Andino moved quietly around the bedroom as he picked up his discarded clothes from the night before, and shrugged them on. Snaps waited patiently by the bedroom door, never moving unless Andino called him in. He’d went out and brought Snaps in once he figured Haven was going to let him stay the night.
The dog never got to sleep in Andino’s bed. It was a rule he’d made when the pup was little, and once peed in the sheets because he was too scared to jump down.
Not when they were here, though.
At Haven’s, Snaps got to sleep wherever the fuck he wanted. And the dog made sure to get right up on the bed, and put his big ass body between Andino and Haven for the entire night. It would be cute … if it wasn’t a cockblock.
He should have gotten up earlier, and headed out of Haven’s place if only so that he could make a trip home to get something decent to wear. A dress shirt that wasn’t as wrinkled, or just an entirely new suit.
Who the fuck was going to notice?
He should put in the effort for today; it was a big day. God knew Dante would expect him to seem like he knew it was important, and to behave like it. The least he could do was act like he gave a damn about it all, but even that was asking for a little too much from Andino.
Besides, while he was still there with Haven, even if she was still sleeping and entirely unaware that he was about to slip out of her house, he was there. With her, and no one else. He didn’t even want to think about what was coming once he left her house.
One thing at a time.
Andino sat on the edge of the bed, and kept watch on Haven over his shoulder as he toed on his loafers. With her back turned to him, all he could see was the blonde strands of her hair fanned out along the expanse of the pillow and the shape of her curves tucked under a white sheet. It took every ounce of his willpower not to wake her up … even just to say goodbye.
His reasons for leaving her asleep were entirely selfish—he might as well just admit that right now. If he woke her up, and she asked why he was leaving so early, then Andino was going to have to lie. He surely couldn’t tell her the fucking truth without Haven throwing something at his head.
Not that he wouldn’t deserve exactly that.
He would.
Andino knew he was hurting this woman. Probably more than she could take even if she did put on one hell of a brave face for him. He didn’t want to keep hurting her, so instead, he was stuck in this cat and mouse chase with Haven until his plans finally came together … and he was able to get what he wanted.
Her.
That was Andino’s only end-goal right now.
Just Haven.
She still wouldn’t understand why he had to do what he had to do today. It would still hurt her. He opted for the coward’s way out instead.
Standing from the bed, Andino shrugged on his suit jacket, and made quick work of buttoning it up the front. At least then, no one would notice the vest and tie underneath were the same navy blue silk from the day before, and his slightly wrinkled shirt would also be hidden. He considered that a win.
Andino’s feet seemed to turn into cement when he rounded the bed to Haven’s side. Despite not wanting to wake her up, he also didn’t want to fucking leave. All that served to do was make him feel heavier than ever.
He didn’t miss the items on her nightstand beside the bed. Every single note he’d left her in a little pile—it was really his only way of safely getting a message to her, but also, he thought it felt more personal. At least, for him.
He wrote to no one.
He wrote to her, though.
She kept those notes like she kept the flowers on her table. Even if the flowers were wilting something terrible now. It would be easy—he figured—for her to throw the flowers away since they were dying anyway, but she didn’t.
She kept them.
It kind of felt like them, in a way.
He was sure this woman—this amazing, beautiful woman with her brilliant, bright soul—thought this thing between them was also dying. But fuck her if she wasn’t going to try to hold onto them for as long as she possibly could.
Andino didn’t blame her.
Bending down, he grazed his fingertips along her bare shoulder before pressing a quick, light kiss to her forehead. Haven didn’t move, and her eyelids didn’t even flicker. He almost wished she would get up, but this was better.
Before Andino could convince himself to stay one more second longer, he gave Haven one last look and then slipped out of her bedroom. Snaps followed behind—it was only the click of his nails against the hardwood floor that could be heard. Andino’s steps were quiet and quick as he headed through the house.
