“I’m finding it hard to believe you’re not Sasha.”
The doors slid open on her floor. I hesitated to follow her out, and she twisted around, her head canted.
“Aren’t you coming, or are you stealing my coffee?”
“I’m coming.” I stepped out, the door closing behind me. “I haven’t been on this floor…I don’t know. Maybe ever.”
“Really? Haven’t you worked here a long time?”
“Since I graduated college. I stay up top.”
“Weston regularly visits every level of his building, according to Elise.”
“I’m not Weston.” And I didn’t like being compared to him by Saoirse.
“No, you’re not. From what I’ve heard and experienced once, you’re ten times less grumpy than him. Though you’re not exactly proving that right now.”
Impatient for this conversation to be over, I jerked my chin. “Fine. Lead the way.”
The smile she rewarded me with was wide and gleaming, lighting her up to the tips of her toes. “All right, boss. Let’s go.”
My sister was waiting in my office when I arrived, working on her laptop at my desk.
“Get out.” I said this with no heat or energy.
Clara looked up from her computer for a flicker, then her eyes returned to her monitor. “You’re incredibly late, Luca. You told me you were leaving home ninety minutes ago.”
“I did. I’ve spent the last hour in marketing.”
Her attention shot to me again. “What? Why?”
I smoothed my hand over my tie and plopped down in the leather and chrome chairs in front of my desk. “I’m taking a page out of Weston’s book.”
“Weston Aldrich runs a very different company than we do.” She rubbed her lips together, her eyes narrowed. “Still, it can’t hurt to give our employees face time, especially since you’ve been an absent executive all these years.”
“I thought so too.”
I propped my ankle on my knee and regarded my sister. At thirty-four, Clara was three years older than me and all business. She was the golden child of the family, serious and committed to Rossi Motors basically since birth.
She looked good behind the CEO’s desk. A natural. But the mantle hadn’t fallen to her. Clara was Rossi’s COO and a damn fine one. If she’d been eyeing the job I now had, she’d never said. It was always understood it would go to me when the time came, but I didn’t think any of us predicted the time would come so soon.
“What are you doing in my office?” I asked.
“Waiting for you, obviously.” She clicked her laptop shut and circled the desk. It still unsettled me to see her protruding belly. Four and a half months along with my future niece, Clara acted like nothing had changed, except her normally efficient, waifish figure now had an ever-growing bump in the front. “I read over the consultants’ report.”
“So, you wasted your time reading bullshit?”
“They have a point, Luca. There’s no denying married CEOs are seen as more trustworthy than single ones.”
“Again, it’s utter bullshit.” My fingers sliced through the side of my hair, giving it a hard tug. “How many of Mom and Dad’s friends regularly cheat on their wives? I would say most if not all.”
“Be that as it may, it’s about perception.” She pushed her dark-rimmed glasses on top of her head, leveling me with her version of sympathy. “I’m going to send you a list of acceptable women you should get to know. This doesn’t have to be painful.”
“Says the woman who chose her own husband.”
Miller Fairfield was a good-on-paper husband, which meant my parents wholeheartedly approved of him. So much, he’d recently been promoted to Rossi’s CFO. Personally, I thought he had the personality of paper, and I’d never once seen him look at Clara the way our father looked at our mother: like she was a treasure, and he knew it. But he’d been around for a decade now, so I’d accepted he was a permanent fixture in the family. Fortunately for me, he was easy to disregard when I didn’t have to deal with him directly.
Lately, though, he’d taken to giving me daily updates on a mom-and-pop business blog that, according to Miller, had a hard-on for reporting Rossi’s missteps. The new habit was fucking annoying, but as long as I nodded and grunted when he did, he left me alone once he was done ranting.
I imagined Clara never heard the end of it. Then again, she could handle herself and her business, so maybe she shut him down easier than I did.
“I chose a husband who would benefit this family and our company, Luca. I didn’t go out cavorting, getting my picture taken snorting cocaine off random whores’ breasts in nightclubs.”
I held my hands up. “That has never happened. Is that what you imagine I do?”
She groaned under her breath. “Whether you’ve done it or not, it’s perception. You often do get photographed stumbling out of nightclubs with different women on your arm. The public—our shareholders—fill in the blanks on what you’re doing inside those clubs.”
Before I could launch my rebuttal, Clara yelped, her hands flying to her belly. I scooted to the edge of my chair in alarm.
“Are you okay?”
She nodded, her mouth tight. “The baby’s swimming. She must like your voice.”
In an instant, I was on my knees in front of her. She took my hand, guiding it to the side of her belly. My niece instantly let her presence be known, fluttering against my palm with all her might.
“That’s crazy,” I uttered.
“I know,” she whispered. “Sometimes she gets hiccups, and it blows my mind to think there’s a tiny person inside me hiccuping.”
I met my sister’s soft gaze. “You really think she likes my voice?”
“She might. She got lively while we were talking.”
Leaning closer, I had a chat with my niece. “Hi, bella. It’s Uncle Luca. I’m fucking dying to meet you.”
Clara kicked me in the knee. “Don’t curse at the baby.”
“Shit.” I winced when she kicked me again. “Sorry, bambina. Uncle Luca’s going to work on that before you’re born. We’re going to have so much fun. Your mom and dad are nice, and they’re going to love you like mad, but I’ll be the one to teach you all the wild things they won’t let you do. It’ll be our little secret. You and me, kid.”
Clara shoved my forehead, knocking me back on my knees. “You will not corrupt my daughter.”
I held up my thumb and forefinger an inch apart. “Just a little?”
She bit down on her bottom lip to hold back her grin. “No, Luca. By the time she’s here, you’ll be reformed anyway.”
“I agree to clean up my image, but you’ll never force me to be Miller.”
She rolled her eyes. “No one wants you to be Miller. Be yourself, just…a quieter version with a beautiful, respectable wife on your arm. Is that so awful?”
“It wouldn’t be if it were my decision.”
She patted my shoulder. “I get it, but we all have to make sacrifices. Besides, this could be the best thing that ever happened to you.”