by Bethany-Kris
“Did you?” he asked.
One of his hands had already outstretched to reach for hers. As soon as she was close enough to him to grab it, she did just that. Renzo wasted no time in yanking her as close to him as he could possibly get her. The first kiss landed on her hairline, and the second, on her forehead.
She couldn’t get him close enough.
Couldn’t hug him tight enough.
God, she missed him.
“You’re crazy, you know,” she mumbled against his chest. “Showing up like this here.”
She had watched bigger men with more important last names be punished for a hell of a lot less than what he did here today. She honestly believed her father when he said the one and only reason he had yet to physically act against Renzo in a way that would permanently keep him away from Lucia was only because of her, and nothing else. Because her father loved her, and maybe … there was a part of him that knew she loved Renzo, too.
Maybe.
His chuckles rocked them both, but goddamn, she loved that sound. Loved the way it surrounded her like a melody she couldn’t forget. Loved the way it filled her senses with something sinful and wicked.
Was that what they were?
Sinful?
Wicked?
She could figure that out later.
Renzo pressed a quick kiss to her lips when Lucia tipped her head back to stare up at him. “We should get out of here, yeah?”
Lucia glanced back at the restaurant. “Like now.”
“Got it.”
• • •
They walked three blocks before Lucia realized something.
No one was following them.
She kept looking back, expecting to see an enforcer trailing them on the sidewalk, but no. There wasn’t anyone coming for them. She thought, maybe she might see a familiar black car circling the block once or twice, but again, there was nothing.
Her mother hadn’t lied.
“What are you doing?”
Lucia glanced up at Renzo, and felt his fingers tighten around hers. “I was just … nothing. It’s nothing.”
He flashed his teeth in a sexy smile. “You sure?”
“Yeah, Ren.”
And wasn’t that just great?
She thought so.
“This way,” he said suddenly.
Without warning, Renzo pulled Lucia into an alleyway between two businesses. She had thought they were just going to walk until one of them got tired, and decided to either hail a cab, or catch a bus. Renzo apparently had different plans. At the end of the alley sat a familiar bright red, vintage Mustang.
Lucia laughed. “Borrowed it again, did you?”
He shrugged as they neared the waiting car. “I was not taking a bus all the way here, I missed the subway and didn’t want to wait, and I wasn’t paying for a cab when this was right around the corner. And yeah, we can go with borrow. Sure, why not?”
“Ren!” She smacked the back of his shoulder with her palm. “You didn’t take it, did you?”
“Is take the new word for steal, or …?”
“Renzo!”
He didn’t give her a chance to blink before he turned quick, and caught her around the waist with his arms. The force of his kiss sent her stumbling back until her back came in contact with the hard brick. Demanding, rough, and harsh, his kiss felt like the best kind of sin as his tongue warred with hers. All she could do was fist his jacket, and drag him impossibly closer. Those hands of his hand up to wrap into the waves of her hair, and tug just enough to make her scalp sting.
Shit.
She loved that.
He only broke their kiss when her lungs were burning for air, and her lips were numb. The slight tingling left on her skin from his facial hair made her wish he had been between her thighs instead.
Renzo’s thumb came up to press against the seam of her lips as his other hand curved softly around her throat. He’d never squeeze … at least, not like this. Only when she asked for it, and only because she wanted it, Lucia knew.
“Don’t worry about the fucking car,” he murmured, his gaze drifting over her features with such intensity that she swore her heart skipped a beat. Yeah, damn. She’d missed him something terrible. “I will drop it off where the guy keeps it tucked away in a warehouse tonight, and he will never even know it was taken out. The speedometer is broken, anyway. It can’t record miles driven. He takes it out maybe twice a year for car shows. It’s a fucking waste.”
Lucia blinked. “You’re terrible.”
“I fucking missed you.”
Her throat went dry.
Her stomach clenched.
The best ache started between her thighs.
“How’s that back seat?” she asked.
God knew they had better things to do.
Other things to worry about.
But fuck it. She was eighteen, and eighteen meant she didn’t have to always be smart and do the right thing. Sometimes, it meant having fun, and taking risks. It meant being risky, and oh, so reckless. Eighteen was the time to do all of that, and there was no one else she would rather do it with than the man looking at her.
“Still big enough for the both of us,” he said.
“So why are we still out here and not in there?”
“Good point.”
His laughter echoed all around before he tugged her toward the car, and Lucia happily followed. It felt like a blink, and she found herself in the back seat of the Mustang with Renzo hovering above her. He took no time at all to strip her of her clothes, and he of his, too. They made a pile on the floor, forgotten and unwanted. God knew she didn’t want anything between them.
Not ever.
His hands skimmed down her body, slow and burning. It made her shiver, but the way he watched her … intense with hooded eyes that couldn’t seem to drink all of her in fast enough, it was addicting.
She wondered …
Would he always look at her like that?
Always want to?
His hands dipped lower, finding her hips as his fingertips dug in deep. She widened her thighs for him, inviting him closer. Renzo didn’t move an inch, he just kept holding and fucking staring.
Driving her insane.
