Chapter 8

CHAPTER

EIGHT

Saverio

D ante recaps an offer from a new whisky distillery in Bolivia. We take care of the import permit and red tape via Luigi’s contacts, and they get a non-exclusive contract to supply our clubs for a significant discount. To sweeten the deal, they’re throwing in a kickback for all the business they procure in our territory.

It’s an interesting proposal. I’ve long since wanted to establish a connection in South America, but my attention is not on my only friend in the world who blabbers from his perched position on the corner of my desk. I’m focused on Anya who sits silently on the sofa in the lounge area of my office.

From the vacant expression in her eyes, she’s miles away. The business talk must be boring her, but it can’t be helped. Since she got fired, I’ve been bringing her everywhere with me. After Luigi’s threat, I’m not leaving her on her own if I can prevent it. I operate better when I have her in sight, knowing I can protect her.

We’re still fucking day and night, my addiction to her only growing stronger by the day, but we haven’t spoken about the baby room after she found me in the midst of demolishing the twin bedroom next to mine, one that, by the design of the architecture, was destined for the mistress of the house.

In my previous life, I wouldn’t have minded giving my wife her own bedroom. Not so with my treasure. Her place is in my bed. At my side.

I study her more carefully. The dizzy spells vanished. The nausea is almost a thing of the past. Nicole is happy with the baby’s development and the mom’s health. Yet there’s a listlessness to Anya that escalated after the wedding, and I know what the causes are. She frets about not earning an income. She likes to be self-sufficient. She’s worried about her baby’s future, and she thought by the time the child was born, she’d be somewhere far away from me.

Like not sharing a room and a bed, it’s not going to happen. The sooner she accepts that, the better.

She’s yet to look at the paint swatches and furniture brochures I left on her nightstand. I ordered a stack of reading material on baby room decoration, thinking it might get her excited about the project, but she hasn’t opened a single book or magazine. The nesting syndrome I read about that hits pregnant woman from their second or third trimesters hasn’t kicked in.

“They’re willing to go up to seven percent in kickbacks,” Dante says, watching me expectantly as he comes to the end of his discourse.

Distributing through our network is a foot in the door of a promising market for the new world distillery. It’s a golden opportunity to get their merchandise into the USA. The deal is worth a lot more than the ten percent markdown and the measly kickback they’re offering.

Turning my attention back to Dante, I ask, “What’s their turnover?”

“Roughly half a billion per annum. They have enough stock to fulfill our orders. I sampled the goods, and they give our Scottish and Japanese suppliers a run for their money. Plus, it’s a lot more economical than our current brands.”

“What about competition?”

“We’ll make them sign a mandate to supply our orders first.”

I rub a thumb over my lips, considering the logistics. It shouldn’t be too difficult to put the necessary measures in place. I’ll request a meeting to get a feeling of who I’m dealing with first. In the meantime, “I want all the information on the shareholders you can get your hands on, including any shady history.”

Dante grins. “That goes without saying.”

I steeple my fingers. “Before I meet with them, I want to lay down our terms. If they accept, we can tie down a date.” I glance at Anya, who’s still staring with unseeing eyes at the window. “It’ll take place on our turf.” I’m not going anywhere until a few months after the birth.

“What are your terms?” Dante asks.

“They can easily make thirty-six grand per club per year. Times that with the twelve clubs Luigi owns across the country, and that gives them?—”

“Four hundred and thirty-two thousand,” Anya says like a sleepwalker, her gaze trained outside.

Both Dante and I look at her. Except for giving Dante an absent-minded greeting, these are the first words she’s spoken since we arrived .

“Exactly,” I say. “How many other clubs are there just in New York City?”

“More than twenty-five thousand,” Dante says.

“Say they cash in on a quarter of that business, which should be feasible if Luigi paves their way, they can make a potential profit of?—”

“Two hundred twenty-five million plus Luigi’s clubs, which totals two hundred twenty-five million four hundred thirty-two thousand,” Anya says.

I stare at her for another moment. “Yeah.” Addressing Dante, I continue, “For that kind of profit potential, I want a kickback of ten percent that grows exponentially with zero point five percent for every million of net growth. With fourteen cents to the dollar, the exchange rate plays in their favor. They’ll clear more from our clubs alone than they can make by selling to their local bars in Bolivia.”

“That’s a nice sum of bolivianos,” Dante muses.

“Two million nine hundred eighty-four thousand one hundred fifty-nine and sixty-six cents,” Anya says.

Dante swivels her way. “Excuse me?”

She looks at him as if noticing him for the first time. “Two million nine…” she starts, repeating the number.

What the fuck?

He grabs the calculator from my desk and punches in numbers. Turning it my way, he shows me the exact figure she quoted.

Too baffled to speak, I can only look at my girl.

Dante jumps to his feet. Typing the numbers into the calculator, he says, “Six hundred fifty-six thousand times one point seven.”

Anya smirks. “That’s an easy one. One million one hundred and fifteen thousand two hundred.”

“Fuck,” he says, showing me that her calculation is right .

I’m so bowled over I don’t correct him for swearing in the baby’s presence.

