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He saw the briefest hint of a smile on her lips before the look of concern returned. “I have a career in mind that will require shoes, unfortunately for you.”
“What kind of career is that?”
“I studied preveterinary medicine. I love working with animals.” She narrowed her eyes before continuing. “Shouldn’t you have known my major already? I assume you were watching me pretty carefully since you stalked me halfway around the world.”
Truth be told, Dante hadn’t known. It had never occurred to him to find that out.
He felt like a little bit of a dick for that.
“I’m sure we can arrange something.” Hopefully that hadn’t come out too patronizing…
Apparently it hadn’t, or perhaps Aurora was sufficiently used to being patronized by mob bosses that she took it in stride, because she merely chewed on her lip for a moment, then visibly relaxed as she picked up her glass of wine again. “So you have my uncle’s job now, right?”
She certainly knew how to get straight to the point.
“Yes,” Dante answered carefully. He still wasn’t sure how close she had been to Enzo, or how she was feeling about the situation now.
“Why you? You’re not even a Moretti.”
“That’s true, I’m not.”
The waiter came and set down steaming plates of food in front of them, a steak with mashed potatoes for Dante and a bowl of pasta with prawns for Aurora. He waited for the young man to leave before continuing.
“Your uncle and I became very close over the years. We trusted each other more than anyone.”
“Hmmm,” Aurora said in a very suspicious tone. “How did you start working together?”
“We met a long time ago through colleagues of my father. He’s dead now.”
Aurora’s eyes flitted down briefly before she raised them again. “My parents are dead too.” She said it with a hint of sadness, but mostly in a matter-of-fact way similar to how one might share how many siblings they had.
“I know,” Dante said gently. Aurora probably didn’t remember, but he had been there to comfort Enzo after the death of his brother and sister-in-law.
It had been a hit from a rival family over a trivial issue that could have easily been solved amicably, and even at her relatively young age Aurora had seen right through Dante and Enzo’s clumsy attempts to pass it off as a hit-and-run car accident.
She’d cried for a long time, then calmly vowed revenge when she grew up. Dante remembered Enzo throwing in the towel on the car accident story and promising Aurora that she wouldn’t need to wait. He’d make the people who did this pay as soon as he could get to them.
Enzo had vowed at that point to keep his niece safe no matter what was required.
“Didn’t he call you ‘The Doctor’?” Aurora’s brow furrowed as she recalled the term, most likely from one of the few calls she had with her uncle checking in on her after he sent her to an expensive boarding school out of state. “Where did that nickname come from?”
“Well, I am a doctor.” Dante said.
“Oh…”
She seemed impressed by that, which shouldn’t have mattered to him so much. But it did…
“I wasn’t planning on working with your uncle after medical school, but I used to help him out with… more private medical jobs. You know, digging bullets out of goons who can’t be seen at a hospital. One thing led to another, and I became kind of like his consigliere in all but name.”
Aurora nodded, taking another bite of her pasta and chewing thoughtfully. She obviously wasn’t completely clueless about her uncle’s way of life since she didn’t question any of that.
The topic shifted as Dante asked Aurora about her schooling growing up, and they fell into comfortable conversation as they finished their meal. Dante paid the bill and led Aurora out to the limo. She took his hand willingly this time, though the scowl was back on her face as soon as they were seated in the car and driving back toward the villa.
“It’s weird being driven around like this,” she whined. “I don’t like not having a say in where I go or what I do.”
Dante grinned at her. “Tell you what, princess. You can decide what we do for the rest of the evening.”
Her eyes brightened a bit. “Can I go outside? In the gardens?”
