Envy by Eve Marian

7

Natacha

Giancarlo and Vito had left an hour ago and I was still sitting at the kitchen island writing cooking instructions and recipes on a notepad. Nonna made sure I wrote down every word.

Some of the ingredients surprised me, like hot peppers and table cream. But I soaked it all in while she spoke. I can’t remember the last time I’d eaten a home-cooked meal. When my parents divorced, I was eleven, but I don’t remember either of them in the kitchen much. When I chose to move in with my dad, he would always buy something on his way home from work or leave me money to order a pizza if he was on a stakeout. I didn’t mind at the time, but now, I wish I’d taken the time to learn.

After putting away the notepad, I cleared the dishes and Nonna helped. “Tomorrow, we’ll go to the grocery store together. I’ll show you how to choose the best fruit and vegetables.”

“Sounds good.”

I’d just put the left-over lasagna in the fridge when someone rang the doorbell. Instinctively, I turned to Nonna.

She frowned. “I wonder who that could be at this hour?”

I considered following her to the door, but remembered that Giancarlo had someone who answered his door for him, so Nonna wouldn’t be alone. Now that I understood his life better, I realized it was a smart security strategy.

Closing the fridge with my hip, I turned and inspected the kitchen. All the dishes had been put in the dishwasher and I’d wiped down the counter.

It was satisfying to see, and best of all, I’d made it through another day without getting fired. Although the confrontation with Nonna was a close call. I knew working undercover would be dangerous. I just had expected my first genuine fear of danger to come from a seventy-five-year-old woman nearly half my size. But I respected it.

Shouting from the foyer interrupted my thoughts. A woman’s hysterical voice reached the kitchen and despite her scaring the crap out of me, I also didn’t want someone mistreating Nonna.

I walked toward the front of the house and watched Nonna consoling a woman with short black hair. She wore an expensive suit, perhaps Prada. Her face was blotchy, and tears rolled down her cheeks.

“You don’t understand, Angela. They almost killed him!” she shouted.

“Calm down, Jo. Here, take a seat, so you can explain.”

The woman sat and pulled a tissue from her purse. Patting down her cheeks, she continued. “Robbie was coming home from work and someone tried to run him off the road. He had to swerve and his car fell into a ditch. My poor baby,” she wailed and blew her nose.

Nonna rubbed her shoulder and back. “Dio mio. Is Robbie all right?”

Placated by Nonna’s concern, Joanne pulled herself together. “He has a bruise on his arm where he slammed against the door on impact. It’s… it’s awful, Angela.” Her shoulders shook from her tears.

Nonna’s hand drew wide circles along Joanne’s back. “A bruise?” she asked soothingly. “Anything else?”

At Nonna’s question, Joanne snapped her head back to stare at her. “Anything else?” she sneered. “Anything else! He almost died, Angela. Isn’t that enough?!”

“I understand your concern as a mother. I worry about all my children and grandchildren. This vendetta is becoming a problem. I—”

Crying, Joanne pushed further away from Nonna and pierced her with an accusatory stare. “All of your grandchildren? No, I don’t think so. You ran to Giancarlo’s house when they came after him, but you don’t look at all concerned about Robbie.”

“That’s not fair, Jo. Giancarlo was shot. He needs help to heal. Robbie is fine. You said so yourself, it was just a bruise.”

Joanne stood from the couch, gripping her black purse. “You’ve always been there for Giancarlo more. I hate it!”

Nonna stood, too, but this time, her face hardened. “I love all my grandchildren. And if you think I’ve been there for Giancarlo more, then that’s because you weren’t there enough!”

I couldn’t see Nonna’s eyes from this angle, but if they were as sharp as her tongue, they would have speared Joanne. I applauded Nonna’s protective instincts.

Joanne, however, recoiled. “Well, I never—” She walked toward the front door. “I came here for your support in talking with Giancarlo to do something, because he won’t listen to me. He must protect his family at any cost. I will not have my children be a part of it!”

“I don’t understand. You want your child to do something yet say you don’t want your children involved. That doesn’t make sense to me.”

“I haven’t asked Robbie to get involved at all!”

Nonna frowned. “That wasn’t the child I meant. I was speaking of Giancarlo.”

Ouch. I didn’t know the man, but for a second, I felt bad for him.

Joanne narrowed her eyes at Nonna. “Just forget it. I’ll speak to Giancarlo myself tomorrow.”

