Kon (Trassato Crime Family Book 2)(33)

“What’s this?” my dad asked, tossing it back on the desk.

He couldn’t be bothered with the details. My dad sucked at numbers and math. Other than being his son, my talent with math was one of the main reasons he recruited me. I scored ridiculously high on every math test, and I took math classes at the local community college during high school. Numbers made sense to me. I could calculate problems in my head that took other people ten minutes to solve.

I browsed the handwritten spreadsheet, quickly double-checking the figures for the stolen car sales over the past twelve months. While the notes were purposely vague, I didn’t like any of this stuff documented on paper. “Do you have a problem the payout? I did the math myself so I know it’s accurate.”

“It is,” Alesio declared, resting his elbows on the scarred wooden desk.

I folded the paper in half and stuffed it in my back pocket. “Then why are we here?”

“I’ve been talking to some of my associates in the Chicago area and we’d like to replicate this business model there, with your help of course. You have the contacts to make the sales happen in Russia and our associates have officers on the pad to make any trace of our business dealings disappear. We’ll set up everything. We already have a warehouse to store the cars before they’re shipped.”

“Ah. And who are these associates?”

“Don’t worry about it. The DiTonnos are well connected in Chicago.”

“We’d have to vet them personally,” I countered. “I’m not going into this blind.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to.”

My dad pulled his phone out of his pocket. “I have to take off, but it sounds like Kon has everything under control. You two can work out the details and Kon will let me know how everything shakes out.”

“Right. Of course,” Alesio said.

“I’ll talk to you later, Dad,” I chimed in, relieved he was leaving.

I couldn’t stand to be in the same room as him another second. I felt like I had a black cloud hanging over my head every time I was in his company. As a kid, I looked up to him. We had inside jokes. He was interested in everything I did, always so proud of all of my accomplishments. I didn’t know how or why it changed. Right around the time Laney started dabbling in drugs, he turned into a self-absorbed prick. Then I found out about the human trafficking and things went from bad to nightmare in the blink of an eye.

The door shutting pulled my head out of the trip down memory lane. “So what are the terms?”

“We want sixty percent of the profit.”

I groaned inwardly. This was going to be a long fucking afternoon when I was gunning to hunt down Carmela. She’d gone radio silent again after the night in her room. While I didn’t normally give a shit if I heard from a woman after spending time with her, I was far from done with Carmela and her sweet curves and sassy mouth.





CHAPTER FOURTEEN





Carmela



I plunked the binder down on Nico’s desk and slouched into one of the olive green chairs opposite him. “This is everything. Let me know what you think of it.”

He grinned, his deep blue eyes twinkling with amusement. My life would be so much easier if I felt something for Nico. My family approved of him. We shared a common history and life experience. Ava had told me no less than a dozen times I was crazy for being so lukewarm about him. I couldn’t help it, though. My soft spot for Kon had been growing at an unsustainable pace. If it kept up at this rate, I’d be claiming something dangerously close to affection for him any day.

Flashes of him stripping off my clothes and giving me the most insane orgasm two nights ago zipped through my head. I pushed away the thoughts of Kon with the same mantra I’d been repeating since I woke up the next day wearing next to nothing.

I don’t like Kon. He isn’t my future. It didn’t mean anything.

Nico opened the binder and flipped through a few pages. My leg bounced up and down. I stared everywhere except at his face. In all honesty, I feared his reaction. Gian loved the way I decorated his house. Nico was only the second person I knew personally to look at or consider one of my designs. The people I met through my website and communicated with via email never met me face to face.

He tapped his fingers on the arm of the tan leather desk chair, his face completely unreadable. I wanted him to like the stuff I selected for him.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

“Do you like it? Is this the sort of stuff you’d pick for yourself?”

“Me?” I asked, wondering why he wanted to know if I liked my work. I wouldn’t put something together for a client if I didn’t love it.