by Howes, Ann
“Speaking of, how did you hook up with him again?”
“Pure chance. One afternoon outside work, he saw me on the street and called my name. I was…shocked at first, but once I got over that, I was glad to see him again. I realized I’d totally forgiven him.”
“For what?”
“He pulled a dick move on me…didn’t have the balls to break up with me in person. I’d also just found out he was cheating on me with that chick Gloria with the really huge boobs. Remember her?”
“Gloria Tortino?”
“Mm hmm.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah. Well anyway, he gave me a present one day and then sent a card saying he needed to get his head together.”
“Huh.”
“It’s because of him, I have trust issues. Anyway, I was devastated, and then later really pissed off. My dad dies and my cheating boyfriend dumps me.”
“Shit, Shelley, that must have sucked donkey balls.”
“I don’t really remember anything else about the funeral, though. Just that he wasn’t there. Mom dosed me up on valium and I guess I suppressed a lot. After that, we were in Los Angeles and life went on. Now I’m here.”
And with no clue who the players are. It appears I have some catching up to do.
For the rest of the drive home, we’re silent, listening to the music, deep in our own thoughts. Or at least I am and I’m beginning to wonder if it was a coincidence that I started dating Dean shortly after I found Joey again.
Jeez, I’m getting paranoid.
Back at the house, Marco kisses me on the top of my head and we head to our separate rooms. But it’s another kiss I’m thinking of.
What’s he up to?
Is this what’s it’s like to be a mafia wife? What my mother went through, with all the late nights wondering where my dad was and if he was safe?
I slip into light blue cotton pajama shorts and a ribbed tank top, brush my teeth and settle down on the bed, aimlessly flipping through channels. Finally, I choose Game of Thrones, but a scratching at my door interrupts just as I’m getting settled.
Truman, tongue hanging out one side, stares up at me when I open. Giving me no chance to deny him, he nudges his flat, wrinkled nose between the door and the frame. Apparently, he’s an expert at manipulating women like me.
“No farting, buddy,” I say, opening the door wide for him to enter. “Otherwise I’ll have to eighty-six your ass. Got it?”
He sneezes and I scratch his stubby ears. After a grunt, he waddles to the end of my bed, turns back and stares at me.
“What?”
He emits a low whine.
“You want on my bed?”
Another whine.
I sigh and look at my toes. What harm can it do? It’s a big bed, so I relent and lift him up. He circles three times one way and then three times the other before lying with this head between his paws. I climb in and watch TV for a while, with one ear listening for the sound of my Mini but all I hear are baby dragons screeching and Truman snoring.
Next thing I know, it’s early morning and the TV is still on. The light is only just beginning to change, peeking through the drapes.
Truman whines and dances at my door, lifting one back leg, then the other in a canine version of the polka.
“All right, buddy, I’m coming.” I stretch, yawn and roll out of bed, wincing at the ache in my knees, and open the door. The dog launches out of my room and races down the stairs.
Jeez.
Sure can move when he wants to.
Unless he’s doing his business in the kitchen, I’ll have to venture down and open the door, but I’ll never make it if I don’t take care of my own urgent need first.
That done and my face washed I head down, expecting to see all four dogs. My heart lurches when I see Gianni instead. In sweatpants, no shirt, gleaming and delicious.
He leans against the granite counter drinking from a frosty water bottle with his eyes closed. I step inside, fascinated with how his throat moves as he swallows. It’s strong and sensual and I have an overwhelming urge to nip at it.
Having had his fill, he lowers the bottle and uses his balled-up tee-shirt to wipe his face.
As if sensing me watching him his eyes open. “De Luca,” he says, blinking. “What are you doing up so early?”
“Letting the dogs out, but it seems you already have.”
“I usually do when I’m here, before I run. Noticed one missing this morning. He spend the night with you?”
I nod and reach behind my neck to twist my hair into a coil and drape it over a shoulder.