She threw open the door and stormed out.

Shaking her head, Nonna turned and stopped when she spotted me. I’d been too engrossed to move quickly and now she had caught me eavesdropping.

“You better not hurt him,” she said. “He’s been through enough.”

My voice was soft, but I hoped my words reassured her. “ I’m not here to hurt him.” At least not physically. If Giancarlo had anything to do with Chase’s death, I would hold him accountable for his actions and turn him in.

She watched me and finally sighed. “All right. I’m going to bed. That’s enough drama for me. Good night, Natacha.”

“Good night, Angela.”

I waited as she walked down the first-floor hallway toward her room and heard the door click.

Giancarlo put his grandmother on the main floor, leaving the second floor open for me to search.

Without wasting another minute, I took the stairs two at a time. Embarrassingly, I was slightly out of breath when I reached the top. I promised to resume my morning workouts with Charlotte when this was all over.

Taking a moment, I assessed the layout. There were four doors to the right and two to the left. I went right first. Opening the first door, I saw a sleek king-sized bed with a white comforter and light-colored wood furniture. There were photos on the dresser of a woman, Giancarlo, and another man. The photo looked to have been taken a while ago. Giancarlo was probably in his teens, and the other two were much younger. Siblings?

I opened the top drawer. At least ten bras were lined neatly in a row and underwear towered in a white box on the side. The second drawer contained sweaters, while the third was filled with T-shirts and shorts. This was either his sister’s room or he had a steady girlfriend.

But based on the photo, I suspected it was his sister’s.

I didn’t think he’d hide the baseball here, so I moved on to the next room. But this one looked even less like Giancarlo’s room and more like a guest suite. There were generic paintings on the wall and unopened toiletries in the adjoining bathroom.

Figuring Giancarlo’s room was on the opposite side of the house, I retraced my steps and walked toward the two doors to the left of the staircase.

I tried the door furthest away. The walls were painted a dark blue and while the furniture was not mahogany; it was dark, nearly black. The four-post bed surprised me. It was a little antique and I imagined Giancarlo more the modern type. Granted, I didn’t really know him that well.

There weren’t any family photos in this room, so I wasn’t exactly sure if it was his. Opening the first drawer, I found four rows of watches. White gold, yellow gold, platinum, titanium, and ceramic.

Like the previous room, the second drawer contained sweaters, but unlike that room, the third drawer didn’t have T-shirts and shorts. Nope, these were a different sort of shorts altogether.

Apparently, he was a white briefs kind of man. My mind wandered for a moment, but I slammed the drawer shut. I hadn’t thought about sex in more than a year. And I wasn’t planning to now.

Resting my hands on my hips, I looked around. If I was hiding an expensive baseball, where would I put it?

A safe? Probably.

I’d most likely build a safe inside my walk-in closet. Circling the room, I noted two other doors. I spied white tiles and a free-standing tub through one door. The bathroom. So, the walk-in closet must be the other door. I walked toward it.

Turning the knob slowly, I opened the door.

Why am I so hesitant to go inside? Did I expect to find bombs or something?

Stepping through the doorway, my heart sped up. Nope. There weren’t any bombs, but there were guns. An entire wall of them, actually.

The locked glass doors stored at least thirty weapons. My heart beat faster. The reality of who this man was and what he was capable of was staring down at me. He didn’t just play the mafia boss, running shady businesses, and loaning people money. No. He didn’t come to play, he executed.

Turning away from the gun wall, I looked for the safe. I was sure he would have one here. But once I found it, what was I going to do? I didn’t know how to crack a safe. My specialty was cracking the façade of adulterers, not locks.

One step at a time, Natacha. Locate first. Panic second.

I ran my fingers across the racks of suit jackets. All various shades of gray and blue. A few black ones, too. The closet was the size of a small bedroom, perhaps ten feet by eight.

At first sight, I couldn’t spot the safe, and I was beginning to think there wasn’t one. But then my instincts drew me to the floor.

I dropped down onto my hands and knees, and checked underneath the suits. Crawling backward, I followed the white wall, until it stopped at a shiny black metal.

Bingo!

I exhaled in relief.

I found Giancarlo’s safe! I knew he would have one and although I suspected his office at first, the walk-in closet made more sense now. Of course, he would have hidden his most precious items in the same room where he kept all his weapons.

