“The baby will be a bastard, my love,” he’d said, patting my head. His voice soft as though the words he spoke didn’t sting worse than Johnny swearing he’d never loved me. “It’s best you hear the truth.”
I hadn’t cared about his truth. “Then it will be my bastard.” My uncle could only stare at me when I sat up, my face flushed and wet, my breaths uneven as the life fluttered inside me. “Whoever this baby will be, it will be mine, and maybe one day, when Johnny grows up, when he sees…”
“No.” Uncle Pat had always been adamant about that point. There was never any discussion. “You can never tell him. Not any of them.” He held my arm, his fingers tightening as he spoke. “My love, whatever else you do, understand this—that family is dangerous. That boy, he is dangerous. Your child will already suffer the indignities of being without a father since you refuse to marry. Better that it have no father at all than one who will put it in danger. An association with the Carellis comes with more trouble than you know.”
“But you and Mr. Carelli…”
“I am a servant of the Lord. I am protected. But you, you are carrying one of their own. If they knew, what do you think they would say? A family so protective of their own blood? So determined to pass along that name? Worse than that, what would their enemies do should they discover there is an infant and a young mother who can be bargained with?” Uncle Pat leaned back, removing his wire-rimmed glasses to rub the bridge of his nose. “I know you’ve convinced yourself that you love that fool boy, but, Samantha, my sweet niece, this cannot be. For the safety of your unborn child, stay away from him and never tell him about the baby.” He sighed, staring at me like he knew how harsh he sounded but couldn’t keep the words from leaving his mouth. “One day, you’ll see. One day, you’ll understand that, for this baby, you’ll gladly break that boy’s heart. You’ll break your own if it means keeping it safe.”
My uncle hated Johnny. That was no secret. When he’d discovered us, naked in my room four months before, I’d thought he might kill Johnny. I’d never seen Uncle Pat move that quickly or scream that loud. Until he found me throwing up in my bathroom a month later and brought me in to see Dr. Wilson.
“He’s ruined you,” Uncle Pat promised me.
I hadn’t understood how true that was. Even later, at five months pregnant, I still didn’t appreciate it. I wanted to make my uncle see reason. Despite how much heartache Johnny had already caused me, telling me he didn’t love me, paying off my uncle to keep him from telling his father what had happened between us, I still believed there was a chance. Someday, somehow, we’d come back to each other.
“He’ll hate you,” my uncle said when I took a breath, readying myself to tell him that the day would come for Johnny and me.
I had faith.
My uncle’s once-handsome face was drawn, and he’d seemed to age five years in those five months. Mainly, I thought, because I’d refused to marry anyone or give my baby away. The guilt was often replaced with irritation when Uncle Pat said awful things about Johnny.
Like he did just then. “I promise you, Samantha. If you tell him you are pregnant after he’s promised that he never loved you, his father will force him to marry you. He will obey, but he will resent you. He will always resent you and your child for trapping him. Johnny Carelli is a dutiful son, but he will never be a loyal husband.”
I hated my uncle that day.
I hated the truth I knew lingered in his words.
I hated that he knew Johnny better than I did.
I moved around my apartment now, staring at more flowers he’d sent me, this time, orchids. They had been waiting for me in the lobby when I returned from Ellenville this morning, signed only with “Hope everything is OK. Let’s finish what we started tonight. Love, J.” And I realized not a lot had changed.
Johnny was still dangerous. With his father gone, that was truer now than ever before. He wasn’t some mafia don, as far as I knew, but it wasn’t like the Carellis walked the straight and narrow. Cara and Kiel had been shot at last year right in front of her family’s museum, and their friend Dale had taken a bullet while they’d hidden in the mountains outside of Seattle because of something Antonia said had to do with “family business,” whatever the hell that was.
I couldn’t bring my daughter around that.
Besides, once Johnny knew the truth, he’d hate me, just like Uncle Pat promised. He’d never understand why I wanted to keep Betta from him for all these years.
The orchids were purple, my favorite color, something I supposed Johnny remembered me telling him when we were kids. The flowers were delicate but luxurious, something Johnny would understand needed looking after. He counted on me to do the job.
I suppose he counted on me to bend for him too.
To say yes to forgiving him.
To say yes to loving him again.
The bookcase at the back of the room was filled with some of my favorite first editions that I had collected. Some were twentieth-century authors, some older, but among all those books were sporadic frames with pictures of Betta and me over the years. My favorite was of her by herself, her face red and splotchy, her hair pulled back as she spiked the ball in her first volleyball tournament last summer. I’d made it to that camp tournament. She’d performed so well, one of the counselors mentioned an all-girls school in New Haven that Betta would likely flourish at. They had a volleyball team, and I could see her on the weekends. The drive was only a couple hours. It would keep her from Johnny if he wouldn’t let me go, or, worse, if he found out what I’d been keeping from him all these years.
I picked up the picture, rubbing my thumb across my daughter’s face. I understood the warning my uncle had given me all those years ago. For her, I’d do anything—destroy any shreds of happiness I might have with Johnny if it meant keeping her out of danger. Even if that danger was from her own blood.