His eyes follow my movements, dropping to my breasts, which pucker under his gaze.
“Lucky dog.”
Um.
“You make it back last night?” I ask, proud my voice doesn’t reflect my sudden inability to breathe. “I didn’t hear you come in.”
“Not till late. Why do you ask?”
“I was worried about you.”
There’s a long pause before he speaks. “Were you, Shelley?”
God, he’s beautiful…and hazardous the way he looks at me.
A thin layer of sweat augments the valley between his chest muscles, darkening the silky line of fine hair separating the two sides of his six-pack. Down to where his pants, hanging low, meet that sexy V. Makes me want to run my tongue over his skin and taste the saltiness.
“Why?”
“Billy told me you’d gone straight.” Or mostly straight. “I don’t wanna be the one to screw that up for you.”
“Is that all?” His voice is soft as he places the water bottle on the counter and curls his fingers over the edge of the granite. Opening himself, inviting me to come closer.
Like a honeybee to nectar I’m drawn, and take another step.
“I don’t want you getting hurt or to do anything illegal for me.”
“Little too late for that, Shelley.
I’m within touching distance. My lips feel dry, so I flick my tongue along the seam to moisten them.
He swallows and the pulse at the base of his neck jumps. I so want to believe there’s something more there. But with my track record?
“What have you done?” I ask.
He shakes his head and dodges my question. “I’ve gotta know something.”
“What’s that?”
“You fuck him?”
“What?” My head jerks back. “You’re serious?”
“Need to know, babe.”
“Gianni, it’s none of your business, besides I think you’ve already made up your mind.”
“Answer me, De Luca. You owe me that.”
“All right…I’ll tell you, if you tell me why you want to know.”
In less time than it takes for me to take a breath, he grabs my hips and spins us around to trap me against the counter. Using a foot, he kicks my legs apart, far enough to step between mine.
I gasp as he situates himself, adjusting his position so he’s rubbing against my most sensitive place. Sensations shoot through me causing my nails to dig into his shoulders.
He grunts and takes a moment before insisting, “Did you, or didn’t you?”
“You don’t scare me…mmm.” My head drops forward to his chest when he flexes again because he’s right there. Goosebumps erupt everywhere. God, he’s going to make me come.
“I wonder why that is?” His pupils are dark and greedy and he’s breathing almost as fast as I am.
“I think…I scare you,” I whisper between breaths. My fingers develop a mind of their own moving over the ridges and muscles of his shoulders and down towards his chest. He sucks in air through his teeth then grinds again. My body responds, with heat pulsing through my veins, liquefying between my legs. I throw a leg around him, availing myself. I’m so primed from wanting him, from his teasing, that when he hits my clit again just right, I spasm and shatter around him, crying out.
Oh my God.
“You’re fucking killing me.” His voice is thick and hoarse as h
e circles his hips against mine. Fingers slide across my face, tilting my head with his thumbs under my jaw. Our mouths collide. It’s urgent, wet and deep. Tongues clash and stroke, unable to get enough as we devour each other. I arch into him, still riding my climax, and slip my arms around his waist, pulling him closer. He’s rock hard and I grind my hips against his milking it for as long as I can.
But I want more and I must have lost my mind because I don’t care we’re in the kitchen. I want him in me and reach inside his pants, intending to get my hands and mouth on that beautiful, pulsing cock. When I do, I circle my thumb over his tip and find it’s moist.
“Fuck,” he growls against my mouth. “Not like this, not here.” He rips his mouth away and pulls back. But his eyes are blazing and hungry. Dragging air in quick hard breaths, he buries his face in my neck. “We need to stop.”
At first it doesn’t register.
He just gave me an orgasm, and it was amazing, mind-blowing even. Doesn’t he want me to give him one too? I’m aching and empty, needing more, needing to taste him. For him to fill me because he’s the only one who can and he wants to stop?
The depth of that thought is something I don’t like at all.