Pressing my lips together, I crawled closer to inspect the safe. It had a digital keypad and a place to swipe or tap a card. Perhaps if I found his card, it would open the safe? Thinking it over, I suspected he most likely implemented both security measures. A key card, plus a passcode. If someone figured out the passcode, they would need the keycard. And if someone stole his keycard, they’d still need his passcode.

It was smart. But it was also infuriating.

I pulled out my phone to call my dad. Maybe he’d have a better idea of how to open the safe.

But before I could press the button, a sound caught my attention. There was a shuffle out in the hallway. My shoulders stiffened and I waited, frozen on all fours.

A moment later, a woman giggled and something dropped onto the hardwood floor.

Was that a shoe?

“Shh… my grandmother is downstairs. I don’t want to wake her up.”

OMG!

That was Giancarlo’s voice and he was with a woman in his bedroom and by the sounds of it, they were about to get it on.

No, no, no, no!

I had to get out of this closet.

Crawling closer to the door, I peeked through the four-inch opening. A red-haired woman wrapped a thigh around Giancarlo’s waist. The creamy white flesh stood out against the black suit he wore. Her hands tore at his jacket and he threw it to the floor.

I pulled my head back and covered my face with my hands. This was bad. Really, bad.

What the hell was I going to do?

A loud thump startled me. And instinctively, my eyes flew toward it.

Giancarlo pressed his body and the woman against the wall next to me. I heard her panting and his labored breathing. The breathless sounds made my belly drop and I was shocked by my body’s response.

The redhead tore open his shirt, launching several buttons across the room. A button rolled and landed right in front of the small gap between the wall and the open door. If Giancarlo followed the movement of the button with his eyes, he would surely see me. I held my breath and listened for his footsteps.

Fabric rustled and then his pants fell on top of the button and I closed my eyes.

I couldn’t believe this was happening. I hadn’t signed up for this. While I enjoyed reading a naughty novel and watching a few explicit movies with Chase, I’d never thought of myself as a voyeur. I never would have imagined that the thumping against the wall would make my heart race.

My breath caught when he groaned. I needed to get away from the door. I pushed myself to the opposite wall and pressed the back of my head and body against it.

I could feel the walls shake from the thrusting on the other side.

Oh, this was so much worse than seeing them. Yes, feeling them was much, much worse.

My heart raced in my chest and I pressed my lips firmly together to hold back a groan.

The pounding grew louder, harder, and faster. A fist thumped against the wall. At least I imagined it to be a fist. I had no idea what else it could be.

The redhead’s moans mirrored the agony I felt inside. I wanted to run. I wanted to stay. I wanted to feel exactly what she felt. The pleasure and the adrenaline rush.

It felt as though I was climbing a mountain, getting closer to the cliff, but unable to reach the top.

My body was on fire and my mind was frustrated, knowing it couldn’t get what it wanted.

It was utter torture.

Finally… yes… finally, the woman screamed and my stomach clenched but did not match her release. I curled my fingers and pressed my thighs together. The pressure was only minimally better. But not enough.

Two shadows walked through the open door and I held my body still. I inhaled deeply and held it, afraid that they could hear my harsh breaths.

At the sound of the shower next door, I exhaled and fell forward, dizzy with relief. And perhaps unspent frustration.

The woman giggled, and I could hear a muffled male voice through the rushing pipes. If they were both in the bathroom, this was my chance to leave undetected.

Carefully, I stuck my head out and saw two bare bodies through the slit in the bathroom door. I pushed myself to my feet and rushed out of the room.

I held myself back from running down the stairs, in case someone else was in the foyer or living room.

I waited an excruciating two minutes, listening for other voices. But I heard none.

I tiptoed down the steps, staying close to the wall, watching for any movement below.

When I reached the front door, I considered leaving from there since it was the closest exit. But I had a key to the back door only and I wasn’t sure what sort of security system he had for the front one.

I halted my instinct to run, knowing that would look suspicious, but my limbs screamed for me to push them.

Reaching the kitchen, I grabbed the knob to the back door and let myself out. I fumbled with the key, but eventually locked it.

Relief, as I’d never known before, washed over me. The cool breeze lifted my hair from my sticky neck and I was sure my gray T-shirt had stains beneath my armpits.

That was close. Too close.

I had to think of another way to get inside that safe. I couldn’t risk getting caught.

Or worse, hearing Giancarlo with another woman.

I didn’t think I could take that again.

Especially since a small part of me—one I was deeply ashamed of—wished it was me.