The phone rang twice after I selected the number, and with each ring, my chest tightened. I didn’t want to make this call. I never wanted to ask the man for anything or to make a confession like this again. But for Betta… Anything for my daughter.
His voice was low, the tone whiskey-rough, and I felt an odd sense of relief just hearing it.
“Uncle Pat?” I said, willing my pulse to slow.
“Sweetheart, is everything okay? How is Betta feeling?”
“She’s fine. Just some bad trout.” I swallowed down the thick knot of worry that had lodged itself in my throat. I wasn’t eager to hear the screaming that was about to come my way. “Listen, Uncle Pat, I need a favor. A big one.”
He’d never offered money before because I’d never been this desperate. That was my inheritance, I knew as much, something left to him from his sister, my mother, that my uncle always said would make me a wealthy woman after he died. I’d never questioned him. He was a financial whiz, had grown that nest egg considerably the past thirty years. I trusted him implicitly. But now, I needed his help.
“All right.” He paused, and I caught the sound of his leather chair coming through the receiver as he moved. “What can I help you with?”
Best to do it quickly. “I need money, lots of it. To buy out Johnny Carelli.”
9
Johnny
The numbers above the elevator took an eternity to rise. Eighty-eight floors and it felt like it took forever for the car to climb. My palms sweated as I watched the ascent, and I couldn’t keep myself from messing with the money clip in my pocket. It was a stupid, nervous habit I’d never bothered to lose, but hell, I was an anxious guy.
Except for the call telling me she was stopping by to see me, Sammy hadn’t responded to any of my calls or texts since she’d left last night, though I knew she made it home. I’d slipped her day guard a hundred to let me know when she came in and to pick up the orchid I’d sent then shoot me a text to confirm. It was a little sneaky, paying off some guy in her building, but it was damn hard not checking up on her when everything in me told me to make sur
e she was safe. You couldn’t live the life I did and not take precautions, especially with the people you cared about.
And fuck, did I care about Sammy. That much was obvious to me.
Three more floors and my guts felt like melted iron was twisting around them.
Nadine eyed me, but she kept her opinions to herself, typing steadily on her tablet as I rubbed the money clip, top to bottom, then dropped it when the bell above the elevator dinged and the doors opened.
Christ, she was beautiful. Sammy was put together like a Chanel ad in a sleeveless black dress with tight pleats at the waist, showing off her defined biceps, olive complexion, and tiny waist. She wore minimal makeup but smelled, as always, delicious, and she let me take her hand to pull her in for a kiss on the cheek, but nothing more, once she stepped off the elevator.
“Miss Nicola,” I greeted, spotting the shift of her gaze as she glanced at Nadine.
“Mr. Carelli.” She tugged her clutch purse between her hands when I smiled at her, and that twisting sensation in my gut intensified. “I have some business I need to discuss with you about the center and the renovations.” Another slip of her gaze to Nadine, then to my office door before she looked at me. But even then, she didn’t linger on my face. “It’s urgent.”
That got my attention and had me trying to push down the worry I felt collecting in my chest. “Very well,” I told her, moving her away from my office and toward another bank of elevator doors across from reception. “Nadine, I’ll be in the private quarters upstairs.”
“Yes, sir. Shall I hold your calls?”
“Please do,” I told her, helping Sammy toward the top-floor elevators.
“Where are you…” she started, still keeping a death grip on her bag.
“There’s more privacy upstairs.” Sammy followed my motions as I withdrew a key and disengaged the lock pad to call the elevator. “No one will bother us up there.” She didn’t return my smile or react to the wink I sent her. The worry doubled as I hit the button again, willing the doors to open.
Sammy walked into the elevator without an invitation, keeping her arms crossed and her back straight as we rode up. Through the glass around us, we had a perfect view of the city skyline. Manhattan loomed around us, lit up like Christmas and New Year’s all at once just from the building lights and traffic below. But Sammy didn’t seem to see anything at all. Her stare was vacant, distracted, something that bothered me more than it should have.
“Here we are,” I said when the doors opened. I ushered her into the penthouse, toward the leather sectional at the back of the room.
This was no office, no boardroom, simply a place where we entertained. A bar ran the length of one corner in the back of the room, and several seating areas were intermittently placed around the penthouse. Two hallways in the front and back of the area led to private rooms, bathrooms, and a small kitchenette, but there were no desks and no conference tables. Everything was luxurious—from the marble tiles, lush leather, and high-end fabric of the furniture and area rugs, to the ornate woodwork and modern gold fixtures along the windows and doors. This was a place meant to entice clients and intimidate enemies.
Sammy was neither. But from how she carried herself, how stiffly she walked next to me, I wasn’t sure what I should consider her.
“Can I get you something to drink?” I asked, walking to the bar, but I stopped short when Sammy held up her hand, shaking her head with a decidedly sharp movement. “Is there a problem?”
“I just want to get this over with,” she said, nodding to the sectional. When I didn’t move, Sammy stared at me, narrowing her eyes like she expected more from me.
“What exactly is it you want to get over?” I had my guesses, but I wouldn’t voice them.
If I said them, they might come true. Couldn’t have that.