In fact, it sucks.
My breath hitches as I pull my hands out of his sweats and push my forearms against his chest. He captures my wrists and crosses them behind my back, keeping me trapped and close.
“You’re not going anywhere.”
“You told me to stop.” My face is burning with the lingering effects of my climax and humiliation as I struggle to free my arms, but he tightens his grip. “I’m stopping. So let me go.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“De Luca, the first time I take you, isn’t gonna be in the kitchen up against a counter,” he says, nipping the tendon in the crook of my neck. A shiver races through me.
“It’s gonna be in my bed. You’re still injured, babe. I don’t want to hurt you because I can’t promise I’m gonna be gentle.”
My chest rises and falls and everything inside clenches. It’s a really good thing he’s still holding me, because my knees threaten to buckle when he drags his teeth and stubble along my skin to my shoulder, making it erupt along the way.
God, he’s lethal, throwing words like that at me. Maybe because I’m coming down from my orgasm, or maybe it’s because of who he is and just how damn good he is, but reality hits me. The universe just threw me a wake-up call. I need to pay attention to its warning. Protecting me from Dean is one thing, but getting me into his bed is another matter entirely.
“You can’t say things like that to me. It’s not fair.”
He pauses, then those eyes hit mine and his brow furrows. “What do you mean?”
“I can’t do this.”
I really want to, but if I give myself to him, it’ll be the end of me. “I can’t play this game with you. You win.”
His body locks up and he blinks slowly. “That doesn’t sound like me winning.”
At that moment, the kitchen door flings open and bounces off a door-stopper. We flinch and turn our heads. All four dogs rush in and surround us, panting and bouncing off their front legs, their toenails clicking against the tiled floor.
Tinkerbell shoves her nose in between our torsos while Truman growls and nips at Gianni’s ankles.
“Shit,” he murmurs in my ear. “Canine interruptus.”
It happens to me sometimes. The effects of adrenaline, hormones or maybe my frazzled nerves but that strikes me as funny. I burst into giggles.
He rests his forehead against mine and snorts, which makes me giggle even harder. Because I’m laughing, he is and we stand together with a giant, slobbering dog’s head squished between us, shaking. I’ve only ever heard him laugh once before, in his kitchen when I mentioned the goose incident. I wonder how often he laughs and for a second I’m really glad it’s me that’s making him.
“Ai.” A shrill voice makes us laugh even harder. I peer round Gianni and through the tears in my eyes see an attractive, plump, Hispanic woman in her late fifties covering her eyes and holding up her other hand, palm forward.
“Mr. Gianni! No en mi cocina! Tu madre will kill me.”
He pulls himself together with an effort and, letting out a deep sigh straightens, releasing my hands from behind my back.
“Shelley, meet Connie, Mom’s housekeeper.”
11
Casual drive-by piece of ass
* * *
“Hola, Miss Shelley,” Connie says. She has lovely, rich brown eyes like stained mahogany that reflect her smile. Which is shy. I can’t tell who’s more embarrassed, her or me. I wonder what she’s got to be shy about. I’m the one who’s been acting like a bitch in heat, grinding myself against Gianni.
Even as I answer with a smile of my own, my cheeks burn and I feel Gianni’s gaze on me. Orgasm and giggling fit aside, something has shifted between us. If only I could allow myself to trust it. To trust him.
“Let me know if you need anything.” Connie glances between me and Gianni. She scoops up Rambo and dumps him into the front pocket of the frilly Viva Las Vegas apron. The one Marco borrowed last night.
“Thank you,” I mumble.
Truman head-butts my ankle and, glad for the excuse to avoid looking at Gianni, I bend and scratch his ears. The floppy-eared Doberman sitting next to him cocks her head. I take my time petting her too.
Connie walks into the pantry, exiting a moment later with a large, unopened bag of dog food.
“Un momento, Mr. Gianni, I feed the dogs. Then I make coffee and breakfast.”
