At least, until my eyes fall to the floor.
There’s broken glass all over, freshly fallen from some of the shelves and ornate displays lined up all around the shop. Expensive liquid soaps pool on the floor in puddles, some of the sparkling colors swirling together and changing color as they mix. In one corner, one of those fancy chalky balls you throw into a bath has fallen over, and it fizzes and pops in the liquid soap spill.
There’s something almost beautiful to the big mess, I have to admit.
I can see brightly-colored footprints leading back and forth from the door to the back of the shop. The space near the checkout counter seems to have been recently cleaned up.
And no sooner has the front door closed behind me than the back door swings open, and the afternoon light filtering in behind me falls on her.
Serena.
I have to keep my jaw from dropping.
Her dark blonde hair shines like gold in the sunlight, playing against her shoulders as if she were posing for a painting. It’s grown out a little since we were younger, and it suits her beautifully. Her hazel eyes could be jewels, gazing at me, taking in my form in that first split-second. Her olive-toned skin gives away the Italian blood running strong in her. And as the years passed and the sun kissed her skin, time has been very, very good to her. The Serena I knew as a teenager was a beautiful work-in-progress, and what I’m looking at now is a masterpiece that takes my breath away.
But then I see fear flash through her eyes. An old, familiar fear I’d hoped never to see again. Does she recognize me?
I then realize the sun is behind me, half-blinding her. I must look like little more than a 6’2” silhouette, clad in jeans, a tight-fitting white shirt, and a worn leather jacket that’s seen better days.
“Are you...closed?” I say slowly, trying to keep my Italian accent buried.
“Oh, oh no,” she says, and I can see the worry melting away from her face. An anxious smile replaces it, and she brushes a strand of hair from her face. I notice she’s carrying a large bucket of cleaning supplies in her other arm, and she sets it down on the counter. “Just, um, taking care of a little mess, nothing to close early for!”
“What happened?” my deep voice rumbles as I carefully step into the shop, trying not to step in the bright blue and violet rivers of moisturizer creeping along the tile.
“Well, you know,” she laughs nervously, tearing off a few paper towels to gingerly step over to the colorful chalk-ball and pick up the remnants of it. “It’s kind of a messy business!”
“I...see.” I arch an eyebrow, watching her drop the fizzy thing into a garbage bag. “There are worse things to spill everywhere.”
“Yes,” she says, as much to herself as to me, visibly trying to keep calm as she looks around at the damage surrounding her. “Yes, there definitely is. Yeah. I’ve got this. No problem.” As if remembering she has a customer, her eyes flutter back toward me, and she bites her lip apologetically. “I’m so sorry, just give me a minute or two and I’ll have all this cleaned up!”
She starts to dig through her bucket, but I’ve already made my way across the shop to the mop leaning against the wall and picked it up. A look of horror crosses her face when she sees me start to drag the thing through the mess.
“Oh- no, you don’t have to do that! Really, it won’t be long.”
I want to glance up at her and silence her with a wink, but I keep my head down as I get some of the fragrant slop pushed into a more manageable puddle. “I came in here to try some soap, didn’t I? This can be a test run. What’s this one called?” I ask as I dip the mop into a puddle of bright blue.
She’s stunned to silence for a few moments, but she finally says absently, “...that’s Blue-bury the Hatchet.”
“Good one,” I say, suppressing a grin on my face, and I can feel hers from across the room.
“Thanks.”
Not even a minute with her, and I already feel like we’ve never been apart. But I can’t let her feel too comfortable around her. I’m a stranger, after all. I have to play the part.
“Don’t you have any other help around here?” I ask, glancing at the back. “It can’t be just you running this place alone.”
“Just me,” she says, emptying the bucket of supplies onto the counter and carrying the bucket to a sink to fill with water. “I’ve usually got a handle on everything—I promise I’m not that much of a mess,” she laughs off, and as her back is turned, I can’t help but look up at her.
Her ass looks even better than I remember. I feel myself thickening between my legs, and I look back down to the mess as she brings the bucket over to set next to me.
