She swallowed hard, and he took one step closer. “Andino called—he said I could come back. My sisters needed me. I figured you and Corrado would understand ... I didn’t have a way to contact either of you. I don’t have your phone numbers; neither of you gave me them and I never needed them before now. Who am I supposed to ask to help me? The same people who sent me away, who didn’t give a shit about what happened to me? Who?”
Alessio tipped his head back.
Ginevra held firm.
“You left,” he repeated.
“Where were you?”
“Albania.”
All at once, the air left Ginevra’s lungs.
Right.
The job.
He’d told her the night at the club.
“What about Corrado?” she asked.
Alessio smiled, but damn, it was bitter all over. It made her heart go crazy when he took another step closer to her, leaving only a few feet between them now.
“Corrado is the ...” Alessio considered his words, adding lower, “... well, he’s the difficult one here. See me, I’m used to being abandoned, Ginny. I can take it.”
“I didn’t abandon either of you.”
“You left,” he returned, “and when you leave, this is what it feels like when no one explains anything to us, and we’re all just ... stuck. Wondering.”
Alessio shrugged. “Corrado ... he’s not like me. When something seems like it will hurt, he shuts all the way down. Almost everyone in my life has left me, so I can handle this, but not him. I don’t like to see things hurt him, either.”
“I didn’t leave like that, Les.”
“But he thinks you did. It’s a pride thing for him, Ginny ... because that’s who Corrado has always been. Despite how much it pisses me off sometimes, it’s also one part of him I love the most. You can’t fault him for his flaws, just like he didn’t want to fault you for yours, either.”
Ginevra hid her shaking hands at her sides, balling them into tight fists when Alessio took yet another step toward her. Careful. Holding himself back because that’s what he thought she wanted.
He had to know ...
She wanted him so fucking close.
“I missed you,” she whispered, “and I miss him. All the time. Every single day. I wasn’t sure what to do, and I’m sorry.”
Alessio dragged in a hard breath. “Yeah, me too.”
“I’m still not sure what to do.”
All at once, Alessio closed the distance between them, and Ginevra had never been more grateful. She found herself wrapped up in his strong, familiar embrace. She pulled in lungful after lungful of his heady scent, letting the comfort take her back to a happier place.
Alessio’s hands slipped under her jaw, and he tipped her head back. First, he kissed her soft, and tentative. So unlike him though she loved the gentle press of his lips against hers. But then, the kiss turned into something else when his tongue snaked out to tease the seam of her lips, seeking more.
God.
She gave him that.
And took what she wanted, too.
Nothing was like kissing someone you loved. Everything was ... perfect. Her world almost tilted back on its proper axis. Except she missed someone else, now. They missed someone else.
Alessio pulled away, but his thumbs stroked her cheeks, taking away the tears that had escaped from her eyes. “Don’t cry, sweetheart.”
“I ... this has been a lot.”
“We’ll fix it.”
“How?”
Alessio chuckled, and pressed another quick kiss to her mouth before saying, “By not giving him a choice—making a statement.”
Ginevra gave him a raised brow. “What, like a grand gesture? Cliché, yeah?”
“Maybe, but it is Corrado. And as much as he figures he’s hard to understand, he really isn’t. Sometimes, show him where he’s wrong while you also admit to your own. Those flaws of his again, and you have to love them, too. Not just parts of him.”
“I do, and you, too.”
Alessio’s throat jumped when he asked, “Do you?”
“What?”
“Love me?”
Ginevra reached up and stroked the underside of his jaw. “Too much. I love you too much.”
“How else would this work, huh?”
Exactly.
Now, she had to let Corrado know, too.
30.
Corrado
I’ll see you there.
Corrado stared at Alessio’s last text after he’d cut the engine to the Porsche in the driveway of his parents’ mansion. He hadn’t wanted to come to this goddamn Halloween party at all, but he wasn’t able to come up with an acceptable excuse to get him out.
He couldn’t even use Les.
Not considering Alessio was here, or if not, was on his way, if his last text to Corrado was any sign. He had no idea where Alessio had been for the last couple of days. He hadn’t come back to Vegas, he wouldn’t pick up Corrado’s calls, and he only answered back one of his texts.
The one about the Halloween party in Toronto.
That was it.
Corrado wasn’t sure what in the hell was going on, but he didn’t like it. At all. It felt like Alessio was hiding something from him, and he needed to find out what that was. Which was what he planned on doing tonight.
He couldn’t do that if he continued to sit in this damn car, so he shoved his phone into his pocket, and stepped out of the vehicle onto the driveway. He took in the fake strings of a spider web hanging from the trees lining the driveway, and the pumpkins decorating the cobblestone. He didn’t know what it was, or why, but his mother never went half-assed for decorating.
Cara didn’t understand the meaning of subtle.
When he was younger, Corrado used to love that, he thought as he headed for the mansion. Every single holiday had been a memorable experience with his family because his mother and father made sure of that, no exceptions.
Given the time of night, closer to nine, he suspected all the neighborhood kids had come and were long gone. The damn bylaws in the gated community made sure all the parents knew their kids had to be home by eight-thirty, sharp.
Now, given the cars in the driveway, and the music filtering out of the mansion, it was time for the adults—and older teens—to have their fun. The invitation went out to anyone who was a friend of the Guzzi family, and anyone in la famiglia.
Corrado tried not to miss it—or any big party his parents threw. This one hadn’t been quite the same, though, because the last thing he was in the mood for was to entertain other people when he could barely stand to look at himself in the mirror.
Yet, here he was.
Doing that.
And why?
Corrado wasn’t sure. Maybe because he was trying to be a little less selfish for one—God knew it had been pointed out more than enough to him over the last while that he could be a self-serving prick when he wanted to be, and this party was about his parents and family. So, he could show up for them, right? Put on a suit, because he was not wearing a costume, a smile, and be the good son for an hour or two.
Or maybe it was because this was the only place Alessio seemed to be willing to meet him, and so Corrado had to do what he had to do.
End of.
At least, tonight, he would get one person he wanted. The other? Well, Corrado was refusing to even let himself think about Ginevra at this point.