As he passed by the kitchen, he stopped and glanced in. The flowers looked lonely as fuck sitting by themselves on the table. Really, other than a few boxes that had been taped up, the table and flowers were the only thing in the kitchen besides a few dishes that rested on a cloth on the counter.
He hadn’t mentioned it the night before, but her place was terribly empty. All the art and photographs that had lined the walls and given the place a lived-in kind of feel were gone. Nearly all of her furniture had been moved out at one point or another.
It just didn’t feel like Haven’s place.
Andino supposed … he was partly to blame for that.
He stepped into the kitchen before he could think better of it. Grabbing the notepad and pen on the island, he scribbled down one more note for Haven to wake up to. He should leave her with something even if it might piss her off more.
A risk he was willing to take.
Ripping the note off the pad, and he set the yellow piece of paper under the wilting flowers. Another one for her to add to her collection.
I had to go, sorry.
And then, just beneath that, he’d written, We’re real, Haven. —A.M.
Andino didn’t miss the goddamn time staring back at him from the clock on the wall. Hell, he could feel the watch on his wrist ticking down to let him know he was already running late, and by the time he got into the city, he might make it to breakfast by the skin of his fucking teeth.
Jesus.
He gave one last look around Haven’s place, and then slipped out of the kitchen, and the house altogether. Snaps darted ahead, and waited for Andino to open the passenger door of the car before he jumped in.
Andino checked his watch, not that he needed to.
He really was late.
Fuck.
He wished he cared.
• • •
“Where were you?” Dante asked harshly.
Andino didn’t even look up from the phone in his hand. Instead, he opted to answer his lawyer back before his uncle.
We could close anytime, the lawyer had messaged while Andino drove across the city.
No, that wasn’t going to work for him.
Continue to take your time, Andino texted back.
“Are you even listening to me?”
Trying really fucking hard not to roll his eyes, Andino shoved the phone into his pocket, and gave Dante the attention his uncle seemed to want. Standing outside of a restaurant, this wasn’t exactly the best place for the two of them to get into one of their rows together … but hell, if that’s what his boss wanted.
“No, I had something else to handle,” Andino said.
Dante scowled as he glanced down at Snaps. “Where were you? And also, he can’t come in. I don’t care what Lucian says when he’s here, but not today.”
Jesus Christ.
“Pink is coming to get him. Don’t mind my dog. He’s always taken care of.”
Spoiled, really.
Not that it mattered.
Dante let out a noise, and passed Andino a look. “Do you think I am that stupid? That’s twice you didn’t answer my question. Where were you? You’re almost late this morning.”
Andino tugged on the sleeves of his suit jacket, and shrugged. “Woke up late.”
Lies.
Dante didn’t look willing to argue, and Andino wasn’t about to go and offer his uncle the truth. So, unless the two of them wanted to stand there for any longer and discuss things that weren’t actually going to get discussed in any great detail, this seemed like a giant waste of Andino’s time.
And he hated wasting time.
Gesturing at the waiting restaurant, Andino asked, “Are we ready?”
Dante gave him another one of those looks. “Act appropriately today. The way I know your mother and father taught you to behave, Andino. This is important not just for you, but for her. Make her comfortable.”
That time, Andino did roll his eyes. He didn’t even try to hide it, and he didn’t give a single fuck what it made him look like.
“Do I seem like the kind of man who wants to make his future wife uncomfortable?”
Because yeah … that’s what he was there to do. Have breakfast and meet his wife-to-be for the first time.
Should be fun.
“I don’t know what kind of man you are sometimes, Andino,” his uncle murmured as he moved past him when Andino opened the front door.
Yeah, him either.
Funny how that worked.
“You know, your mother might have enjoyed being here this morning,” Dante said as a hostess directed them through the business. “You could have invited her along.”
Why?
So, then his mother could meet and try to like a woman that Andino had zero intention of actually being with, never mind making a life with?
That seemed … wrong.
“Just me today,” he said. “Had I been able to have this breakfast go my way, you wouldn’t even be here.”
Dante scowled again. “You’re in a mood, I see.”
