“How do you plan to do this?” Rizwan asked as we stood in line at the cafeteria. Monday was pie day and I sincerely hoped that it wasn’t dry like it had been last week.
“Do what?” I asked, caught off guard by his sudden question.
“Lockhart’s assignment.”
“I have no idea, Riz,” I sighed, fighting back a yawn. “But the idea of one less final is so tempting to pass up.”
“I can’t imagine myself walking into the Mancini Mafia house and demanding to speak to Fabrizio with the plan to grill him for some exclusive information regarding the manslaughter two charges that he was almost charged with. And that’s assuming that we’ll actually be able to find out where the infamous Mancini house is.”
“I’m sure their lawyer knows,” I grinned as a plan started forming in my mind.
“And all we have to do is google her name and we’ll be able to find out where she works,” Rizwan finished off my question, the large grin on his face matching mine. “What do you say to teaming up on this assignment?”
“I say, if I’m going to work with anyone on this, it’s going to be you,” I nodded, and we shook hands to seal the deal. “The first thing we should do is call up the law firm and try to book a meeting with Benedetta. I’m sure google will can tell us what her surname is.”
“Benedetta D’Angelo,” I told him.
“Good memory,” he complimented me as we grabbed a tray each and began picking out some food for lunch.
What I didn’t tell him was that the sole reason I remembered her name was because I suspected that she was somewhat close to Massimo. Far too close for my liking. Though it was stupid of me to feel this way about a man that I had only met once.
Just because he flirted with me didn’t mean that he meant anything by it. It wasn’t the first time a customer flirted with me on the job, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last time.
“What took you guys so long?” Ethan asked, already finished with his lunch and eying up the second half of Tia’s sandwich.
Ethan and Tia had been dating since the freshman year of college, and I couldn’t think of two people more in love with those two. Like Tia had said late last night, Ethan was a pretty boy. With his sandy brown hair and sparkling blue eyes, I could see how many thought of him as a dream boat or teenage heartthrob. Well, that’s what I learnt from the stories he often boasted of from his high school days.
Next to Ethan sat Nala. She was friends with Tia from high school and when I started living with Tia, Nala just came with the package. With her blonde hair, heart-shaped face, delicate features, and deep brown eyes, she was beautiful both inside and out. And she had her boyfriend Toby to always remind her of that. Toby wasn’t with us today which meant that he was either in class or in football practice.
And then last up, was Rizwan. His skin was a deep tan, his eyes a shade darker, and his har even darker than both of those shades. He grew it long, nearly to his shoulders, and often kept it away from his face using a headband. Recently, he had been working on growing a beard, but it didn’t connect quiet yet.
Rizwan and I were the only single ones in the group, though I had an inkling that he had an eye on one of the girls which was also part of one of the clubs that he was a part of. It was cute, but he had to gather the courage and ask her out before someone else did.
“Have you seen the length of that line?” Rizwan snorted as he dropped his tray on the table unceremoniously and pulled back the chair to take a seat. I took the one next to him. “We’re lucky that we joined it when we did. Otherwise, we’ve starve before we managed to get our hands on any food.”
“Do you think it’s too risky for me to go back and grab another sandwich?” Ethan asked, mimicking the stance of a meerkat as he sat up tall to see over our heads at the winding queue which had only gotten longer in the few moments that we had been talking.
“Very risky,” Nala’s nose scrunched up as she nibbled away at her salad. “But you look absolutely starved.”
“You’re going to regret it later when you’re starving, babe,” Tia laughed. “Go and get yourself a sandwich. And can you get me a bottle of water as well, please?”
“Sure thing,” Tia grinned and pressed a quick peck to her lips before he bounded out of his seat to join the end of the queue. Knowing Ethan, he would smile and talk his way up the queue until he finally got to the front well ahead of the people he was standing at the back with.
“Did you guys see the news?” Rizwan asked.
“See the news? It’s not news to me,” Tia snorted. “I told Yas about all of this last night, but she didn’t believe me.”
Nala and Rizwan turned their questioning eyes to me, and I shrugged.
“I hate to admit it, but she’s right,” I chuckled and shrugged. “When I clocked in last night, Tia told me about this conversation that she overheard. She was convinced the man was a part of the mafia, but I didn’t quite believe her.”
“I don’t blame you,” Nala said. “If Tia came rushing to tell me all of that, I would think she’d been drinking too much again.”
“Hey!” Tia complained, looking almost offended. “Let me tell you what happened. Unlike Yasemin who would probably be late to her own funeral,” she started, and I nodded my head eagerly. I mean, Tia wasn’t wrong. Even when I was dead, I probably wouldn’t be on time for anything. “I was quite a bit early for my shift. So, I grabbed myself a scone and I sat on one of the benches. I was on the phone to Ethan and then I started hearing all this shady stuff from the man sat on the other stuff.”
“What kind of shady stuff?” Rizwan asked, looking just as sceptical as I had when I had first heard the story as well.
