Rotten Men (A Rotten Love Duet Book 2)

by Ivy Fox

  “I’m going to cum, baby. If you want me to pull out, I have to do it now,” my tone all gravel and full of plight.

  “Cum with me, Dom. Please!” she cries, and we start to unravel as I coax out her orgasm, rubbing her small nub raw while riding us through the thunderous storm as it screams to the heavens.

  “Dominic!” she wails, cumming so beautifully that I can’t help but fill her up with everything my body has to offer.

  It takes us forever to find our way back to the real world, and the ugliness that awaits us.

  With her delicate hands cradling my head, her eyes misty with unshed tears, she claws at my insides with her sweet childhood endearment.

  “My beautiful, blue-eyed angel,” she sighs, her brow glistening and her cheeks pink from exertion.

  Although I know it’s foolish, and that such truths should never part from my lips, my own words of worship leave me, “I love you, Red. I love you so fucking much.”

  One small tear falls to her chin, and I lick its remains, going straight back to her mouth for one last kiss before we’re faced with the choices of the past.

  Cruelty is our reality when my office phone starts to ring and breaks the spell we so adamantly want to keep hold of.

  Selene is first to sever our bond, pulling away from me, while she commences to put back the discarded bra and the dress lying on the floor. I stand up to fix my own shirt, as I answer the phone.

  “What?!” I bark out, annoyed by whoever threw the first stone at our fragile bliss.

  “Yo, bossman. Just wanted to give you a heads up that The Thorn is headed your way. Thought you might take issue with him barging in while you’re entertaining your lady friend,” he chuckles, full of innuendo, his not-so-subtle way of saying that every staff member upstairs must have heard us.

  Like I give a fuck.

  What is worrying is the fact that I had a meeting with Ciro and forgot all about it the moment I laid eyes on Red.

  “Stall him,” I reply, hanging up the phone and throwing a worried look my girl’s way.

  “What is it?”

  “Red, as much as I want you on your knees for me one day, this is not how I pictured it,” I tell her, as I push her under my desk in one forceful move.

  “Dominic, what the h—” she starts to say, but I slap my hand on her mouth.

  “Shh, Red. We’re about to have company,” I say, right before my office door flies open.

  “I told you he was here,” Ciro says to the anxious bouncer trailing behind him. “Dominic never misses an opportunity to go for a fun outing with me,” he sneers, his smooth, even tone causing the behemoth man behind him to turn green, with whatever horrid images he’s conceiving for what the Outfit enforcer and its ruthless underboss might consider being fun. “So are you ready?” he asks inquisitively while looking around the office with too curious a browse.

  “Just finishing up some things here and I’ll be good to go,” I tell him, staring at the pitch black screen of my computer.

  “Hurry up then,” he replies irritably. “I’ll grab a drink upstairs while you finish up. This office smells too much like cheap sex and cum for my stomach to take,” he goads.

  “Yet the smell of blood doesn’t bother you at all,” I tease back.

  “I like what I like.” He shrugs unapologetically and heads back out the door without another word.

  The bouncer doesn’t move from his frozen position though. I stand up from my seat and walk over to look him in the eye.

  “Keep him upstairs and don’t let him move until I say so. Otherwise, the next person I’ll be fucking is you. And trust me, it’ll be your junk, not mine, that I’ll shove up your ass. You understand me?” I warn menacingly.

  “Yes, boss,” he croaks and runs out the door to do my bidding. I slam it shut, this time locking it from the inside.

  I walk over to my desk, kneel, and see a pale-faced Red shaken to her core. If I didn’t know it was only Ciro who interrupted us, I’d swear she looks as if she has just heard the devil himself.

  “No one will harm you as long as I’m near you, Red. Not in this life, and I doubt in the next,” I cajole, taking her hands in mine, bringing her back up to her feet.

  “I’ll take you to the back door that leads you to the alley behind the club. Or, if you want, you can stay here until we’re both gone.”

  “I want to leave now,” she stutters, so unlike the strong woman I know she’s become.

  “I know you’re frightened, babe, that your father might get wind of you being here. But I promise I won’t let him touch you.”

  Her eyes slant my way, with new determination and strength in their green depths.

  “There are far more dangerous men than The Butcher, Dominic.”

  I agree—me being one of them.

  If anyone even thinks of hurting the woman I love, they’ll rue the day they ever crossed me.

  THIRTEEN

  Selene

  I hang up the phone, and my fabricated smile falls from my face, as do the silent tears that accompany it. I’ve never been gone this long, and the distance is slowly eating away at me. I’ve done many things in my life that have caused me pain, but being back here—facing the misery I spawned—while simultaneously being away from home, is clawing at my brittle heart.

  I need to get back, but until I get what I came for, my hands are tied. Just another penance I need to see through, while I wither away from the endeavor. I feel as if my whole life is a combination of sacrifices and calamities, with only a few stolen moments of joy to keep me going.

  When will I ever be at peace?

  When will I wake up from an endless black night and see the sun again?

  They say home is where the heart is. But what happens when your heart has been split into so many tiny fragments, that ensuring its survival seems almost redundant?