He always was, lately.
“Dante, Andino. We thought you weren’t coming.”
All it took was the sound of Kev Calabrese’s voice drifting across the quiet restaurant for Dante to finally take his attention away from Andino. He was both grateful, and extremely fucking annoyed because of it, too.
Christ.
He hated the Calabrese brothers.
Kev and Darren stood on either side of a young woman who looked no older than twenty-one, or so. Hell, maybe she was younger than that.
Too young for me, Andino thought.
Nobody would care about that, though.
Kev was saying something else, but Andino tuned the man out. He didn’t give a shit what Kev had to say, or how the asshole wanted this whole breakfast to go down between them. He was more interested in the quiet woman with her gaze turned down toward the floor, and her shaking hands clasped tightly together at her middle.
Oh, they’d dressed her up, sure.
An appropriate purple number that showed off her curves, and womanly appeal. Her long, dark hair had been let down in soft waves, and someone had taken time to do her makeup with care to make her look natural and fresh. He could see that she’d taken her hair color and the shape of her mouth from her dead father, but the rest? He suspected that came from her mother.
Whoever and wherever that woman was.
Ginevra Calabrese was a beautiful young woman. There was no doubt about that. Right then, though? She was also terrified. Andino could see it.
“Do you prefer Ginevra, or Ginny?” Andino asked.
He was quite aware that he spoke to her before he’d been allowed to—that her brothers hadn’t even introduced her to him, and that was out of line. Andino didn’t give a shit. All he saw was a scared young woman who didn’t want to be there, but was quiet and doing what she was told because she had been told to do it.
That bothered him.
All eyes turned on him, including his uncle.
“Well?” he asked quietly.
Ginevra looked up, and her brown eyes landed on him. “Either is fine.”
“But which do you prefer?” he asked.
“Ginny.”
Andino smiled. “Okay.”
Ginevra glanced down at her hands—her shaking had stopped, at least. “I’m very happy to meet you, Andino.”
No, she wasn’t.
Scared out of her wits, likely.
Not happy.
“I’m sure,” he murmured. “Let’s eat.”
And maybe in that time, he could figure out a way to also get this poor girl out of the hell she had found herself caught up in. There was no doubt in his mind that should something happen with this arrangement, Ginevra would be moved to another man to satisfy her brothers’ needs, or whatever the case may be.
A shame, really.
Fuck him for having a heart.
God seemed to like having a good laugh at his expense lately. Why not add one more laugh to the bunch?
• • •
Andino was not missing the way his mother kept passing looks at his father like she expected Giovanni to do or say something to his son. That was the thing about Kim—she wasn’t very good at being subtle.
This whole silent attempt at conversation by his mother had been going on ever since he walked into their house an hour ago for supper. And he still hadn’t even had supper.
Andino was over it.
“What?” he finally asked.
His mother glanced at him, but quickly went back to cutting the fresh bread on the island. “Nothing, Andi.”
Gio chuckled under his breath, but kept quiet.
“Right,” Andino said. “So, we’re going to pretend like you haven’t been shooting Dad looks all night or something?”
Kim sighed, and smiled a little. “I was just thinking … well, it’s been a few days, hasn’t it?”
“A few days for what?”
“Since your breakfast.”
Oh, that.
Fuck.
He blamed his mother’s curiosity about the whole Ginevra and marriage thing on the fact she really wished Andino would hurry up, and settle down in life. Then, she could have a half of a dozen grandbabies to spoil.
He didn’t want to break his mother’s heart, but there was no way on God’s green earth that would be happening with the Calabrese daughter. It wasn’t that there was anything necessarily wrong with Ginevra except for the fact she wasn’t Haven.
And that was a whole host of problems for him.
“How did it go?” Kim asked.
She tried to sound flippant, but her tone came off entirely too sly for that nonsense. Andino gave his father a look—a silent plea to help him—but Giovanni acted like he hadn’t even seen a damn thing.
Nothing new there.