“Usually isn’t this bad, I just...had a really bad spill this time,” she says, raising her eyebrows as she hesitates. I know what she looks like when she’s holding something back. She always was a proud girl, and now she’s a proud woman.
The years haven’t taken her spirit. Nothing could do that.
I dip the tip of my mop into the water and wring it out. I feel her watching me, and it makes me want to work all the harder. But I didn’t come here just to clean up.
“Just think of it as free advertising,” I say as my strong forearms work the handle. “People will be smelling this from a block away.”
I hear her gentle laugh, so full of life and quick wit, and it makes my heart just a little lighter to be able to draw that out of her so easily.
“It certainly helps draw in burly strangers to work for free,” she quips, and I grin as she breaks out some paper towels and spray to start scrubbing the floors in detail where I’ve already passed by. But I still have my suspicions to chase down.
“From the looks of this place, I’d say burly strangers are the last thing this shop needs—let me guess, did a football team come through here and get a little rowdy?” I’m probing to see how much she’s willing to tell me about what happened, because I have a feeling this isn’t the kind of mess that happens on accident.
“No, no,” she says with that slight flippant scoff that tells me she’s lying. Even after all these years, I can read her like a book. Thankfully my new look, the bright light and the rough voice cigarettes gave me keep her from recognizing me. “Just...you know, someone bumps into one of the displays, things start falling, and it’s one big chain reaction.”
“This is a big chain reaction,” I say, glancing at the various bits of broken glass across the shop.
“Tell me about it,” she says under her breath.
I’m not convinced for a second, but I let it go as we work together. It goes fast, both of us working as a team—it happened almost wordlessly, but it feels so natural. She still works quickly, thinking I’m a new customer and not wanting to embarrass herself, but I take my time to make sure the job is done well.
“Oh my god,” she says as she checks the clock when I stand up from detailing the floors, wiping my hands on a towel, “we’ve been at this for half an hour!”
“Making good time,” I say, looking around the shop proudly. It’s cleaned up pretty nicely.
“No, I mean, you spent all this time!” she says, letting out an incredulous laugh as she washes her hands off and dries them.
“Don’t mention it,” I say, setting the mop against the wall where I’d found it.
“I think I should,” she says, hands on her hips as she smiles at me. “Seriously, though, I really appreciate it. After everything that’s happened today, I never expected a stranger to take that kind of time.”
“What’s happened today?” I ask, quirking a brow, and I see her cheeks tinge with a bit of color.
“Wh- oh, nothing. The guy who caused the accident just kind of ran off, is all,” she lies, averting her eyes to the setting sun outside.
“Dirty move,” I say, crossing my arms. “Good thing you run a soap store.”
She just stares at me in disbelief for a beat before she bursts into a laugh at my awful pun, covering her face for a moment. “Oh...wow,” she says,
starting to take a few steps toward me. “Who are you?”
“Someone who can tell you’ve had too much on your plate for one day,” I say. Every muscle in my body wants to take a step toward her as well, to play the game between us that she’s slipping into already. I want to flirt with her, charm her all over again, even as a stranger, take her out for a good time. If I’m really honest, I want to bend her over that counter and take her right here and now.
But for her safety, I have to keep my distance. I’m just checking in to make sure she’s okay, and then I can disappear from her life all over again. With any luck, she’ll never even realize I was back into it.
“Oh, who am I kidding,” she says, running a hand through her hair and looking out the door. “You’re right. Today’s been a nightmare.” She looks back to me, eyes flitting up and down my form. “Thank you, though. Really. God, I feel so silly, you didn’t come here to--”
“Get some rest,” I say, her name on the tip of my tongue before I reel it back in. “I’ll come back by tomorrow. Maybe I can take care of any other messes that come up,” I say, a boyish smile on my face.
I see the color flush into her cheeks, and she loses her words for a moment before she says, “I’ll be here!”
She was a spoiled brat when I knew her, but even then, it was the easiest thing in the world to get her off her guard and swooning. But I liked that about her. She didn’t feel shame for her feelings. She felt everything intensely. It was good to see that hadn’t changed.
