Page 9 of Corso DeLuca

The solution is cool, stealing what little warmth I had as pink-tinge stains the once clear fluid. His touch is tender, soothing to my frazzled nerves. I bite my lip against the moan dancing on the tip of my tongue. Is he baiting me? Pretending to care if I live or die? Did he really care about Greg? Or, had Greg got in too deep with the bad guys?

“Did you order the hit on Greg? Was he closing in on you?”

“No,” he says, continuing to work. Corso’s ministrations are above reproach, but his touch, those brief glances at my lips, at my breasts feel more like sensual caresses than any doctor I’ve encountered.

Where my shoulder was numb, now its burning like a cheap wig at the campfire. That’s what I deserve for imagining him out of his clothes. Focus, Jessie.

“He died in my arms,” I whisper, “your name on his lips.”

Jealousy and anger consumed me the first three months without Greg. Corso, not me, occupied his final seconds. Details about our case were more important than what we shared as man and woman. My heart knew we weren’t in love, but a part of me wanted to keep the fantasy alive. But, in the end, Greg was too good of a man to let me hold onto a lie.

Corso regards me, those dark eyes, sparking with a warm glow. “You stayed with him?”

“He was my partner.”

Something akin to respect looks back at me. Seriously, what is the deal? Everything I assumed about Corso DeLuca seems contradictory—the bad guy being a good Samaritan.

“Brave woman.”

There’s pride in his voice. In that moment, I understand that Greg mattered to him. But—

“Ouch,” I rasp.

“It’s an antibiotic. Won’t have you dying on my watch.”

The ointment stings, and I flinch away. “That’s the devil in a tube.”

Corso steadies me with one hand locked on my shoulder. “Be brave, princess.”

My eyes fall to his long digits on my skin. When did he remove his gloves? Our complexions are similar, though our ethnicities are not. I’m straight up northern Virginia hood, he’s Italian mafia royalty. But the villain I casted him as in my head is not the man before me.

“All done, tough girl.” His eyes crinkle at the corner, and I smile. The eyes are nice, almost kind, but… not quite. I try a different approach to get my answers.

“So,” I drawl, letting my head lull, “it’s obvious you and Greg talked.”

“Friends often do,” he grumbles, tugging on the gauze roll he’s using to bandage me up.

I keep my eyes on his workmanship, anywhere but his eyes. Confusion tosses what I know and what I thought I knew in a mass of conflicting emotions regarding these two men. Was Greg on the mafia payroll? Is that why they killed him? My pulse quickens, which is a bad thing with blood loss. “How long were you friends?”

“Our mothers were close.”

He’s curt. The words pained in their delivery. This is a subject that he’d rather not discuss. Huh… I’m unsure how to proceed with this bit of information. Like, best friend I’ll give you a lung close, or his mom mopped the DeLuca floors close? Greg never mentioned his family, for which I’m grateful. It allowed my secret, my sister, to remain with the other skeletons in my attic.

Corso drops all pretense of aloofness at my soft interrogation.

“Ask your question, special agent,” he snaps, looming over me, big arms crossed over his very nice chest.

“Was my partner dirty?” There. I asked. My heart pounds, and I’m light-headed with pain, but I need to know who I shared my life with. For ten years, I went without sex before Greg. Stereotypes about female law enforcement officers sleeping with all the guys, even the married ones, to blow off steam from the stress of the job, never appealed. Before I give up the skins, I need proof, evidence that what I feel is tangible, a real connection. So, why have I been drinking in this criminal the whole time he’s been fixing me?

“Five years with you,” he mutters.

His jaw tightens, a visible tick jumps out at me. I’ve struck a raw nerve. The caregiver has taken a backseat to the savage. Cold eyes and flared nostrils are aimed in my direction. Retreat is not in my genetic code. I lean in, readying for the storm.

“Tell me what I want to know,” I command.

“The audacity to think you can come into my hotel, get yourself shot, bleed all over me, and then demand that I answer your questions is comedic,” he bellows.

Of course, Corso DeLuca would leverage my curiosity to his advantage. He hasn’t answered my question. Or did he?