“Please,” she whispered, “I want—”
“I want to look at you. I just … want to always be able to look at you, Lucia.”
Lucia blinked, stunned. “You always can.”
She’d make sure of it.
He kissed her, then. Hungry, and desperate. His soft touches turned demanding and greedy in a flash, heating her up and telling her that he was done looking. He wanted to feel.
It never failed to amaze Lucia at how it felt to have this man between her thighs, and on top of her. The weight of him was substantial as he pushed her roughly into the back seat, but she couldn’t get enough. It only felt better when his hand locked around her throat as he pushed her thighs opened wider until she felt that telltale ache in her muscles.
The word frantic came to mind.
The way he grabbed at her. How she pulled back, locking him in with her legs tight around his back as he slid his cock along the seam of her pussy. His hand slipped under her ass as he thrust inside. All she could do was suck in air, and lose her mind in the way it felt when he first filled her full.
“Fuck, yeah.”
His words echoed all around.
Like a catacomb.
She reached up to stroke her fingers over his stubble-covered jaw, but he caught the tips between his fingers, and bit down. Pulling out of her, he slammed right back in again, making Lucia whine.
That ache was back.
Her need grew heavier.
“Harder,” she breathed.
Renzo grinned around her fingers, and then sucked them into his mouth as he fucked her the way she wanted. Pinned down, a hand on her throat, and his cock pounding into her at an unrelenting pace. All she had to give herself some sense of stability was her hand against his back, but all she could do was drag h
er fingernails down over his skin as hot pleasure licked through her nerves.
“Are you going to give me what I want, then? Come for me like I want, Lucia?”
“Yes.”
Her whine felt too high.
Too airless.
Too out of control.
Yeah, even one week without him was way too long.
She’d never let it happen again.
Ever.
• • •
“Renzo, hey,” a familiar face said as the two of them walked past the usual loiterers on the stairs of Renzo’s apartment building. “And princess Lucia. Been a minute since you were around, huh?”
Lucia gave the guy a look, and pointed a finger at him. “I’m watching you.”
“Someone better,” the girl beside him joked.
Laughter followed them inside the apartment building. Renzo was quick to pull a keyring full of jingling keys out of his pocket, before he handed them over to her. He pointed to one key in particular on the ring, saying, “My apartment key, go on up. I have to grab Diego. He’s downstairs with a babysitter.”
She smiled. “Okay.”
“Fair warning—the kid misses you a lot. He might not leave you alone for a couple of hours.”
Lucia only shrugged. “So?”
Renzo’s chuckles filled the hall. “You say that now.”
He dropped a quick kiss to her mouth, and didn’t miss the chance to pat her on the ass as she headed up the stairs, too. Lucia tossed him a wink over her shoulder just before she caught sight of him disappearing into the bottom level hallway. It took her no time at all to climb the stairs, and come to the right floor for Renzo’s place. Throwing the door open to enter the hallway. Lucia immediately wished she would have waited and just come up with Renzo instead.
There, down the hall, was a familiar woman. Sure, Lucia didn’t know Carmen Zulla on a personal level, but the things she did know about the woman were enough to say she also didn’t want to know her in any kind of way.
Renzo’s mother didn’t notice Lucia. She was too fucking busy beating her fists against the apartment door. She looked like a mess—hair matted, and greasy. What bit of makeup she had been wearing—some lipstick, and maybe kohl around her eyes—was smudged, and ruined. The clothes she had on looked like they hadn’t been washed in a week, or more.
Lucia wasn’t the type to judge. She had a feeling this woman had some kind of trauma in her history that led her down this path of substance abuse, and addiction. No one just woke up one day and decided they wanted to be an alcoholic or a drug addict. It didn’t work that way.
This was a disease.
No one chose it.
But that didn’t mean Lucia could feel sympathy for this woman, now. Not after the things she knew, and shit she had seen since being around Renzo. Carmen might not have chosen her path, but she did choose to hurt her children. She chose to neglect, abuse, and disregard their wants and needs for her own selfishness.
Lucia didn’t feel anything but anger about that.
When Carmen didn’t get the response she wanted by banging on the door with her fists, she let out an angry sob, reared back, and kicked the door instead. Lucia made a sound in the back of her throat—half surprised, half confused. That was what finally caught Carmen’s attention that she was no longer alone in the hallway.
It took the woman a second.
Then, two.
She blinked, staring at Lucia like she might recognize her, but was trying to place where she knew her from. Then, all at once, Carmen seemed like she figured it out as her gaze dropped to the keys in Lucia’s hand, and then back up to Lucia’s face.
“You,” the woman hissed. Well, a garbled hiss might have been a more accurate description. Just how high was Carmen right then? Her pupils were pin-thin as she came closer to Lucia with careful, yet still stumbling steps. “You’re the little bitch he’s fucking, right?”
“I—”
“Renzo, my son,” Carmen continued. “What, he’ll give you the keys for his apartment, but he won’t even let his own mother have a place to sleep, too? He’s a bastard, like he’s always been. Would rather keep a little rich bitch happy than take care of his own mother. Did you know that, girl? He just throws me out on the street like trash. But what does he do for you, huh? What does he do for you?”