There’s so much more I want to say, but I step out into the cool air without another word to her as I hear her voice calling, “Wait, I didn’t get your name!”
I pretend not to hear.
Seeing how happy she is now, I can’t let our tangled past flood into her life and upset everything she has. She’s running her own business, for God’s sake.
How would she feel about me if she knew I was an enforcer for the mafia?
I don’t even know how I feel about myself.
No, the boy she once knew is gone. And now, there’s just me.
I shake that thought off me as I start to walk away from the building. I have to keep my mind clear and focused for business. In truth, I had no plans to leave her for the night. A wrecked shop and a nervous business owner are telltale signs of extortionists coming through. Have the Cleaners gotten to her already? Whatever the case, I was planning to post up in my car and stake the place out for a night until I could watch Serena leave the shop and get to her car without incident. I’d even tail her home to make sure she gets there safely. I’m good enough at this kind of thing that I don’t worry about getting caught by her. Hell, I’m good enough at it that I make myself uneasy.
And my fears are validated as I approach my car in time to see a black sedan roll down the street.
I slow my pace, eyes watching it, and I can feel eyes inside it watching me. My hand itches to go to the gun under my jacket. But just after what feels like an eternity, the car picks up speed again and takes off. My lip curls into a grimace.
Serena’s being watched.
SERENA
“Have you been doing those morning affirmations I taught you?” chirps my best friend Rafaela through the speakerphone.
I roll my eyes, relieved that she can’t see me do it. It’s midday, and the store has been dead-empty for two hours. At this rate, I’m half-tempted to call it a day and just go home, but that ravenous, desperate hunger for a sale keeps me riveted to my usual haunt behind the counter. Besides, my mind is distracted. It’s hard to think about work when all my thoughts seem to center around that handsome, rugged guy who came into the shop a few days ago. Last night, I even dreamed about him, only I couldn’t quite see his face.
Something about him is so shockingly familiar, but he kept looking away from me, speaking in a low voice. He definitely fit the bill of tall, dark and mysterious. I can’t imagine where I would know him from. At first, I thought maybe he was a guy from my classes or something, but I don’t remember seeing anyone looking so rough and unkempt on campus. Everything about him seemed to exude mystery, from the way he dodged my gaze and wore his hood up to the way he seemed to appear and disappear without giving me a chance to even ask his name.
My brain has been working overtime to try and figure him out. Why did my body have such a strange, visceral reaction to his presence? It felt almost like deja vu, like we have met before sometime, maybe once upon a dream. It’s like he’s just on the tip of my tongue, and I can’t help but feel like if maybe I had seen his face properly, I would know who he is.
It’s enough to drive me mad, especially when work is so boring and there’s nothing to distract me from my thoughts. Luckily, Rafaela is between classes right now, so it’s the perfect time to chat.
I lean over the phone lying on the counter and reply, “Yeah, yeah. Breathe in, breathe out, I’m a powerful goddess woman who can handle whatever life throws my way, blah blah blah.”
“Hey!” she laughs, failing to sound indignant. “You know, that kind of thing really does help a lot of people with their self-confidence. It’s not all just psycho-babble, I swear.”
“I know, I know,” I answer, resting my chin on my hands as I watch the rain streak down the front window of the shop. “Maybe that’s why it’s so slow today,” I murmur aloud.
“What?” Rafaela asks, confused.
“Oh, God, sorry. I just zoned out for a minute. It’s raining cats and dogs over here. I think maybe that’s why nobody is coming into the shop today. You know how New Yorkers are— they’re all too comfy in their apartments to go outside unless it’s nice out.”
Rafaela chuckles. “Yeah, like you wouldn’t be snuggled up under a blanket back in Riverdale right now if you had the option.”
“True,” I admit, sighing. “I wish I was home right now. Watching TV, painting my nails, sipping some tea… ugh, now you’ve just killed the last measly dregs of my willpower today. If I can manage to get through the afternoon without calling it quits, it’ll be a miracle.”
