by Piper Page
I wished I hadn’t kissed him. It lingered over me. Arousal pooled in my core, my temptation perhaps too much to fight.
“We’ll Skype once I get back,” I said. I cringed after I said it. I brushed a hair away to try to hide.
“Skype?”
He hadn’t even heard of it. “We’ll talk on video over the Internet.”
This was getting painful. Bright lights flashed in my mind, Abort, abort… abandon ship now. I pointed myself toward Tina, back on the chair, my lips quirked.
“Skype,” he repeated. He squinted at me. “I don’t want that. I want you here, Krista, where you belong. If you want to deny that, fine. I’m not going to lie to you or myself and pretend like I want you to leave.”
Before he turned and strolled away, he said, “Remember what I told you. You can stay here with me.”
I watched as he strode off with his head held high, his muscles flaring. I’d got the impression he was steaming. I’d pushed him away, led him to believe there might be more to this. The sun might be blazing above me, but I turned cold as I slipped back onto the chair next to Tina.
She popped her earbuds out. “What happened?”
“Nothing,” I grunted. “I told him I’d be leaving.”
“We still have one day left, though,” she said.
Anger bubbled inside me, getting close to overflowing. I cooled out before I snapped at Tina. She wasn’t the cause of my anger. She wanted what was best for me.
I was frustrated I’d finally found a good man, then had to leave him after falling for him yesterday. Life certainly didn’t seem fair.
Ignoring her suggestion of a one night stand before my plane left, I tossed the towel over my face and leaned back.
“Literally throwing in the towel,” she said with a chuckle.
I laughed back. You just had to laugh after a string of disappointments like I had. “I’m going to enjoy the rest of my trip,” I stated.
“A good plan. With this weather, what’s not to enjoy?”
We lay out in the sun for a few hours, Tina drinking her fruity mixed drinks while I drank the non-alcoholic form.
Around four, I told Tina I’d see her later, since I’d be burnt to a crisp if I stayed out any longer. She agreed to see me once she got back from the pool, whenever that was. I wasn’t feeling in the mood—I’d not said much after my brief argument with Diego. Or should I say break-up?
It was a break-up in a way. I mulled it over as the elevator took me up to my room. We’d not been together, but it certainly felt like an ending. Like my heart had been broken, our future dashed upon a rocky shore.
When I walked into my room, I picked up the hotel’s bill. Underneath, there was a strange envelope. I thought it might be a personalized letter from the hotel, so I kept it there for now.
I read over the statement. It made no sense. My thoughts spun out of control. Why did it say I would be staying another week here, that everything for that week had been paid for?
“Diego,” I growled.
I swiped the letter from the floor. I opened up the envelope to pull out the handwritten letter.
“$3,000 enclosed to cover the work you’ll be missing while staying with me an extra week. Stay here with me. – Diego.”
Holding the wad of bills, I fell back onto my bed. I sank into the mattress and thought long and hard about what I would do.
Chapter 4
Diego
* * *
Our estate, like always, was jam packed with activity. I wasn’t in the mood, so when a few members invited me to play pool, I declined.
I would always clean house on card games, so they tried to get me to bet on anything else. I went straight for the bar, past the pool tables and the rifles hanging on the wall. I didn’t drink much, but I needed something to take the edge off right now.
Usually after throwing a few punches at a punching bag, I would shut myself away and deal with the books, but I didn’t want to lift a finger or look at reports.
I wanted to know that Krista would stay.
Going back and forth over the Internet would never work. Too much temptation there—it would be torture. Her option would be to stay with me here, or nothing else.
Santiago—my oldest brother, a hulking brute who worked as head enforcer—sat in the corner and lifted a glass of beer at me as I approached. The foam still bubbled at the rim.
“Where you been?” he asked, raising a brow.
I dropped down onto the stool. I leaned my elbows on the table and noticeably slouched.
“What the fuck is wrong?” he asked now.
The upbeat rock music of squealing guitars and wailing front men, and the girls in the corner with the boys laughing and dancing, felt sorely out of place.
“What are you, a fucking mind reader?”
Santiago squinted at me. More like his right eye bulged at me, like a freaking cyclops.
“It doesn’t take a mind reader to see you walking in here with a stick up your ass.”