  With him at my side, at least I’m blessed with one loving soul to dote on. I can pour into him all the love I have inside, knowing it will never convey how much he means to me. He is my whole world, and I would go to the ends of the earth to guarantee his safety and happiness. I just have to keep this in mind and maintain my resolve. I’m doing this as much for him as it is to placate my desire to repair an unjust wrong.

  But being back in Chicago and seeing Vincent, Dominic, and Giovanni again feels like a cruel punishment I must overcome. Just being in the same room with any one of them, witnessing with my own eyes what my disappearance has done, is crippling.

  Even though Dominic—behind his brute, hard exterior—still holds that same sweetness I fell in love with, I know his hands are far too tainted with the blood of the Outfit’s enemies. He lives out his days on autopilot; an obedient machine to do the famiglia’s bidding without thought of how he loses a bit more of his tender heart with each life he so apathetically takes. The grim stains on his calloused hands become harder to wash off, and I wonder if he even realizes it anymore, how he dies just a little with each new kill. My childhood protector has become a nightmare to behold.

  Then there is Giovanni—a boy who loathed the life he was born into just as much as I did. Yet now he is the brains behind every deal, every syndicate accomplishment, and every crimson-soaked dollar they make. His logic and know-how have obscured any compassion or leniency he was so quick to give as a child. The boy who wept in my arms the day he took his first life, has grown into a ruthless man who doesn’t bat an eye at sending someone to an early grave. My best friend, my confidant, and my accomplice in all things has lost his cocky lust for life and turned into a fearsome mastermind.

  If my heart didn’t hurt already with these revelations, then one look at Vincent would be the final nail in my guilt-ridden coffin.

  Vincent—the lost boy I so desperately wanted to save and condemned wholeheartedly instead. His arsenic tone and regal, frozen form is nothing but a carefully placed mask to hide the poison running through his veins. I’ve worn masks all my life,
enough to recognize one in my presence. Both Vincent and I were masters at it, but before, his disguise was placed to protect those he cherished; now it’s to conceal that there is nothing to merit such a sentiment. His mask hides the fact he’s become hollow—just an empty vessel pretending to still have a heartbeat when there is nothing at all left to give him life.

  All that exists now is hate.

  Hate for himself.

  Hate for the living and the dead.

  Hate for his life.

  And of course, hate for me—the catalyst of his downfall.

  They have become the judge, the jury, and the executioner of the Outfit, and I doubt there was ever a threesome quite so haunting in the history of mafia empires. Even rivaling the Cosa Nostra’s legendary cutthroat trio—’Lucky’ Luciano, Meyer Lansky, and ‘Bugsy’ Siegel. Those notorious gangsters have nothing on my rotten men.

  Wasn’t it inevitable that they would become these cruel, vindictive men? That fate was already clearly designed this way, foretelling us all what role we were destined to perform, including my own?

  When I left, they all lost their anchor and their compass of morality. Yet they managed to hold on to their bond with each other, fiercely enough not to lose their souls completely—a small mercy, considering that they were all just as broken and flawed as I was.

  They are at least alive, even if they’re not a hundred percent whole. That was the point of me leaving, wasn’t it? But if I truly believe that, then why am I conflicted with so much agonizing guilt?

  It’s one thing hearing about their transformation from my mother’s benevolent lips; it’s entirely different witnessing it with my own destitute eyes.

  And what does it say about me, that even though they are the reason behind so many cold-blooded murders and atrocious crimes, I feel nothing for those whom they have trespassed against? I don’t have one ounce of compassion for the plight of those unknown faces. I am completely unrepentant in my concern for only the souls of the three men who cause such destruction. Regardless of their hideous acts, they still have my heart and always will.

  I look around the depressing motel room and feel suffocated being confined within its ugly walls. I need to breathe fresh air and seek solace beside someone who understands what I’m going through and doesn’t think ill of me for it.

  Only one person comes to mind—the one I could never abandon, and in turn, could never forsake me.

  I pass the cemetery gates and keep my eyes peeled to my surroundings. I usually prefer to come here early in the morning when there is less of a chance of running into other mourners, but today I’ll just have to rely on the setting sun and the late hour to conceal my visit. I walk the familiar path to my mother’s grave when I catch a recognizable form kneeling beside a tombstone—one that I desperately try to avoid, too ashamed to even face his final resting place because of the part that I unknowingly held in his untimely death.

  I hide behind one of the various maple trees surrounding the turf-grassed area, and steady my breath while watching Vincent converse with his departed cousin. It’s difficult to make out his words, but a small flicker of hope ignites inside me when I see him offer a tiny smirk with his heart-filled words.

  It’s as close to smiling as I’ve seen on him since my return, although he never was one to share those frequently in the past either. Growing up, I used to think that Vincent’s smiles were as rare and beautiful as shooting stars. They didn’t occur often, but when they did, they lit up the sky with their beauty—so stunningly exquisite that you’d forget to breathe when beholding such wonder. My chest tightens within my ribcage, melancholy taking ahold of me when I think about how those precious grins must have died the minute Pietro perished in my arms. And when I left, I made sure he never found a reason to smile ever again.

