were painted a dark tan with thick crown moldings, and he’d mixed several priceless old pieces with modern ones. A stand-alone linear fireplace separated the living room from the dining room and a massive kitchen took up the one entire wall. He didn’t cook often, since he was a single man living alone, but he could if he needed to.
He moved to the kitchen, grabbed a beer, and popped the top before he settled on his sofa and took a long drink. Yeah, he’d come a long way since being a gravedigger sharing a studio with five other guys. Of course, he didn’t realize at the time that the graveyard was really a front and that most of the caskets were filled with guns instead of bodies. Trafficking in firearms using a cemetery was both twisted and fucking clever. The only bodies buried in that graveyard were ones that were better off never being found. At eighteen, Lucien had been blissfully unaware and at thirty-one, he really didn’t give a shit because that job helped him to get to where he was now. Of course, looking around his spacious apartment and seeing only his reflection in a mirror, where he was now wasn’t all that great. He thought bitterly, I need to get a fucking life.
He switched on the television and when a picture of Horace Carmichael, the DA, flashed on the screen, he turned up the volume.
“. . . a crack in the case against the Grimaldi crime syndicate. District Attorney Horace Carmichael has testimony from a source close to the Grimaldi family that conclusively links them with several arson cases, racketeering, and the cold murder case of Elizabeth Spano, the NYU theater major found strangled thirty-two years ago in Central Park. That case has been kept in the public eye by the tireless efforts of the victim’s father, Anthony Spano. More to follow.”
Darcy MacBride climbed from the cab and wiped her sweaty hands on her skirt. She was nervous, but then, this was Lucien Black, whom she hadn’t seen in fourteen years. She remembered the first time they met at the orphanage. Even at sixteen, he was the most beautiful boy she had ever seen. And his eyes, God, she could have happily drowned in them; but he was so serious, as if he bore the weight of the world.
She had been scared when she’d first arrived at fourteen, given up by her mom because she hadn’t wanted a kid anymore. She couldn’t lie, it had hurt to be cast off like an unwanted puppy, but she hid the pain behind humor and sarcasm. Only Lucien seemed to see beyond that and offered her the one thing she always secretly longed for: a place to belong. And she did. She belonged with him and they both knew it. For those two years they were inseparable, and she gave him her young heart with the reckless abandon of youth.
The day Sister Anne died was forever burned into Darcy’s memory. Even though Lucien loved Sister Anne, he tried so hard to not show how much her death hurt him. And when he did finally give in to his pain, he mourned so silently that watching his grief was even more heartbreaking than seeing Sister Anne waste away. It was that same night that Darcy gave him her virginity. Even at sixteen she knew that he was it for her.
When he said he was leaving the orphanage, he told her he wouldn’t go without her. But her fairy tale died before it had ever even had a chance to start. Not leaving with him was her most profound regret.
When her headhunter told her about the position he was looking to fill, part of her didn’t want to take the interview—some scars still hurt no matter how long they’d had to heal. But she missed him—had spent half her life missing him—and even if she didn’t get the job, the opportunity to see him again wasn’t one she could pass up.
She moved her hands down her black pencil skirt and absentmindedly touched her hand to her French twist before she reached for the door of Allegro. She had followed his successes through the years and knew that this was the first club he had ever opened. It looked like he kept his offices here too.
The bar and tables inside were as scarred as the floor. Of course those who came here were coming for the music, not the atmosphere. Darcy