“This,” Sammy said, retrieving an envelope from her bag. She offered it to me but didn’t let me take it. Instead, she slipped it onto the table, pushing it forward like she couldn’t stomach the idea of our fingers touching. “This should more than cover the cost of the building and the renovations. I would like to buy my way out of our arrangement.”
There was a shake in her fingers that I didn’t miss. The tremble moved up her arm, and I swear I caught it twitching across her mouth as she stepped back, gaining distance from the table and the check that lay between us like a bomb. I hoped whatever my expression was, it hid the jackhammering of my heart and the sinking feeling that made me sick to my stomach. This was coming at me out of left field, and it made no sense. Something had set her off since the time we were together, with me deep inside her, ready to take her completely, then that phone call and the mad dash two hours away from the city.
She watched me, seeming to draw strength from the small envelope on the table. The longer it rested there between us, the straighter Sammy’s shoulders got and the more confident she became. “Do you have anything to say?” she asked me, uncurling her arms to rest them at her sides.
“Plenty.”
It was all I could say, and it was the truth, but I held back, reminding myself what I’d done to her in the past and the promise I’d made to Sammy. I’d do anything for her. Even listen when she wanted to walk away from me.
Instead of arguing when she narrowed her eyes, I held up my hands, hoping to calm her before things got out of hand. I nodded toward the sofa, relaxing only when Sammy eased to the opposite side of the sectional.
I followed her, unbuttoning my jacket before I sat, leaning against the armrest with one arm draped along the back of the sofa and my legs apart. “Now,” I said, sizing her up, noting how stiffly she sat, how she held her mouth in a hard line and curled her fingers against her clutch. “Tell me what this is about.” Her grip tightened, and I held up a hand, hoping to calm her. “Please.”
She swallowed once, back straight, chin moving up, already defiant. “My uncle knows we’ve been seeing each other.”
Some of my worry eased, but I didn’t let it show. “Ah.”
Sammy was loyal to the old priest, something I understood. He’d raised her. That mean bastard was the only family she’d ever known. He wouldn’t take us being together well. It made sense that he’d lay the guilt on her and, being a dutiful niece, she’d listen when he told her to end things.
“So,” I said, tapping my thumb against the back of the sectional. “He found out about my helping you with the center and doesn’t like it. That forfeits our arrangement, Sammy. There’s no need to pay me off.”
“No,” she said, letting some of the hardness ease from her features, though not for long. She glanced once at me, then rested her bag in her lap, laying her palms flat against it. “Uncle Pat doesn’t want you involved…doesn’t want us to have any contact. He’s adamant and…wants…to buy the building and…”
“What do you want?” I knew the answer. I’d read it in her body the night before, when I touched her, when I felt how tightly she wrapped herself around my fingers, around my cock.
She wanted me. She wanted me touching her, tasting her. That reaction, that passion, that sweet, warm wetness, none of it could be faked.
When she didn’t answer, I leaned forward, watching how tense she became. She quickly squeezed her eyes closed and held her breath as I sat next to her. “I don’t care what the priest wants. I want to know what you want, bella.”
“That… It doesn’t matter.” She stiffened when I touched her arm, but she didn’t push me away. “Johnny…”
“You want me.”
Sammy kept her eyes closed as I watched her, the profile of that beautiful face cast in shadow against the low penthouse lighting and the cityscape outside the expanse of windows around us. She leaned into me when I rested my forehead against her temple and kissed her there.
“I’ve wanted you since I was a boy.”
“It’s not that simple.” She turned, finally looking at me. “We can’t have the things we want just because we want them. There are always other co
nsiderations.”
“Not for us.” This time when I touched her arm, Sammy pulled away.
“Even for us.” Sammy leaned back, and something descended over her features then, a wall, a veil that told me she would keep herself from anything that made her feel what she wanted for me. “Do this for me,” she said, her voice strong but strangled, as though she hated every syllable she uttered. “It’s the least you can do for me.”
My body recoiled at her words just as surely as if she’d punched me. She spotted the reaction I couldn’t hide. It was in the wince she released, how she moved her hand, as though she thought of comforting me but then changed her mind in the same second.
Turning, I leaned my forearms on my knees, threading my fingers together, and let the guilt cover me. It burned and poured over every inch of my body, but I welcomed it as the memory of Sammy, so young, so beautiful, her face flushed from her tears, her eyes red and puffy, rushed to the front of my mind.
“I still love you,” she promised as I walked away from her. It had been over a year since I’d first broken her heart. She was older, even more beautiful, and she still hadn’t let me go.
It took all that I had inside me not to say the words back. She was everything to me then. But I couldn’t keep her safe and keep her mine. Not with my father’s enemies closing in. Tony DeAngelo had sent his crew to burn down one of my father’s factories when Papa finally chose a side and it wasn’t his. Four of his men died. Two of the janitor’s sons had been killed in the fire, neither one of them older than twelve. Family didn’t matter to these assholes. I couldn’t keep her safe, not as powerless as I was at twenty.
Sammy’s chin shook as I stared down at her, thick, fat tears clinging to her long lashes. Each one acid on my skin.
“I don’t love you, Sammy. And I never will.”
Nailed Down: The Complete Series Page 59
