Page 26 of Mario
It is only paper. It should not bring back the feel of her fingers.
But it does.
A brief brush when I took the card. A smaller thing when I shook her hand at the end. Not enough for anyone to remark upon. Not enough to violate the rules of a professional meeting.
Enough for me to know she felt it.
She hid it well.
Not perfectly.
I move to the window.
Beyond the glass, the garden is dark except where the lights catch the stone path. Farther out, past the wall, Chicago stretches in steel and light. A city from which I still haven’t taken as much as I’d like.
That has been the work for two years. Quiet entry, followed by careful acquisition. No noise until I wanted it. Alliances where useful. Enemies removed where necessary. All of that in the dark while building a company to stand in daylight, strong enough to support what happens elsewhere.
Now there are more eyes, more questions.
More people looking at Conti Enterprises and wondering how a family from Naples climbed so quickly in a city that regularly chews people up and spits them out.
Victoria Murray is one of those people.
The difference is, she did not pretend otherwise.
She looked at me across my conference table and told me silence could become a liability.
I have killed men for less direct warnings.
Not recently.
And not women like her.
My mouth curves before I can stop it.
That, too, is a warning.
I look down at the card again.
She is too young for me.
Nearly thirty, yes, but still younger than she realizes when she is sitting across from a man who has already made peace with the ugly parts of himself. She has ambition, intelligence, discipline, and a pulse that betrayed her when my thumb touched her hand.
She also has a firm to protect, associates who trust her, a future she is trying to build with both hands.
A decent man would leave that alone.
I have never pretended to be a decent man.
But I am not careless. That is the distinction.
I return to the desk and set the card down precisely where it was.
Then I open the folder Lorenzo had sent over after the meeting. Engagement terms, proposed revisions, document accessparameters. All clean on the surface. All carefully structured to show her what she needs while keeping her away from what she does not.
She will push, though.
I knew that within ten minutes of meeting her.