“I feel you there, girl. I literally almost fell asleep on the subway this morning.”
I burst out laughing, picturing my friend with her long, curly black hair and signature scarlet lipstick nodding off on the train, falling over into the lap of some scruffy homeless guy. Then I can’t help but picture the guy who came into the shop a few days ago. My mystery man. He’d looked pretty scruffy, himself. What is his story? Who is he?
I shake the thought away and reply, “Yeah, that would’ve been pretty bad.”
“I swear, between classes and the bar and studying and trying to still be a good girlfriend to Nico, the grind is about to put me out of commission for good,” she laments. “And yeah, I know it’s all good for my future or whatever, but really, I’m just tired. You know?”
“Oh, trust me, I know,” I agree. “You and me both. We haven’t even had a proper girls’ night in, like, months. I miss being roommates with you. Are you sure you don’t want to move into my empty old house with me and my mom? I’m only half-joking here,” I add with a laugh.
“Hmm, tempting offer, but I don’t think Mama De Laurentis would be too pleased to have me and Nico move into that old manor. She’s a little old for our antics, I think.”
I try to visualize what our household would look like—and it is not a pretty picture. My mom is a very private person these days, having retreated into a quiet loneliness to lick her wounds after losing everything years ago when Dad died. Vivacious, quick-talking Rafaela would be the opposite of a calming presence for my mom, even though for me, she’s been a lifesaver in the past couple of years. Rafaela and I met in college, when I was studying business and she was a psychology Master’s student. Somehow, we ended up having lunch together in the courtyard almost every week, and our friendship blossomed from there. I’m done with school after earning my Bachelor’s, but Rafaela is still chiseling away at a PhD. She’s six years older than me, but every bit as determined and ambitious, an
d for a while we even lived together. It was never a permanent situation, as I was still paying for the mortgage on my family home in Riverdale, but during exam times it just made more sense to crash at Rafaela and Nico’s apartment rather than wasting time going back and forth all the time.
Living with Rafaela gave me a taste of freedom and independence I still crave, but my duty to keep the family home running and afloat, as well as take care of my mom, keeps me where I am. Sure, it’s frustrating sometimes, but my dad taught me that family is the most important thing in the world. And I know he would want me to look after mom and the old house, so I do it for him.
“I’m working at the bar tonight if you want to come by!” Rafaela says brightly. She runs a bar called Room With A View alongside her boyfriend Nico, and when I was a student I spent a lot of time there. In fact, I wrote most of my reports and term papers sitting at the corner table of the bar. It was a cozy, homey atmosphere, and I missed it.
“I’ll see what I can do. So, is your next class the one with the hot professor?” I ask, quickly changing the subject. But before I can hear Rafaela’s response, my attention is distracted by the flash of a shiny black car pulling up to the street parking outside the shop. My heart sinks, my instincts going on high alert. Something feels off, and I realize it’s because that car looks like a mobster’s ride.
“Nah, unfortunately this is the class with that weird lady who looks like Danny Devito’s cousin or something,” Rafaela is saying through the speakerphone. With a shaking hand, I quickly snatch up the phone and turn off the speaker, pressing the receiver to my face.
“Rafaela, um, I gotta go, babe. I-I’ll talk to you later, okay?” I manage to mumble, staring at the front door with my heart hammering away in my chest.
“Wait, what? What’s wrong? You sound weird. Is everything okay, Serena?”
“Uh, y-yeah. It’s fine. I’m fine. I just—I gotta go. Love you. Bye,” I reply quickly, ending the call before she can even respond. I glance down at the phone and shakily type in 9-1-1 before tucking the phone into my pocket. I want to have that number ready to go just in case things go sour. Of course, I realize with a sinking feeling, involving the police would probably only make the situation worse when it comes to the mafia. They’ve got cops on the take. I know what it’s like. I learned just enough from eavesdropping on my dad’s conversations years ago to know that I have to tread carefully here. One misstep, and I could lose everything. Hell, I could lose my life.
Bound for Life (Bound to the Bad Boy Book 1) Page 3
