn’t caught sight of Damian once, either.
After silence greeted my ears, I slipped past the door, gliding my feet in soft, gentle movements across the hardwood. A neoclassical oil painting loomed across the entrance to the library, Ludovico De Luca’s stern face donning a foot-high frown. The painting never failed to give me shivers.
Ludovico De Luca had been the first De Luca descendant to step foot in America. He’d also been certifiable. I’d read in the Vitali archives about how he killed his wife, son, and daughter-in-law. Some theorized he probably would have killed his grandson, too, if it hadn’t meant the end of his legacy.
What I hadn’t expected was the same damning historical account I’d read in the Vitali archives to be framed and hung in the library like a mounted taxidermy trophy. Like a memory to take pride in. People frequently dismissed the De Luca family as crazy for a reason.
I pushed open the double doors to the library, expecting emptiness like the best sanctuaries were.
Instead, I found Damian.
He rested on a maroon velvet divan, his legs propped up against two accent pillows fit for a King’s crown. A first edition copy of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov rested between his palms. The same copy I’d been reading and left lying on the side table last night.
How was I supposed to know anyone read in this house?
Dust covered half of the books in the library, Damian never stayed in the house longer than an hour, and Angelo De Luca guarded more rage than intellect in that skull of his. Nothing about this household screamed, “Literary!”
“There are goosebumps rising along the length of your arms.” He didn’t once look up from the book. Even if he had, several feet separated us.
Foreign jitters traveled up the length of my arms. They startled me, but I forced myself to tamper them. “I don’t recall reading that line in the book.” I took a seat on the divan across from his, resigned to his intrusion. It couldn’t be worse than being cooped in the room.
He turned the page and managed to make the movement look masculine. “They’re a physical manifestation of your attraction to me.” His tone left little for debate. Like his words were fact, and daring to argue otherwise would be met with failure.
I thanked Maman for her lessons in composure. Without her, my voice would be far less level. “So, my goosebumps, which don’t exist,”—lie—“are a physical manifestation of my attraction to you, which also doesn’t exist.” Double lie. “I take it the rumors of insanity running rampant in De Luca territory are true.”
At last, he met my eyes. “Those aren’t rumors. They’re facts.”
But he didn’t look crazy.
And despite how much I tried to convince myself otherwise, truth laced his words. No matter how out of the blue they were. I was attracted to him. And maybe there were goosebumps. Maybe.
If he could do random, I could, too. “Do you hate me?”
His eyes flicked back to his book. “Hate would require emotion, and I do not possess any of those where you are concerned.”
“The hair on your forearms are raised.” I ignored the lust that scratched at my stomach when his lips tilted slightly upward.
It felt like we were playing with each other. He may as well have pulled me close and whispered, “Play with me, Princess,” in my ear. My heart beat that fast.
Instead, he tampered his half smile. “Is that so?”
“It’s a manifestation of your attraction to me.”
“Possibly,” he allowed, and I couldn’t handle what passed between us—a zing of realization as one kindred spirit recognized another. “It’s certainly not natural.”
Did he just admit that he’s attracted to me?
I tapered my reaction. It took a beat, but I saw where he was going with this and cursed myself for not seeing it sooner. Could I blame the months apart from a classroom? “Do you really think neuroses can physically present themselves?”
Never in a million years did I think I would be here, sitting in the De Luca boss’ library, discussing Freud’s “Dostoevsky and Parricide” with Angelo’s secret son. This wasn’t a truce. This was literature, and somehow, at least tonight, it had bridged a gap between us.
He flipped a page. “It makes more sense than the alternative.”
“Not to me.” I tucked my feet under my thighs, leaned against the cushion, and allowed myself to get comfortable as I thought.