“He was whispering the whole time so I couldn’t hear everything, but it sounded like they were looking for someone to flee the country. He was speaking about how they had all the entrances and exits covered, and that there was no possible way that whoever they were looking for could leave the country. Now, looking at everything on the news, I just know that it had to be one of the Mancini brothers.”
“Which one?” I asked, curious.
“I’m not sure. I didn’t get a good look at him, but I think it might have been the one on the right,” Tia shrugged.
“Which one?” Nala asked, staring down at her phone. When I leaned over to take a look, I saw her looking at a picture of the Mancini brothers.
“This one,” Tia tapped on the screen, pointing out one of the ones stood at the back. “He’s the most handsome out of them all, if you ask me.”
“He’s a little too old for my liking,” Nala’s nose scrunched up. “I think there’s some charm to Fabrizio which makes him better looking than all his brothers.”
“Really?” I hummed. “I think Massimo might just have the edge up on the rest of them.”
“Please,” Tia snorted. “You just like old men.”
“He can’t be that old, can he?” my lips tugged down into a small, questioning frown.
“Google says he’s thirty-five,” Rizwan said, holding up his phone for us all to see. “That’s not too bad.”
“It is when Yas’ twenty-two,” Tia snorted.
“Thirteen years isn’t too bad,” Nala hummed, a thoughtful look on her face.
“It is when our little Yas here was only five when Massimo started college,” Tia said, and I had to agree. When she said it like that, it sounded bad. Perhaps that was because Massimo had felt the need to ask my age last night.
“Did he even go to college?” Nala chuckled.
“Google is a little confused on that one,” Rizwan chuckled before turning off his phone. “If you ask me, I think that lawyer had a little something to her.”
“Of course, you would say that,” I laughed.
“How many brothers are there?” Rizwan asked.
“Seven,” Tia countered, leaning over to get a look at Nala’s phone as well.
“There were only six on the live interview,” I murmured, mentally counting once again. “Which brother is missing?”
“It has to be Francesco,” Rizwan murmured. “Massimo got really defensive about it when that reporter asked.”
“She was a little out of order, if you ask me,” Tia said.
“She was very out of order,” I agreed. “She cut short what could have potentially been the interview to propel her career.”
“Speaking of interviews, you would not believe the assignment Lockhart set us today,” Rizwan chuckled before proceeding to tell them.
“That man’s crazy if you ask me,” Nala pulled a face. “And he’s always drinking out of that flask. Like, what’s up with that?”
“I think he’s more eccentric than crazy,” I chuckled. “But you’re probably not far off.”
“Are you guys going to take part in the assignment?” Tia asked, a curious expression on her face.
Rizwan and I turned to share knowing looks.
“There’s no way we’re missing out on this,” I shook my head.
“We’ve actually agreed to team up on this one. If one of us is going to evade the final, then so is the other.”
“How are you going to do it?” Nala asked at the same time as Tia said,
“I’ll be more than happy to offer up my services. Just say the word, and I’ll be there.”
“What kind of word, babe?” Ethan asked as he returned with a half-eaten sandwich, and a bottle of water for Tia, just as he had promised.
“Yas and Riz are going to interview the Mancini Mafia,” Tia declared rather loudly. In fact, she was so loud that we attracted the attention from the neighbouring tables, but we ignored their probing looks.
“We just need an exclusive quotation or information from them so it’s not much of an interview,” Rizwan explained, and I nodded in agreement.
“Interview or not, it sounds rather impossible to me,” Ethan frowned. “How do you plan to get close to one of them long enough for them to answer your questions?”
“I don’t know,” Rizwan frowned, seemingly stumped.
I, however, wasn’t quite as stumped. I became acquainted with Massimo Mancini last night and while there was no guarantee that he would return, either for a coffee or to see me, but I was hopeful. If he did – hopefully it was more of a when than an if – it would be the perfect opportunity for me to get the exclusive scoop about his brother’s case.
Just one small titbit of information would be enough to get Rizwan and I out of our Journalism final, and there were many lengths that I was willing to go to for that.
Of course, this was not something that I mentioned to my friends. Not just because it sounded far too good to be true, but because I didn’t know what I wanted. Did it even matter seeing as it seemed Massimo had a girlfriend already.
After lunch, I bid my friends goodbye and got on the subway to head back to my apartment.
Journalism with Professor Lockhart was the only class that I had on Mondays. I usually stuck around to get lunch with my friends before I headed back to my apartment for a quick nap and then some study time.
I had another night shift this evening which meant that I would be able to get some work done then, so I could sleep longer during the day.
However, this time, I found myself looking forward to a whole lot more than doing some light reading, watching a movie, and helping myself to as many drinks as I wanted.
Even though it was silly of me and probably a long shot, I was hopeful that Massimo meant what he had said this morning, and I scarcely allowed myself to wonder if I would be seeing him again. And no, it wasn’t just for Lockhart’s assignment.
-
Please remember to like, comment, REVIEW and follow me if you haven’t already! Check out my PATREON if you would like the read this ENTIRE book, and get EARLY ACCESS to the rest of this series - up to CHAPTER 19 of BOOK 3! :)
PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/LaylaKnight
Layla Knight
23.01.2022
