A necessary evil they’d prefer be kept out of sight.
Luca, however, treated me with nothing but respect. Even if it felt like he was distancing himself from me a little. I didn’t know how to describe our relationship. It was something I’d never had with anyone else. We’d spent the night together, but since then, he’d begun to focus primarily on our business interactions together.
He didn’t invite me back to his room or come to mine.
Every time I went to bed alone, I couldn’t help missing him. Yearning for him. Craving him. I wondered if something that had happened that night disappointed him in some way. Or maybe it was because he was the father of such a young child. Maybe he wanted to put Anna and her nee
ds before his.
I tried to understand and not feel thrust aside, but I wanted more from him. I just didn’t know how to voice it. And truly, given the situation, maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe it wasn’t meant to be.
I’d come up with a new idea to pay some of the middlemen in the organization with bulk shipments of marijuana they could sell themselves. It gave them the chance to up their incomes while letting the Varasso’s keep the extra funds in their coffers.
This meant the interest on their Swedish bank accounts could continue to grow, while the cash in their colossal metal safe—located in the wine cellar—remained undisturbed. It’d been a risk, and a big one, but Luca had allowed me to try it. And the experiment had worked. In a single month, Corridor B made double the amount of any other corridor.
After that two important things happened. Luca put me in charge of all eight corridors, and his brothers stopped behaving as if I was pond scum. The Sunday dinners improved massively, especially since Marco had finally apologized—he was a stubborn as a mule—so he and Luca could bury the hatchet. We became one big happy mafia family.
Sort of.
Ever since my experiment became a success, the middlemen within the organization began to request me, calling me Queen Molly. At first blush it was an ego boost. I’d never been the queen of anything before. But then I just found it funny. Even my YouTube channel had a meager following at best. It felt more like an inside joke than anything else.
But that was when I noticed a change in Luca.
At first, I blamed it on the increased workload. Both he and I saw a dramatic uptick in the amount of business we had to attend to. He expected a lot out of me, and I worked long hours for him. I didn’t even mind. I just wished he felt for me what I felt for him. Before I took over all the corridors, I’d catch him gazing at me sometimes in that longing way.
But then, he stopped. Totally.
Despite us continuing to spend all this time together in a professional capacity, it felt as if he was pulling away. He’d be talking to me, then for no apparent reason, he’d say he had to do something else. Things were beginning to feel awkward.
I wondered if I’d been mistaken about those longing looks. If they’d been a figment of my imagination.
Which felt depressing. Everything we discussed had to do with either business or occasionally Anna if I brought her up, but nothing else. He didn’t broach the topic of having sex again, so I didn’t either. I didn’t feel like I could complain. I had more than I ever had before. Really, I had everything I could wish for.
Except for him.
I’d even begun to send some monetary gifts to Tara. I’d told her that I couldn’t come see her due to being so busy with a new business opportunity.
It wasn’t a lie.
She’d gotten pushier and pushier about where I was and what I was doing. Why I couldn’t come see her and she couldn’t come see me. It made me anxious. I couldn’t involve her in any of this. It would be bad for everyone, especially her.
But as much as remaining separate from my sister bugged me, the thing that nagged at me the most was that something was wrong between me and Luca. As time went on, it became more and more obvious.
I just wished I knew what that something was.
16
Luca
Alessandro had stationed himself at his laptop, checking the inventory from each drug corridor. I’d poured myself a tumbler of single malt whiskey, feeling stressed and needing something stronger than wine.
I’d been tied up due to the additional growth the business was experiencing, especially since a boost in drug sales also equaled more need to launder money. Large amounts of cash drew raised eyebrows and red flags from the authorities, and even though several officers and detectives were on our payroll, we had to be ever vigilant that we covered our tracks.
Our organization had to be a snake eating its own tail. Insular. An unending and contained circle.
Between the requirements of this extra attention and my number one priority—making time for Anna—I hadn’t had the energy for anything else over the past two weeks. Well, with one exception.
Molly.