Chapter 7 - An Uneasy Alliance
I dropped the folder back onto the bar, my fingers resting on the edge of the paper.
“You think a legal covenant buys my silence, Mr. Greco?” I asked, my voice steady, though my pulse was racing. “You think you can drop a preservation deed on my counter and act like a local hero after trying to squeeze this neighborhood dry for six months?”
Dante didn't blink. He reached across the bar—his movements slow, deliberate, giving me every chance to pull away—and lightly touched the back of my hand where it rested on the wood. His skin was warm, his touch calloused in a way that didn't match a man who spent his life behind a mahogany desk.
“I didn't bring this to buy your silence, Nora,” he said, his voice dropping into a low, hypnotic register. “I brought this because I want to negotiate a partnership.”
“A partnership,” I repeated skeptically.
“You’re a law student with a brilliant corporate mind and a direct line to Meridian’s majority stakeholders,” Dante said, his thumb brushing ever so slightly against my knuckles. “And I’m a developer who needs someone who actually understands the heartbeat of this neighborhood instead of just looking at financial spreadsheets from a penthouse tower. Help me rebuild the North End the right way. No hostile takeovers. No shady backroom deals.”
I looked down at his hand on mine, then slowly raised my eyes to meet his gaze. There was a raw, unmasked honesty in his expression that caught me completely off guard.
“And if I say no?” I asked quietly.
A slow, dangerous smile touched the corners of Dante’s mouth.
“Then I keep coming back to La Luna Rossa,” he said softly. “Every single day. Until you agree to have dinner with me somewhere that doesn't require an apron.”
Before I could think of a sharp reply, the heavy front door of the restaurant swung open, and Rosa walked in carrying a massive crate of fresh lemons, stopping dead in her tracks when she saw Dante Greco leaning across the bar talking to me like an old friend.
Rosa dropped the crate with a loud thud.
Dante slowly pulled his hand back, sliding it back into his coat pocket, never breaking eye contact with me.
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“I’ll let you get back to work, Nora,” Dante said smoothly, turning toward the door. He paused over his shoulder, his dark eyes gleaming with quiet amusement. “Think about my proposal. Seven o'clock tonight. The oyster bar on Atlantic Avenue. Don't wear the apron.”
He pushed open the door and stepped out into the crisp morning air, leaving me standing behind the bar with a legal covenant in my hand and a chaotic storm brewing in my chest.