That need to defend and protect Renzo swelled swift and harsh inside of Lucia’s heart. How dare this woman insult him after everything he clearly did for her?
“He doesn’t need to take care of you,” Lucia spat at her, “that’s not how it works. Parents take care of their kids, not the other way around. But I wouldn’t expect someone like you to understand that. You’ve never taken care of him, have you? He’s done your job for his whole fucking life.”
In retrospect, it might not have been the smartest idea to provoke a woman who was clearly high, in a rage, and probably felt like she was backed into a corner, even if she wasn’t.
Too little, too late.
Carmen struck out with a closed fist, and a screech that could burst eardrums. That first punch felt like hitting a brick wall. Lucia dropped the keys, and fought back.
The bitch wasn’t getting a second hit in.
That was for certain.
TWENTY
“Lucia’s really here?”
Renzo had to laugh at how excited Diego was as he asked the question. So excited, in fact, that the kid missed an entire step on his way up the stairs. He barely managed to grab hold of the back of Diego’s shirt to right him to his feet so that he didn’t smash his damn face off the stairs. The last thing he wanted to do today was make a trip to the closest hospital to get Diego’s face stitched up.
“Yeah, buddy, she’s upstairs right now. Can’t wait to see you.”
“Yes!”
Of course, the kid picked up his pace again. Renzo had to practically jog to keep up with his little brother. It was only when they came to the second-floor landing that he heard the noise upstairs. It wasn’t uncommon for a fight to break out in the apartment building, but especially not around here. It was all too common, really. Usually, Renzo just ignored it, or if he had to pass it to get to his place, he kept his gaze forward, and didn’t try to step in.
It was just easier that way.
An unspoken agreement between the tenants, really.
But that yelling coming from one floor higher was not just any fucking tenant. He recognized the feminine shouts echoing down the stairwell.
Jesus Christ.
No.
By the looks of Diego’s horrified expression, the kid knew who was fighting one floor up, too. Shit. This was not what was supposed to happen today. This should have been a good fucking day.
Renzo swore the world just liked pulling jokes on him. Like it allowed him to think everything was going his way for once, only to come back around and boot him right in the ass with a bitter laugh. Something was always keeping him down.
Darting past his terrified brother in the stairwell, Renzo took the last flight of stairs three at a time to get to his hallway. He threw the door open in just enough time to watch his strung-out mother grab a fistful of Lucia’s hair, and throw her against the wall. To Lucia’s benefit, it looked like she had given it back to Carmen just as much as the woman had given it to her considering his mother’s bloody nose, and busted mouth.
Lucia didn’t really have a mark on her.
Yet.
Renzo wasn’t going to let her get hurt, either.
That was the thing about Carmen, though. When her sobbing antics no longer worked, and she was beyond the point of no return, the woman quickly turned to violence to solve her problems. Like she thought it would work to just smack someone around to get what she wanted. God knew she had done that to him more than enough over the years. Renzo had never fought back when he was younger because shit, it was his mom. And then once, she turned on Rose … he thought he broke his mother’s arm dragging her away from his sister.
&nb
sp; She never went after Rose again, though.
Never dared to lift a finger at Diego, either.
Carmen was also a hell of a lot more hesitant to go after Renzo, too. He took all of that as a win, and whenever his mother did go into one of her rages, he didn’t mind putting her in her place when he had to in order to keep her from hurting him, his siblings, or even herself. Not that she deserved his protection from doing harm to herself.
Hadn’t she been doing that for her whole life every single time she smoked something, or shot more poison into her veins?
“Fucking little bitch!” Carmen screeched.
Yeah, that was enough of that.
His mother didn’t even see him coming until he was right behind her. It was too little, too late, then. Renzo bear-hugged his mother, it was the safest way to keep her arms tucked down at her sides, and not able to harm someone should she be able to reach them. Yanking her back away from Lucia, he swung hard, and released Carmen at the same time. She stumbled a good five feet down the hallway, but he was more concerned about Lucia.
Fucking nobody was going to put their hands on her.
No one would ever hurt her.
“You okay?” he asked.
Lucia straightened against the wall, and wiped the edge of her mouth with the back of her hand. “Yeah, Ren, I’m okay.”
His gaze darted to the doorway of the hallway where Diego had come to peek through the crack. Fucking thing—it had never shut properly. It was supposed to always be shut for fire safety, or some shit like that, but it was jammed open. Diego’s wide, tearful eyes darted from Renzo, to the spot behind him.
He barely heard Carmen’s insult before his mother’s hand struck him in the side of his face. The surprise slap shocked him for a second—it made his vision blurry, and his ears rang with noise. It took him entirely too long to shake the dizziness away, but when he did, he was already going for his mother again.
He got ahold of Carmen just as she struck out at Lucia. The edge of her fingernails caught Lucia along her throat, leaving behind red scores that looked painful, and fuck …
His rage blew out of control, then.
Maybe it was the bit of blood on Lucia’s throat.
