Page 45 of The Man with a Treasure

I was instantly angry at someone I thought could never make me mad.

And I was irate with the girl who was staring at me, pity in her unforgettable green eyes.

When our shift was over, we wandered into the vineyard for Pietro and Cristian’s nicotine addiction that needed attention. Sal and I had yet to speak to each other. It was for the best. Any shared words would have led us to an argument in front of the Giordano family. The Giordano family which now included Noemi. For hours, I had to stand there and watch over the woman I loved while another doted over her in the back yard, trying to impress anyone who gave a fuck. Which seemed to be no one but me.

Stewing with rage and hurt, I kicked dirt as Cristian and Pietro lit up their cigarettes.

Pietro suspiciously eyed me. “Our brooder is extra brooder-y this early evening.”

When I refused to reply, Cristian asked, “What was with your reaction in the foyer?”

My eyes raced to Sal’s. “It was about lying friends.”

Pietro and Cristian’s eyes almost popped from their sockets. I had never spoken about Sal this way before.

Sal’s jaw locked. “I didn’t lie.”

“You didn’t prepare me, either.”

His shoulders caved. “Angelo, you would have tried to save her from a future that can’t be denied.”

“I thought this fiancé lived in New York!”

Sal exhaled. “Only her father. Noemi, as you know, has been here all along, free to—” He suddenly remembered we weren’t alone and stared at the two older Suits with hanging jaws.

Fuck!

Cristian muttered, “Oh shit.”

Pietro shook his head. “No. Tell me that neither of you has personal relations with Mateo’s fiancé.”

Blinking in alarm for being so stupid, Sal and I both started talking at the same time, denying any suspicion Pietro or Cristian had.

It didn’t work.

Cristian started pacing, and Pietro cursed.

Possibly because I had been the one who was so angry, Pietro angrily pointed at me. “Angelo, if any of this becomes known, that soon-to-be-Giordano will cost you your life. I swear it. Not only yours but hers. No male Giordano will stand for such shame. A cheating wife? They would rather their woman dead. You understand?”

As deplorable as his words were, I knew they were true. To interfere now would get Noemi killed.

After studying my expression of remorse, Cristian’s arms fell to hang at his sides while his head leaned back, and he spoke to the sky. “Dear God, why did you let him fuck her?”

“No! No!” Sal tried to protect me. “No one fucked anyone.”

Pietro froze, staring him down, then threw his hands in the air. “Jesus. He fucked her.”

Sal and I were floored with how easy we were being read. We stared at each other until two sets of astonished eyes found us. Pietro and Cristian covered their mouths with one hand and pointed between us with their others that held dying cigarettes.

Sal and I tried to shake our heads no, denying we both had been with her, but our head bobbles were closer to resembling bowls of Jell-O, instead.

Both older men dropped the dead cigarettes and lit new ones, puffing and exhaling smoke as if trying to imitate a forest fire.

Cristian could barely speak around all the smoke in his mouth, “So many condoms.”

Pietro kept sucking on the cancer stick. “And so little time. They’d almost have to be with her at the same time to go through so many—”

Two sets of eyes found us again. Well, they had to wave away the cloud of smoke first.