Page 116 of Pink

“Hell no.”

Absolutely not, in fact. The time he had spent with Gigi was enough to tell him that the lifestyle she lived was not as glamorous as it seemed from the outside. He couldn’t imagine Arely being put in the same position.

Gigi didn’t seem offended about it, and instead changed the subject altogether to something they hadn’t been given the time to delve into what with their busy days getting in the way. Even this lunch was probably going to get cut short by a meeting he had to have with his boss later while Andino visited his barber on the other side of Manhattan.

“My mother liked you,” Gigi said, rolling her glittering eyes. “She wanted me to tell you that she looks forward to spending time with you after Fashion Week is over.”

Lev’s chin tipped up at the slight bitterness he heard in Gigi’s tone. She didn’t show it where she sat across from him at the table in the restaurant that he had been able to both get a reservation last minute but also make sure it was private enough for them. Andino’s La Vita Bella, that was.

She might not show her bitterness, but she didn’t have to. Not when he had so clearly heard it.

“Is that an issue or something?”

Gigi’s gaze snapped from the windows to his face in an instant. “What, no. I just—”

“There’s a pap,” Lev interjected before she could explain more on the topic.

Before Gigi could even find the man aiming a lens of a camera out of his car’s window, focused on them through the restaurant’s large bay windows, one of the enforcers Lev had trailing Gigi came into view with a hand already waving at the guy. As fast as the car had pulled up to the side of the street outside the business, the vehicle sped off with the window still rolled down.

Although now, the enforcer walked away with the camera. That earned a chuckle out of Lev.

“We haven’t even gotten our food yet,” Gigi muttered, “and already they’re showing up. I’m sorry, I know you wanted to have a normal date.”

Right.

Well …

“I wanted to have lunch with you while I could this week,” he murmured, reaching across the table to catch her hand with his own. Weaving their fingers together, he lifted her hand to his lips and dotted soft kisses along her silken skin. “I’m still trying to work on that date thing, so let’s not count this as that. Not yet.”

“I mean, at least they’re good for getting rid of the assholes. The enforcers, I mean. They don’t care about catching a charge for something like my security does. Not sure what they’re really doing, though.”

“Keeping you safe, babe.”

“From what? Nothing has happened for me to need them. Jensen hasn’t shown back up. According to my agent, the campaigns for the Revvers have all been canceled. Not on our end, either. I think it’s safe to say whatever you thought might happen because of all that—”

Lev made a dark noise under his breath, stopping her from saying more when he said, “I can’t remember what it feels like to think the way you do. “

“How do I think?”

“Normally, I guess.”

That had Gigi’s brow dipping low. “What does that mean?”

He might have laughed at how she sounded offended at the very idea of being called normal. Problem was, this wasn’t a laughing matter. In any way. The bigger issue was that Gigi clearly didn’t understand how serious the possible issues with Jensen and Marco could actually be for them both. Maybe that was partly his fault.

After all, he hadn’t really explained what it was like to be … the person he was. The man he had been turned into the moment he took a job for Andino Marcello.

Lev sighed when Gigi continued to stare at him, clearly waiting for an answer to her question. “It means … before the fucking mob came into my life. Before they turned me into Pink, you know? I used to think like you, too. If nothing was happening, then all was good.”

Gigi swallowed hard. “Why did you … did you join, or?”

“I work for Andino. That’s it. That’s all. Saying I joined implies something that doesn’t exist for guys like me in this business.”

Mostly.

“But why?” she asked.

Lev shrugged, his thumb stroking the side of her hand because it helped to keep his thoughts from running wild into a past he really didn’t want to revisit. “I needed the money and the security for my kid, so I took the job offered to me even knowing it might mean that same job could take me from Arely someday, too. But before all that, I was like you. I had no idea how everything was going to change when I stepped out of my house and became Pink for the mob. Girl, a week? Two or three … five fucking years, it doesn’t make a difference to these men. They’ll wait as long as they need to for a vendetta or just goddamn business. Don’t think because it’s been a quiet week that we’re safe. We never are.”