As one, the three still-grounded dogs storm the door as soon as she opens it. Rambo hooks his paws over the rim of the pocket.
“She needs hazard pay for that job,” Gianni says almost to himself.
Indeed.
I take the opportunity to make my escape. However, when I turn to leave the kitchen, his fingers hook around my wrist. “What just happened, Shelley?”
I squeeze my eyes shut and hope my voice won’t betray me. Then I turn back and face him, keeping my eyes on his face and off all those delicious muscles. “You’re right.”
“About what?”
“This has to stop.”
“I disagree and I’m gonna be a dick and remind you, I didn’t start it. You did.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yeah, you did.”
“How did I start it?”
“You put your hands on me.”
“You trapped me against the counter first.”
“That’s because you walked into the kitchen dressed like that. So you see, you started it.”
Gah!
Then he grabs my chin, forcing me to meet his gaze. It’s flaring, and not in a good way. More like a pissed-off, frustrated way. “What changed?” he says slowly.
“I don’t do casual, Gianni. That…um…what just happened?” I swallow, looking for the right words. “That’s not going to work for me.” I push his hand from my chin and back up a step.
His brows come together. “There’s nothing casual about that. You just came when I barely touched you. That’s the most beautiful thing I’ve experienced in a long time, De Luca, and from where I stand that more than worked for you.”
Those words again, the ones that will kill me. Shit, I may as well own it because he has me there.
“You’re a very good kisser…and you were in the right…um… place. But it can’t go on, it will lead to something we’ll regret.”
“Don’t demean it like that. There was much more to it than me just being in the right place and I won’t regret it.”
“Maybe not, but when you’re done in a week or so you’ll move on to the next. That’s not how I operate.”
“Is that what you think? That you’re a casual, drive-by piece of ass?”
“You forget, I know who you are. Your reputation, Gianni Cadora, goes all the way back to high school. Y
ou nailed every girl I knew and all the ones I didn’t and I don’t believe that’s changed.”
“Not all of them.” He steps back and folds his arms, making those biceps bulge.
“You don’t have to split hairs. And just to clarify, you’re not denying it. Have you ever had a relationship for more than a few weeks?”
“No, can’t say I have.” He lets out a long breath.
“Why not?”
“I never wanted one.”
“Uh huh.” It’s my turn to fold my arms. “My point exactly.”
“And that is…?”
“I’m just wondering if you’re capable of feeling anything more for a woman other than she’s just a piece of ass.”
“Careful.” His eyes turn stony, the blue changing to gray. “You think I’m a heartless bastard, Shelley?”
“Hey. Those are your words.” I toss what he said to me yesterday back at him. “And that is not what I said.” I put my hands to my forehead and blow out air. “I don’t want to do this now, in here.” I cast a glance at the door. Connie could return any second. Who knows, she might even be listening at the door.
“We’re doing it, De Luca. And perhaps now is a good time to talk about your marker.”
I blink several times, holding my breath.
Holy shit.
“What’s it going to be?” I whisper.
“It’s going to be what I say it’s going to be. In my bed, when I want, for as long as I want.”
What?
“Are you nuts? You’re going to make me sleep with you?”
“I’m not going to make you, De Luca, and there will be very little sleeping involved.” He leans in close to my ear. “Based on what I experienced earlier, you’re going to want to.”
My head explodes, every synapse firing at once. My jaw drops, I slam it shut, then it drops again.
“You said we’d work something out. We haven’t discussed this.”
“We’re discussing this now. Those are my terms.”
“I have a say in this, don’t I?”
“Nope.”
“What do you mean nope?” I yell.
“Be honest with yourself for once, Shelley.” His fingers clamp around the back of my neck. He pulls me close to him, our faces inches apart. “Ten minutes ago, you were hot and ready with your greedy hands on my cock. If I hadn’t slowed things down, we’d be giving Connie a show fucking in the pantry up against that wall right now.”
