Page 22 of When She Falls (The Fallen)
It’s easier to help someone else achieve their goals than to meditate too much on my own.
Vale appears and whisks Gemma and Cleo away, while Ma patters on to me about some drama with our cousins until I find an excuse to step away.
I get to the main dinner table before everyone else and scan the names on the place cards.
Gemma and I are on opposite ends.
Fuck that. How am I supposed to figure her out if she’s all the way over there?
I swipe her card and swap it with the one that’s right across from me.
She arrives a few minutes later with the rest of the guests and looks for her seat. When she realizes how close we are to each other, her gaze volleys to me, and something exasperated passes over her expression.
I grin. This is going to be a fun dinner.
The server comes around offering wine, and Gemma does her best to ignore me.
I’m okay with that. Just looking at her is a thrill, especially when she looks likethat.
A sparkling pendant glimmers against her skin, as if it’s there to draw my attention to where it’s nestled between her breasts. The neck of her dress dips low enough to show off a tantalizing bit of cleavage. She’s a walking distraction. That dress should have come with a warning.
I pull on my wine. She does the same. My gaze is drawn to the way her fingers are curled around the stem of the glass, and a visual of those fingers wrapped around something else makes my neck feel hot beneath my collar.
“Will you stop staring?” she hisses.
I blink, like I have no idea what she’s talking about.
“I was just zoning out,” I say.
“Zone out on someone else.”
“You’re sitting directly across from me. Don’t take it personally. It’s just convenient.” I smirk, hoping to piss her off enough to make those cheeks turn red.
It works, because when does it not? I don’t need to work very hard to make Gemma angry. My mere presence seems enough to do it.
She shakes her head. “What’s with the name?”
“Hmm?”
“Ras. Why is that what people call you when your name is Cassio?”
It’s a question I’m not expecting.
My blood chills. Memories press in from the darkened corners where I keep them.
You’re an idiot, Cassio. Nunzio will kill you for what you did.
I smooth my palm over my tie. “Never mind.”
She doesn’t drop it. “What does it mean?”
Why did Ma have to mention it?
Ras is a term in the Camorra system for someone who answers to a higher boss.
You’re not Cassio anymore. You’re ras. My ras. And you’re going to do whatever I tell you to from now on.
I can still see Nunzio’s face as he said those words. He was so angry, so determined to make me pay.