Worked up with excitement, Dante continues to throw calculations at her that grow more and more complicated, and she gets them right each time.

“Fuck,” Dante says again, his jaw hanging on the floor as he drops the calculator on the desk.

“Language,” I growl in warning, battling to wrap my head around what I’ve just witnessed.

Dante watches me with his jacket brushed aside and his hands on his hips.

“How do you do that?” I ask, getting to my feet.

She shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s like a pattern. Once you get how the pattern works, it’s easy.”

There’s nothing easy about the calculations she does in a split-second in her head. In all my life, I’ve never seen anything like it.

Dante cuts me a look.

We’re thinking the same thing.

My treasure is a mathematical genius.

I take her in with wonder, my admiration for the miracle that she is climbing all the notches until it hits the ceiling.

That’s when an idea occurs to me.

Anya’s talent and skills give me the perfect solution to keep her safe from Luigi. It’ll drag her deeper into our business, but it’s a small price to pay for her life. I know just how to make her indispensable. I know exactly how to make Luigi and Giorgio so dependent on her that instead of wanting to get rid of her, they’ll guard her like their most precious asset.

Holding my genius’s pretty honey-colored gaze, I say, “I’ve just found our new bookkeeper.”

Anya blinks. “What? ”

I walk to where she sits. “We’re yet to replace Lewis.”

Apprehension washes over her features. “You must be joking.”

“Sav,” Dante says, his tone beseeching. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

I know what’s going through his head. Including Anya by exposing the organization’s deepest secrets and crimes is nothing short of putting her life in danger. Only, in this instance, it’s a way of clearing the price on her head. He can’t know that it’s a soundproof way of preventing a war.

“Give us a minute,” I tell him, not breaking eye contact with Anya.

He hovers for a second but finally walks out and closes the door.

Silence stretches while we weigh each other.

Anya speaks first. “I can’t do that.”

“You’re just as capable of doing the books as Lewis was.” Correcting myself, I say, “No, you’ll be better.”

“That’s not what I meant.” She looks at me with a willful expression. “I don’t want to get involved in your business.”

She makes to get up, to no doubt escape, but I step so close to her that our knees touch. Sinking back into the cushions, she observes me with trepidation.

“I wish there was another way, Anya, but there isn’t.”

Her pulse flutters in her throat. “What exactly are you saying? That you’re not giving me a choice?”

“There is no choice. Luigi wants you dead. He also desperately needs a new bookkeeper he can trust. Antonio took over, but he’s making a mess of things.”

She huffs a laugh. “And you think Luigi will trust me?”

I look deep into the mesmerizing pools of her eyes that resemble the color of the sun, of whisky, of sin. And suddenly, I know without a doubt what I have to do. “He will if you prove that you’re loyal to me.”

She shrinks deeper into her seat. “How am I supposed to do that?”

“You’ll marry me.”

The expression that comes over her beautiful face is so stunned I may as well have slapped her.

“You can’t be serious,” she says in a breathless voice.

“We’ll get married before the baby is born.”

She opens and closes her mouth, but no sound escapes from her lips. Her cheeks are the color of ash, the blood drained from her face.

When she finally finds her voice, it’s to say with a bitter accusation in her tone, “Do I get a choice in this , or have you already decided?”

I lean down and brace my palms on the backrest, one on each side of her face. She cranes her neck to bravely hold my gaze even as fear and uneasiness dance in her eyes.

“Would you prefer that I go down on one knee?” I ask.

“No,” she says, all but spitting the word at me.

“I’ll be good to you, tesoro .” I caress the lines of her face with my gaze. “You know that from living with me already.”

Her pretty eyes spark with animosity and defiance. “Marriage will tie me to you forever.”

And isn’t that the sweetest thing I’ve heard?

Yeah, forever with her sits very right with me.

“When it comes to your life, my love , no price is too high to pay.”

“Why?” She studies me. “Why would you go to such lengths to keep me safe?”

She keeps on asking the same question, trying to understand my motives, but I can’t tell her my deepest secrets and saddest regrets. All I can give her is the same answer as always. “You know why.”

“To save your own skin,” she concludes with a sad little smile. “What’s that saying about keeping your enemies close? I guess you only have one alibi. You can’t risk losing her or letting her shoot off her mouth.”

Smiling, I admit another truth she already knows. “I never lied about my intentions.”

She flattens her palms on my chest and pushes me away. I make space for her not because I have to but because I choose to.

When we’re standing toe to toe, she tilts her face up. “What happens if I say no?”

“You’ll do the books and marry me anyway.”

“I see,” she says, looking at me like my mother did when my father told her I’d stolen the money that had paid for the food she’d eaten.

Her dejection hits me right in the chest.

“In that case,” she says, “all I ask is that you give me time.”

“You’ll have time, tesoro , four months to be exact, but I’ll put a ring on your finger and give you my name before that time is up.”

Painful disillusionment distorts her expression.

I sweeten the blow with a soft kiss on her lips.

She doesn’t resist me. She accepts her fate like the brave girl she is, and the possessive beast inside me roars with satisfaction.