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In fact, he’s as private as me and Nate. Just not quiet, and he definitely lacks the rationality that would’ve kept him out of the spotlight if he’d practiced it.
But then again, he breathes for the antagonistic forces conflict brings him.
His attention remains firmly on me, and even though his stance is relaxed, it doesn’t fool me. Kingsley will always be a predator, ready to pounce.
“Now, are you going to tell me why you went to Nicolo for ‘help,’ as he so eloquently put it?”
“I don’t see how that’s any of your business.”
“It abso-fucking-lutely is if you’re a senior partner at, and I can’t stress this enough,myfirm.”
“Your and Nate’s firm.”
“That’s fifty percent my business. It’ll be one hundred percent our business if I tell your dear bestie you’re asking the mafia for help.”
I grit my teeth. This asshole really knows how to get on my last nerve. “Nate has nothing to do with this.”
“I’ll be the one to decide whether or not to call him in the next five minutes, depending on your answer.”
“You’re not possibly thinking of disturbing him on his honeymoon, are you?”
“Not if you start talking in…” He looks at his watch. “The next four and a half minutes.”
“First of all, fuck you.”
“Your less than subtle advances are bordering on obsessive, but I digress. Second of all?”
“I just need Nicolo for something.”
“Such as?”
“You don’t have to know.”
“On the contrary, I most definitely do. The whole truth and nothing but the truth.”
“Since when are you a fan of the truth?”
“Since I learned that the strength of a man’s spirit is measured by how much ‘truth’ he can tolerate, or more precisely, to what extent he needs to have it diluted, disguised, sweetened, muted, or falsified.”
My mouth falls open. “Did you just quote Nietzsche?”
“Did you just prove you’re still a nerd?”
“And you still refuse to admit you’re a fan.”
“I’m not a fan. I’m an observer.” He steps toward me and the air automatically vanishes. The space is stilled, intensified, and has enough tension to slaughter someone. I’m so in the habit of bickering and fighting with this man that I tend to be taken off guard when he invades my space.
When I’m the only presence in his eyes that shares the lethality of a storm and the intensity of an earthquake. He should give his name to one of them.
And why the hell does he still smell like back then? The cedarwood and male musk submerges me with memories I thought I’d murdered with my naïve little heart.
What type of person doesn’t change his cologne for twenty-one years? Shouldn’t that be frowned upon in some manual?
I wish he wasn’t so close that all I can breathe is his presence. I wish he wasn’t so close that I can see the flecks of gray in the ocean of his eyes or see myself drowning in that bottomless ocean.
If I said he had no effect on me, it’d be the lie of the century, what people in the Middle Ages got flogged and stoned for.
“Now, what is it? The undiluted harsh, naked version of the truth?”
