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He pulled me into this whirlpool of life and just stood there watching?
The alcohol in my blood was burning, incinerating all caution and hesitation. I stopped spinning abruptly, didn't think twice, jogged straight up to him, and held out my hand.
"Don't just stand there judging, Mr. Moretti." I looked up at him, chest heaving, burning fingertips hovering inches from the front of his black coat, close enough to feel his heartbeat. "Give me your hand. Unless you're chicken?"
Chapter 15
Marcelo
The damp air from the Seine rolled up onto the bridge with early spring's bite.
Streetlight halos pooled on the cobblestones like spilled yellow grease. An accordion pulled out a three-beat waltz that bounced off the stone arches. A dozen or so people had gathered, their scattered applause syncing with the rhythm.
Ruby stood right there in that pool of light.
Her deep brown hair had come completely undone, the ends brushing her trench coat collar, a few damp strands plastered to her flushed temples. Every time she spun, the hem of her beige coat whipped through the cool air, flashing a length of taut calf above black ankle boots. She moved in quick steps, a little unsteady but utterly uninhibited, her chest heaving with each breath, the corners of her eyes curved into narrow crescents, her amber irises luminous under the streetlights.
Whistles pierced the air around her.
She stopped her spin abruptly, her feet scraping against the ground. The next second, she lifted her coat hem and jogged straight toward me, stopping less than half a step away.
Hot mulled wine breath and heavy warmth hit my jaw.
She tilted her face up, fingertips hovering before my black coat lapel, still drunk and defiant.
"Don't just stand there playing judge, Mr. Moretti." Her chest rose and fell violently, lashes trembling in the light. "Give me your hand. Unless you're chicken?"
For that second, I didn't move.
In Sicily, in New York, through every conspiracy thick with gunsmoke and assassination—the Don of the Moretti family never exposed weakness on an open street. Elegant, controlled, ice-cold, always standing within the shadow's safe boundary—this was instinct carved into forty-one years of bone. Offer my hand to a drunk young woman and dance on a Paris street for strangers to gawk at?
Absurd.
But on that wrist suspended in mid-air, she still wore the dark brown leather bracelet I'd fastened on her myself that afternoon. The brass scissors charm flashed once in the dim light. That spark in her eyes—drunk, stubborn, faintly uncertain—drove straight into me.
I released the black shopping bag I'd been holding, letting it slide onto the bench beside the streetlight.
Drew my right hand from my coat pocket.
My rough palm seized her damp fingers. Five digits locked down hard, yanking her forward.
The crowd erupted.
The accordion player grinned wide, his fingers hammering out a faster waltz variation.
I stepped forward with my left foot, my right palm sliding through her oversized coat to land firmly on her warm, full waist. Ruby gasped. I spun her halfway around, her boots landing clumsily between my feet.
"Follow my lead, little rose," I murmured, pressing my chest against her trembling body.
This was proper Florentine court ballroom footwork. At fourteen, my etiquette instructor had beaten my knuckles with a cane, forcing me to nail every rotation angle to the millimeter. Thirty years later on the Seine's night breeze, that muscle memory made me flawless.
Forward, back, side pull, pivot.
My strides were wide and steady, completely commandeering her center of gravity. Ruby's messy steps were forcibly corralled into rhythm. The shock in her eyes lasted only briefly before dissolving into an irrepressible laugh. She laid her left hand on my right shoulder, fingers digging into the wool coat fabric, tilting her face up as I spun her through the crowd's center.
Trench coat and overcoat tangled and scraped in the darkness, the air thick with the overripe peach sweetness rising from her skin.
"Bravo!"
