“What was that about?” she asked.
Alessio clicked his tongue. “He doesn’t talk well.”
“He talks perfectly fine.”
“Okay, his communication is sometimes shit.”
Ginevra considered it. “Yeah, that’s fair.”
“And he’s in a mood.”
“I figured. It’s the whys.”
Alessio chuckled. “He’s sleeping alone, and he isn’t getting to fuck first thing when he wakes up. He doesn’t have quiet time in the morning because when he does roll his ass out of bed, there’s already two other people in this house that have been up for hours. Oh, and he doesn’t like to run on a treadmill, but he hates jogging on a city street, so all he has is the gym here. He ran out of his favorite whiskey he likes in his nightly coffee three days ago and hasn’t gone out to get more. The current ringtone on my phone irritates the hell out of him, but he won’t tell me to change it. You sat on the chair instead of next to him when we started the movie. Pick one, Ginevra.”
She blinked.
He ... knew all of that.
Like he’d been keeping a tab.
“I’m very out of place here,” she murmured.
Alessio’s amusement faded. “Or you need time to learn.” He waved a hand, adding quieter, “He’s moody, difficult, and fickle. Constantly. His mornings often determine how the rest of his day is going to go, and God knows it’s better for everyone when it goes well. And yet, he puts up with my shit, too, or the fact he has to turn on the heat in the penthouse at night because you won’t sleep under a blanket.”
Ginevra guffawed. “That’s—”
“The truth. Everybody’s human, and it’s not the flaws that make up the person ... we all have those, and it’s only a small portion of what defines us. Corrado isn’t easy to deal with, but I’m not perfect, either, and neither are you. If you want to know why he gets into his moods, then pay attention. You’ll figure it out, too.”
They stared at each other, but neither spoke. He had offered her something—the confirmation she was wanted here, by at least one. And she was kind enough not to point it out to him.
Alessio had his pain, after all.
“So, will you tell me how you met?”
She figured a change in subject was needed.
Alessio let out a steady stream of air, his smile growing again. “The League.”
“What is—”
“An ... organization,” he interjected carefully. “Do you want me to be frank, or color it up with goodness for you?”
“I’m sorry?”
“I know where you came from—who you are. So, you’re aware of some things about this world, and how it works. You recognize things are not always black and white because some of us, like me and Corrado, or the people you come from, live in shades of gray.”
“Corrado told me he was worse than them once. Made men, I mean. The mafia.”
Alessio nodded. “He’s not wrong, either.”
She stilled, a chill running down her spine. “But what does it mean?”
“The League trains people—we walk in one way and walk out another. Think of it like this ... a man comes back from a war, he has a very specialized set of skills that is no longer useful to his country, and won’t help him in civilian life. What’s he to do?”
“I’m not sure.”
“The League does. They’ll train him, and he’ll either become an independent contractor for the organization, or he’ll be auctioned off to a buyer who will decide, depending on his skill set, what kind of jobs he might do. Recons, hits, robberies, recoveries ... more. It all depends on what someone needs, and what the person with the skills is capable of. The training takes place over a year, it’s intensive, and it’s hard.”
“That’s ...”
“Overwhelming, isn’t it?” Alessio asked, chuckling. “It’s a lot to take in. Sounds like a fucking movie, huh?”
“Like it’s not real.”
“Except it is, and from the time I was ten, it’s what I’ve done with The League. I’ve been to twenty-eight countries, I have taken out the potential leader of a major rebellion for a government who couldn’t have it on paper, and I have been on a team that went after a politician’s daughter to remove her from the traffickers who took her from a family vacation on a cruise. I killed a mob boss’s rival because he was causing too many problems, but he couldn’t be attached to the hit. What do you think I do for a living, Ginevra? Or Corrado?”
“Hitmen doesn’t sound like the right word.”
Alessio scoffed. “Not even close.”
“What would you call it?”
“Well, everybody likes to call it something different, but The League likes to say they train assassins. Highly skilled, dangerous, and useful depending on who has deep enough pockets to buy one of us.”
Oh, wow.
Ginevra had another inkling even as the chill in her spine grew colder. “So, why is Corrado guarding me, then? Seems like a waste of his time if you all do ... other things.”
“He owed a favor.”
“Oh.” Ginevra pulled the blanket down and eyed Alessio. “Ten, you said?”
“Yeah, it’s about when I first came to the people who started and control the organization.”
“That’s very young.”
“My father had been dead for years, and my mother might as well have already been six feet under what with the way she needed drugs to get her from the bed to the floor on an hourly basis. The League was a far better choice for me, trust me.”
God.
Her heart hurt.
No child should feel unloved by their parents. Ginevra missed her mother more than anything in the world, and thoughts of Marie filled her mind late at night when she couldn’t sleep. The pain of losing her mama would never go away, but she realized as she stared at Alessio, she would much rather deal with this kind of grief than the type he faced every day of his life.
They both hurt.
One seemed ... more painful.
“Your mom, well, you don’t talk about her with fondness.”
“Because I felt none.”
“I’m sorry.”
Alessio shrugged and grinned again. “Thing is ... I’m grateful for her, which puts me in a strange place, right? She might as well have abandoned me, like my father, and everybody else around me, too. But if not for her, then I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t have The League.”
Ginevra cleared her throat. “Or Corrado, right? You said it’s where you met him.”
“Yeah, and him, too.”
Ginevra heard his wariness. Like he wasn’t sure whether meeting Corrado had been a good thing, but he didn’t sound like he wanted to change it, either.
God knew she understood the feeling.
Far too well.
• • •
From her position on the chair, Ginevra was able to see the credits for the movie scrolling past, but Alessio was the most fascinating thing. She wasn’t sure when he’d rested his head in his hand, and closed his eyes, but at some point, he fell asleep during the movie.
Usually, the man gave off an intensive vibe. Like he was vibrating with energy, some of it dark and enthralling, but it had nowhere to go. A simple conversation with him left her doing a deep dive through her mind and heart because even talking to the man was overwhelming.