Gio was far more likely to indulge Kim, anyway. Not to mention, Andino was sure his father was also curious about how all that had went a few days ago, and what would be happening now.
“It went fine,” Andino settled on saying.
“Just fine?”
“Ma.”
Kim shrugged one shoulder, and leaned against the island as she stared at him. “Don’t blame me for wanting to know about her, or how you feel. I worry, Andino. It wasn’t like this happened over time. It was quick.”
To say the least.
“I feel fine,” he lied. “And the breakfast went well.”
Gio made a noise under his breath. “Even with the Calabrese there?”
Andino didn’t even try to hide the scowl that slipped over his mouth at that question. “Well, they made things interesting.”
Yes, that was a good way to put it.
Why the fuck not?
“And you like her, then?” his mother asked.
Oh, great. We’re back to that again.
“Ginevra is … pleasant,” Andino replied.
He knew that was the wrong choice of words the moment they slipped past his lips, but there was nothing he could do now. They were out there, and his mother heard them. Which meant she also heard the fact he didn’t actually compliment his wife-to-be, or offer anything that might show he held some kind of affection.
Kim was not going to miss that.
At all.
“I see,” his mother murmured.
Gio sighed heavily and said, “It’ll take time, I think, to get past the … uncomfortable part of this whole arrangement.”
“You mean the fact she’s been told to marry me, and doesn’t want to?”
Kim frowned.
Gio, on the other hand, nodded. “Yes, that.”
“She does seem like …”
“What?” his mother asked.
“Nice, Ma. She seems nice.”
Which wasn’t a lie.
Ginevra had been sweet, and entirely pleasant during their breakfast. She hadn’t talked out of turn even once, and she was nothing less than respectful to him. Andino assumed—and probably rightfully so—that it was more because of her brothers than because she actually cared to be nice, but that was another issue for a different day.
He had to handle shit one thing at a time.
The ringing of a phone in another room sent Andino’s father off the stool at the island. He was gone from the kitchen without a look back, leaving Andino alone with his far too curious mother, and all her questions.
God, he loved his ma.
He did.
Andino also didn’t want to hurt her by refusing to answer her questions, or even telling her the sad truth. It seemed like his mother wasn’t really going to give him a choice, though.
“Well,” Kim said, “then what can you tell me about her, Andi? You wouldn’t even let me go to meet her, and who knows when I will? Give me something to go on here. I want to … like her.”
Of course, she did.
Because Kim was wonderful.
Andino scrubbed a hand down his jaw, and used the moment he had to decide what he needed to do. He decided to give his mother what she wanted, but not about who she thought he was describing.
“She’s independent in the ways she can be,” Andino said, smiling. “And strong, I think, all things considered.”
Kim’s familiar gaze lit up. “Oh?”
“I appreciate that in a woman. One that can probably give my shit back to me as much as I throw it at her.”
“She will certainly have to be able to handle you.”
“I think she can,” he returned. “She’s smart, and quick. Capable of handling her own business, it seems. And she’s beautiful. In the obvious ways, but in her own unique way, too.”
“Hmm.”
A small hint of a smile played at the edges of his mother’s mouth. She had no idea that the woman he just described was one he had been in love with for months—one he fell in love with simply because she was who she was—and yet, couldn’t have.
Kim didn’t know Andino meant Haven. He wished he could tell her the truth.
“Snaps loves her,” Andino added quieter.
His mother’s gaze jumped up to meet his. “Snaps was there?”
“Outside.”
Kim nodded. “That’s a start, Andino. I know that this wasn’t what you wanted … you had different plans for your life, but this could be good, too.”
Oh, he doubted that.
Andino only smiled.
Thankfully, the beep of his phone allowed him to take his attention away from his mother without seeming rude. Or like he was trying to find a way out of the conversation. He turned his back on Kim, and checked the message. He hoped it was Haven, but like the stubborn woman she was … well, she hadn’t once called or messaged him since he left her house a few mornings ago.
No surprise there.
Andino was giving her time.