  My back stiffens as Vincent stands and says his goodbyes to the family that no longer exists. Every last Romano lies here waiting for the day Vincent will join them. I grind my teeth and inwardly growl menacingly at them. If I have my way, they will wait an eternity to get their hands on another Romano.

  Except for Ciro—that one the dead can have.

  I push the evil name away from my thoughts while I watch Vincent turn his back on his family’s plot and walk up to the grave I intended to visit. He kneels on the snow-covered ground before my mother’s tombstone and whispers something to her I wish I was privy to. He stays at her side for a full ten minutes, continuing on with his secret conversation. He finally stands with his head bowed and leaves a parting gift for her that I’m unable to see properly from my hiding place. His long black coat hides his wet knees but not his distinguished form.

  Before I can stop myself, I stand before him, halting his exit. His saddened, hazel eyes, turn to cold slits at my appearance.

  “I see you’re still here,” he sneers, scouting the cemetery to make sure we’re not being watched.

  I shrug off his remark and bridge the gap between us instead, getting as close to him as he allows. I hear his intake of breath, not comfortable with our proximity, but right now I need to look into his eyes and see the truth embedded in them.

  “Why do you come here?” I hush softly, waving the white flag of truce; even if it’s only while we stand on this sacred ground.

  “To pay my respects,” he answers sternly.

  “Why pay respect to my mother, though? She was no one to you,” I continue, searching his handsome, sullen features to their full extent.

  “That’s not true,” he relents, breaking eye contact and looking above my head into the distance.

  I place my gloved hand on his cheek and bring his attention back to me. I feel him flinch with the unexpected contact, making me yearn to hold him and never let go. But this one touch is all the bravery I can muster when it comes to Vincent. I’ll fall apart at his feet if I try to embrace him, only to have him reject me.

  “Tell me the real reason why you come,” I whisper, my eyes locked on his. There is a small softness to them that begs to come out, and I take one step closer, breathing in his ingrained grief and lament.

  “Because no one else does,” he says at last.

  “And?” I plead further.

  “And because I failed her,” he admits somberly.

  “Everyone failed her, Vincent,” I reply, stroking his cheek softly, relishing that he’s letting me do so, but hating that his skin can’t feel my warm touch through the leather glove.

  “The Outfit should have done something,” he murmurs beneath his breath, his eyes losing the flicker of tenderness, only to be replaced with the hate he is determined to feed.

  “You can still do something about it. You don’t have to let her life of suffering be in vain. There are other women in the same predicament who need someone to intervene. You have the power to inflict change, Vincent. Be better than your predecessors. Only you have the power to break the cycle.”

  He takes a step back as if injured by my proclamation, pulling away from the small contact I wanted to preserve.

  “It might have been easy for you to break away from famiglia tradition. But to most of us, it isn’t that simple. We live by the syndicate code of honor and die by it, too.”

  “What honor is there in turning a blind eye to an abusive husband and father who torments his family? Or having young, innocent boys kill as part of their initiation? Tell me, Vincent, where is the honor in selling a young girl off into wedlock to someone she doesn’t love?” I try to reason with him.

  His eyes ice over, and the veil of animosity and rancor rises back to its full, ugly glory.

  “If I recall correctly, you ran away from such a fate. Forgive me if I don’t congratulate you on your nuptials. While you were marrying the man of your dreams, we were left here picking up the pieces of your treachery and destruction.”

  “Vincent—”

  “Go back to where you came from, Selene, before I’m reminded that honor demands I offer up your head for your
betrayal,” he snarls back, leaving me cold and bereft with his parting statement.

  I’m unable to move, trying hard to compose myself after such a confrontation. I deserve his wrath. I deserve his judgment. I even deserve his hate. Still, having it all thrown at me at full force, it’s as if I’m being strangled by death itself.

  My shaky knees wobble as I take the first steps toward my mother’s grave, eager to unburden all my woes and secrets to her eternally prone ears. I freeze in place when my eyes land on the gift Vincent left for my beloved mother. A familiar white rose lies on her granite tombstone—one I have become accustomed to finding on each of my visits.

  However, a new flower lies next to its snow-colored companion. Entwined like two lovers in a passionate embrace, the pair of roses look delicately out of place in these forlorn surroundings, yet completely in their element while at each other’s side.

  I trace each petal with my finger, unable to prevent the hope that springs to the surface.

  Maybe my lost boy isn’t as lost as I think him to be.

  Maybe he’s trying to find his way, just as I am.

  I kiss each rose gently—first the white, and then the red.

  I close my eyes and let out a small prayer for us to find each other; if not in this life, then in the next. Just as these two roses are only complete when in each other’s arms, I fear the same applies to Vincent and me.

  Either by fire or ice, our love will always burn. Not even death can change that.

  FOURTEEN

  Giovanni

  I stroke Selene’s naked back with my fingers, relishing her soft, creamy skin at my tips. It’s an addiction I’ve acquired throughout the nights I’ve been welcomed into her bed. But tonight, my hunger is satiated enough, allowing loose the ramblings locked in the dark corners of my mind—a place where only unanswered questions rule. With my principessa on her stomach and me on my side, our eyes are locked together, bound by longing and love, just as they have always been.