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I slam the door shut with the heel of my foot and press my back against it. Rory’s nowhere to be seen, but on the other side of the bar, Dan stops twisting a rag in a glass and cocks a brow at me. “Kelly really that bad?”
When I shake my head, the words I knew it was you rattle around in it. I don’t recognize him, but even in his fucked-up state, it seemed like he recognized me.
Unless I imagined it? He said it so quietly, so slurred, that he could have said anything. But there’s one niggling observation that makes his words impossible to dismiss.
He’s Irish.
Martin O’Hare’s Irish.
No. That’d be terribly unlucky of me. Wouldn’t it?
With nerves racking through my body like a freight train, I nod and agree in all the right places as Dan takes me through the signature cocktail of the week—passion fruit martini—and rambles on about the snacks in the crew mess: salmon and cream cheese bagels.
I couldn’t give a flying fuck about cocktails or food, and my cheeks ache from holding up a plastic smile.
When the phone rings behind the bar, I jump out of my skin.
“Yes?” I breathe down the line.
Raphael’s voice comes smooth and somber. “Tell Dan to bring a water, no ice.” He pauses. “Penelope?” I clutch the receiver tighter, my shoulders bracing for impact. “Dan. Not you.”
He hangs up.
“Was that the boss?” Dan asks, tone too chipper for my frazzled state.
I nod, scrambling for a glass and filling it up with water. Why Dan? Why not me?Christ, my mouth is watering in suspense.
Maybe I do recognize him, and I just wasn’t looking at him properly.
There’s only one way to find out.
I slide the water on a tray and stomp into the sky lounge. Now, the air is thick from something other than cigar smoke and lighthearted competition. My gaze sweeps over the back of Kelly’s head to Angelo’s stony expression, then locks on Raphael. His eyes simmer with a cool green fury that suggests I’m in deep shit for disobeying his request, but right now, I don’t fucking care. I drop the glass on Kelly’s side of the table and glare at his profile.
No, I definitelydon’t recognize him.
He rolls his head on his neck to give me a smarmy smile. “Would you deal, Princess?”
I blink. Shift my gaze to the cards in front of him. He’s playing the last hand of the game; there’s a pile of discarded cards on the table, and only one card left in the shoe.
I don’t know why it slides out of my mouth. Maybe it’s because I want to keep him looking at me for longer, so I can truly study his face and see if I recognize him. Or maybe, it’s because I’m a fucking idiot.
“Depends if you’re playing the ace as a high or low value card,” I whisper.
A second passes like the beat of a drum.
Raphael rubs the bridge of his nose. Angelo lets out a slow breath. And Kelly’s resounding chuckle reverberates in the hollow of my chest. “Deal.”
Raking a cautious eye over Raphael, Angelo plucks the last card from the shoe and flicks it on the table.
Ace of spades.
It’s so quiet I can hear the tick of Raphael’s Breitling on my wrist. The whir of the blender going on the other side of the door. How can Dan make passion fruit martinis at a time like this?
I look to Raphael for an answer, which is stupid, because I don’t even know the question. Head dipped between his shoulder blades, he slowly drags his gaze up to me, and I don’t like what I see in it.
It’s soft. At odds with the suffocating tension pressing against the four walls of the room. When it drops to the pendant around my neck, it hardens with resolve.
“Penelope.”
