Corrado grinned, glancing away because right, he was the one who needed to keep himself in check. Not at all Alessio.
No.
Alessio’s fingers tapped against Corrado’s chest, drawing his attention back to the man as he nodded. “Within a couple of months? Not firm, but likely. Got it.”
He hung up the phone without a proper goodbye and handed it out to Corrado accompanied by a pointed look. Corrado took the device, shaking his head at the same time.
“He’s hoping to have everything finished within a couple of months,” Alessio said like Corrado hadn’t heard the conversation already. “We’ll see how that works out.”
“Still nothing for her to have about her sisters, though.”
Alessio shrugged. “They’re alive, Corrado. You can tell her they are still alive.”
Yeah.
What good would that do, though?
“It’s the best we can do.”
“Right,” Corrado agreed.
Not that it made him feel better.
Alessio turned back to the stove, his pancake bubbled in the center to say it was ready to flip.
“Turn it over,” Corrado said. “And try not to make a mess.”
“I am doing fine.”
“I didn’t say you weren’t.”
Alessio made a noise under his breath but did flip the pancake. Corrado wasn’t sure how long the two of them stayed like that, close together against the stove as Alessio made an entire stack worth of pancakes that were decent, and not at all burned, but the minutes ticked by.
In their closeness, he found home.
In their silence, comfort.
A part of Corrado hoped the two of them were getting back to what they had been before this whole thing happened. Oh, he wasn’t stupid enough to think it would be the same, but it could be better.
He wanted that just as badly.
Corrado pressed a quick kiss to the top of Alessio’s wide shoulder. His head turned, his gaze finding Corrado, but he said nothing. Not that he needed Alessio to say anything—all he ever needed was the man to be there.
In Alessio’s stare, he found familiarity.
Understanding.
Corrado figured Alessio still had shit he needed to work through here, and he was more than willing to allow him whatever he needed to do it. Now, at least, they could get back to them while he did it, and that made all the difference.
It always had.
Alessio turned his attention back to the last pancake on the frying pan, saying, “Someone should go wake Ginevra up. She’ll want to eat, too.”
“She’s up.”
Corrado glanced to the side, and sure enough, found Ginevra standing in the kitchen’s entryway watching them. He’d sensed her presence from damn near the moment she came to stand there, even though she hadn’t made a single noise the entire time. She hadn’t been there long enough to overhear the phone conversation with Andino, but she had been watching Corrado and Alessio interact together for quite a while.
Alessio looked her way, too.
Ginevra’s cheeks heated as her stare drifted between the two. He didn’t find shame there ... at least, not to say she might be embarrassed despite her blush. A bright curiosity blazed in her eyes, and he bet she didn’t have the first clue what to do with that at all. And then she turned to dart out of the entryway, leaving air and shadows in her wake. Corrado let out a hard breath, a heaviness climbing up his spine.
Her reaction was all he needed.
The door had been open.
He bet she knew what happened the night before and had a front-row seat for at least some of it.
Alessio dropped the spatula to the counter. “Let me go talk to her, yeah?”
That ... wasn’t a bad idea.
“You should.”
Alessio sidestepped Corrado to leave the stove. “All right. Keep the food hot.”
“Sure. And, Les?”
“Hmm?”
Corrado shrugged one shoulder. “Be easy. You’re a bit overwhelming at first, but especially like that.”
A sinful smirk curved Alessio’s lips in the most wicked way. “You don’t know that’s what—”
“Be easy.” Corrado pulled open a drawer on the island, and in a flash, tossed an item to Alessio that he caught without hesitation. He stuffed the foil packet into his back pocket. Alessio didn’t know whether he was offended or aroused that Corrado was sure enough about what would happen between him and Ginevra that he pulled out a condom from one of their many stashes, or if it should irk him. “A just in case, yeah?”
“Right.”
12.
Ginevra
“Ginevra.”
Oh, God.
Alessio’s voice calling out behind Ginevra had her wishing she could crawl into a hole and disappear. She thought, surely, she could act like nothing had happened the night before. Like she hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night to the sounds of two men fucking. Like she hadn’t been able to tip her head up and see everything happening across the hall because Corrado slept with a goddamn lamp on.
Not that it bothered her.
That was a lie.
It bothered her.
But in strange ways she hadn’t expected. For one, because a part of her wanted to join them. For two, because she was out of her league here with these men, and their brand of love. Not only had she found that she couldn’t look away the night before, a part of her hadn’t wanted to, either.
That wasn’t her moment.
They weren’t fucking her.
She had no business watching them together, and yet, she hadn’t been able to stop, either. Somehow, she’d went back to sleep ... but not until they finished. And not without an ache between her thighs she was sure wouldn’t ever be satisfied.
“Ginevra!”
A few more steps that’s all.
Then, she could tuck herself away in the bedroom, close the door, and pretend like this hadn’t happened at all. She wasn’t ready for what was happening here if she couldn’t stare those two men in the face the next morning without reliving every single detail of the show she got the night before.
So, she needed to avoid it.
Entirely.
Right?
“Would you stop? Christ, woman!”
Ginevra didn’t make it to the bedroom before Alessio caught up to her in the hallway. His hand snagged her wrist and grabbed tight before she found herself spun around fast. The walls were a blur until everything stopped, her back hit the edge of the decorative table a couple of feet away from the bedroom doorway, and Alessio closed in on her.
She felt like a caged animal.
This man had that effect.
When he loomed over her, when he got close, and those eyes of his were only on her. Yeah, she felt just like a caged animal, and he was the predator that found his prized prey. Not that she minded it, but right then ... Ginevra wanted to hide away.
“I want to go to my room,” she whispered.
Alessio’s brow dipped. “Ginevra—”
“I didn’t mean to see that last night, and I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have spied. Please, let me go.”
He didn’t.
In fact, he moved closer.
Pinned her harder.
Ginevra dragged in a ragged breath. “What are you doing?”
“You think we’re mad at you?”