Inferno(32)

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE INTERCEPTION



The thunder of feet against the pavement startled me from my thoughts. I snapped my head up just in time to see Nic racing towards me. I shoved the card into the back pocket of my jeans.

He skidded to a halt right in front of me. His eyes held a wild, frenzied look. ‘What was that about?’

Surprise at seeing him was quickly replaced by bitter memories of my fight with Luca, and all the things that were said. Nic shouldn’t be here. And yet he was, and this time it definitely wasn’t for me.

I folded my arms and looked around him. ‘Hmm? What was what about?’

Nic frowned in a very obvious I-know-you’re-lying kind of way. ‘I saw you talking to Sara Marino just now …’

‘You mean your cousin?’ Their bone structures were identical; she had Nic’s cheekbones and Luca’s mouth.

Nic levelled me with a dark look, funnily similar to the one Sara had just offered me in similar circumstances. ‘Don’t call her that. She’s scum, just like the rest of them.’

Family politics can really feel like they’re sapping the marrow from your bones. Especially when somehow you get caught in the middle. I was like a goldfish trying to navigate its way through two opposing schools of sharks. ‘Where did you come from?’ I asked, changing tack.

He gestured behind him, to the side street by the library across the road. Much more subtle than Dom and Gino’s earlier stake-out point. But then again, they were idiots. ‘Calvino and I were watching the diner.’

‘Why?’

Nic narrowed his eyes. ‘We think there’s something in there,’ he said, cagily. ‘Something your uncle needs.’

‘What?’

Nic clamped his mouth shut and frowned.

‘Why are you giving me that dirty look?’ I asked him.

‘How long have you known he’s with the Marinos?’

‘I’m not getting involved in this,’ I told him sharply. ‘I don’t know anything about anyone.’

‘Do you know what this means?’ he said, but I got the impression he wasn’t really asking me. He was asking himself. The implications were huge. They were etched across his face.

‘It doesn’t mean anything,’ I said. ‘You don’t know anything for sure. That girl didn’t mention anything about Jack.’ It was a brazen lie, but better than letting the anger escalate, better than fuelling the fire.

He pulled his hand through his hair, cupping the back of his neck. ‘Do you have to be so difficult?’ he murmured.

‘Do you ever take a holiday?’ I countered. ‘Like, do any of you just wake up and think “Today feels like a pyjama day.”? Or is it always, “Today is a good day for murdering and stalking.”? Seriously, Nic. Seriously.’

He came closer, until I could feel the heat of his body.

‘Seriously,’ he echoed, his voice strained.

I stared at his chest. I didn’t want to look at his eyes. ‘You are so … frustrating.’

Nic loosed a loaded breath, and I caught the edge of his smile in a mistaken glance at his face. Don’t look at him. ‘I know that feeling,’ he said, his murmur warming the shell of my ear. I wanted to scream, cry, shove him and then possibly make out with him. Dammit. It felt like my whole body was on fire. It occurred to me that I might be on the verge of having a breakdown in the middle of Gracewell’s parking lot. The stakes felt too high all of a sudden.

What was he doing here? What the hell was Jack playing at? What was in that diner?

And where? I knew every inch of that place.

‘Sophie, ti prego.’ Nic’s words were a quiet nudge. He curled his arm around me, pulling me into him. I pressed my fingers against his chest, feeling the quick th-thump of his heartbeat. Human, fallible. Scared, I realized. Scared of what was to come. Gently, he pressed his forehead to mine. ‘Everything will be OK,’ he whispered, his heartbeat galloping beneath my fingertips. ‘Just tell me what she said to you.’

I made the mistake of looking at him. I could smell the faint scent of alpine, almost feel the heady blissfulness of the last time we had kissed. I swallowed. ‘She didn’t say anything.’

He inhaled sharply. ‘Fine, let’s talk about something else, then.’

‘Like what?’

His eyes were trained on my lips. His hand moved to the small of my back, the other cupped the back of my neck, pulling me into him. ‘This,’ he said gruffly.

He pressed his lips against mine, hard and searching. I shivered against him as his kiss grew stronger and more urgent. No. I made myself think. I made myself remember. He dragged his hand down my back, brushing his fingers along the waistband of my jeans. No. I pulled my lips from his just as he slipped his hand into my back pocket. I pushed against him, but it was too late; he was already pulling the card out from where I had tucked it.