Page 269 of Alessio

Shit.

She caught that look he had.

Intense, again.

Contemplative.

Like he didn’t know what to make of her. It was the same stare he’d had in the car, and she didn’t know what to make of it. Or how it made her feel, or why she felt anything about it at all, really.

Why did it feel like everything was changing? That this was going to end up being more than just her hiding away from her half-brothers while New York waged a mafia war?

“Yeah,” she heard Corrado say, “I think I found trouble with that one.”

“Seems like you find trouble a lot, man.”

“That’s unfair, and—”

“And you’re not a liar, so.”

“You know what,” Corrado said, “fuck the drink, get out.”

Chris laughed loudly. “I missed you, Corrado.”

“Can’t say the same.”

“Lies.”

Ginevra slipped back down the hallway, and into the library.

No one came to find her.

She didn’t mind.

“How long do you think you’ll need?” Dare asked.

“A couple months, maybe. I’ll let you know if I need more time off.”

Dare made a noise on the other end of the call, but didn’t question Corrado on why he needed time off. That was thing about The League—being an independent contractor, essentially, allowed him more freedom than other members who went up on the auctions, and signed years of their lives away to buyers.

Corrado would never do that.

No one owned him.

“I thought you wanted to do that upcoming job with Alessio. The political hit in Albania, I mean,” Dare said, “because this will fall in that time frame, according to the details I have for that assignment.”

“It didn’t need two people on it.”

He just wanted to go with Les.

Things changed sometimes.

It couldn’t be helped.

Dare cleared his throat, asking, “Things are fine, aren’t they? You’re not … having trouble with anything, are you?”

Corrado almost laughed.

That was about as deep as Dare cared to get with one of his people. He didn’t care if they had personal shit going on in their lives as long as it didn’t mess with The League, and what the organization was doing. On the opposite end of the coin, Dare and Cree were some of the few people who knew the complexities of Alessio and Corrado’s relationship.