Instead of Haven, it was a text from Pink. The enforcer keeping an eye on Siena Calabrese, and reporting back when something interesting came up. Andino was still trying to figure out what to do with that woman, after all, and how to get her safely back to his cousin.
Where she deserved to be.
Siena took up yoga—same time every week on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Andino looked over Pink’s message again, and nodded to himself. Good, the girl did know how to listen, and follow directions.
That spelled good things for her.
Instead of replying to Pink, Andino sent off a message to John’s father instead. A simple, I think I might go visit John.
Lucian would know what it meant.
• • •
“Yoga seemed like a good fit for you,” Andino said as the woman of the hour stepped out of the changing rooms with her gaze turned to the floor. It was the sound of his voice that finally made Siena Calabrese take note of her surroundings, and who was near. Her eyes widened when they landed on him leaning against the wall. He gave her a quick smile, and when she glanced down the corridor with visible fear, he said, “Your enforcer is still outside like the dumb fuck he is.”
Siena relaxed a bit, but not much. It had been a good while since Andino had seen this woman, and the last time … well, it was when her fucking brothers dragged her away from John’s house that awful night.
She looked better.
And yet, she still looked sad.
Not surprising.
Andino was hoping he could make things better for this woman, and maybe … she could help him out, too. A tit for tat, kind of thing, if everything went well.
“Your yoga class starts in what, ten minutes?” he asked.
“About that, yeah.”
“How long is it?”
“Hour and a half, sometimes a little less.”
“Does the enforcer come in to watch, or check on you?”
Siena shook her head. “He hasn’t so far.”
“Good.” Andino pushed away from the wall, and gave her a second look. “Do you want to change back into your other clothes, or are you good with the yoga pants and tank top?”
She only blinked. “What?”
“We’ve got places to go, and people to see. Do you want to change, or are you good?”
That fear in her eyes was back in a blink.
“I shouldn’t leave,” Siena whispered.
Andino arched a brow. “Not even to see John?”
That had her perking back up again.
He smiled.
“See, I thought if I could get you away from your brothers for more than five minutes at a time, we might be able to work on this whole mess we’re in now,” Andino explained. “Yoga seemed like a good fit for you, all things considered. You listened, and so here we are. It’s a risk—you going with me, I mean—but is it one you’re willing to take?”
Siena’s hands tightened into fists at her side. “For John, yes.”
Of course.
Love was crazy like that.
Or so Andino was learning.
“I have to be careful,” Siena was quick to say.
Andino gave her a look. “Do you think I’m stupid?”
“No, but—”
“Good, then let’s go.”
Siena didn’t move. “My brothers aren’t stupid either, Andino. And they’re not playing games anymore. Do you know they killed Ginevra’s mother when she tried to step in and help her daughter when it came to the marriage to you?”
Andino stiffened.
Siena barked out a laugh. “I guess you didn’t know that, huh?”
“No, but that explains a lot,” he replied.
“Like what?”
“Why she seemed so scared when she had to meet me.”
Siena glanced away from him. “She—and her sisters—are good girls. They’ve never really been involved in the mafia like the rest of us. My point is … well, you get the point, don’t you?”
“You have to be careful,” he said. “Yeah, I get it.”
“Good.” Siena frowned, and that sadness came back into her eyes even as she tried to hide it by looking away. “They’re never going to let me be with him now. Not after everything … and now, with our families working together. Well, what’s the point, Andino?”
He made a noncommittal noise. “The point, is that you never give up. Not until someone puts you in the ground, and at least then, you know the rest was worth it because you did all you could. Don’t you remember what I told you that night when your brothers showed up and took you away?”
Siena nodded. “Yeah.”
“What was it?”
“This isn’t forever.”
Damn right.
“Keep that in mind.” Andino waved a hand at the exit door down the corridor that led outside the building instead of to the yoga class. “Care to surprise John with me? I think he could use a smile. If so, let’s go. We’re running out of daylight.”
Siena didn’t need to be told again.