The bartender, a girl who tried to get in my pants before, slid over to me. I blocked Santiago out with my elbow.
“What you having, Diego?”
“Your choice.”
“Got it.” She poured me glass of something light and crisp, then slid it over. I thought she might ask me what was wrong, but she got the hint and moved away to try to get tips from elsewhere.
I took my first swig and had second thoughts. Getting drunk wouldn’t solve anything, and it would require a lot of drink to get me to forget Krista. I leaned back and breathed deeply.
The atmosphere of the room sank in. One of our enforcers lifted up a girl like she weighed nothing. With the music ramping up, she curled her legs around him. Others cheered and clinked glasses as he bounced her around on his lap, her tight jeans sliding lower over her ass until we all could see her thong.
Things got rowdy here often. But the group of men started throwing elbows at each other and nodding in our direction. Like they knew they shouldn’t get too rowdy when one of their leaders looked like he could snap.
I had to get out of this funk. I shifted toward Santiago.
He already lined me up in his sights.
I knew my older brother would make me suffer. I shouldn’t have shown up and expected him not to say anything. Perhaps I secretly needed some help, even though I never liked to admit it.
“Something is definitely going on,” he said, jabbing with his stubby finger. “You’ve not run the reports yet. They were supposed to be done yesterday, and I know how on top of them you are. When’s the last time you were late?”
I gulped. I decided to take another drink.
“A long time ago…”
“Never,” he corrected me.
“Never,” I said now, knowing that I always figured out the numbers, always drew up the detailed plans with facts and figures.
We’d been in turf wars. Our lives threatened. And I’d always done my job. Now an American girl showed up and I fucked up for the first time.
He wouldn’t let me go easily. “Now isn’t the time. You’ve got to get your head straight. Did you know I wanted to talk to you about the Guerreros?”
I shrugged.
Santiago did that intense squinting again. By the end of this conversation, we would be wrestling on the bar floor.
“Your reports track their territory and shipments. As well as we can track them. And from what I’m hearing, they took out a house that’s close to our territory. Too close.”
The Despiadado Guerreros, or Vicious Warriors, were gaining ground. Santiago was right. We’d not been too worried about them, but perhaps we’d grown less cautious surrounded by the fruit of our labors.
See, we’d come from nothing. Our mother had been a puta, or whore. Rest her soul, but that was the truth. She’d done it to keep our three brothers fed and alive. When a gang leader murdered her, we might’ve been small and young, but we were vicious.
They didn’t expect a bunch of tee
nage brothers to get revenge and murder the heads of the biggest gang in Puerto Rico. But because they never expected it, it helped us pull it off.
We didn’t stop there. We took over the group, then expanded, and kept growing. I always liked numbers from the first book my mother got me, the only one she could afford—a hand me down math book.
And with that knowledge she gave me, I grew this business into an empire. Into a billion-dollar crime business, until we were all modern day kings.
“Tell me what’s going on with you. It’s important, I know it is,” Santiago said, leaning in.
“Fine,” I relented. “You’ll never give up anyway.”
He laughed. “You know me too well, bro.”
“It’s a girl.”
“A girl? What, did she rob you?”
In a way. She robbed me of my sense. I should’ve been focused on the business like Santiago said. Instead, I was more focused on her, if she would stay.
Looking grim, I turned to him and said, “I fell for a good woman.”
Santiago froze. Then he slapped the table and burst out laughing. He took a swig of beer, stopped because he couldn’t swallow, and then pounded it down as he continued to laugh.
When he saw my reaction, he stopped.
“Wait, you’re serious?”
“I’m dead serious. And yes, she did rob me. I met a good woman who robbed me of my heart.”
He chuckled again. “You have a heart?” He shook his head and patted me on the shoulder, as if realizing he shouldn’t be such an asshole. Brothers were allowed to be bigger assholes to one another because we understood when we meant it and when we didn’t.
The group in the corner started to dance more, getting louder. The bartender lined up shots for them once they came back from dancing. Even the guys playing pool began to shout as they circled the table.
“Is she here?”
“No,” I said. “She’s not involved in this life.”
“Oh, brother,” he grunted. “Oh, fuck. You mean, she’s got no idea who we are?”
“No idea.”
I figured that knowing I ran the biggest gang, the Estrada Familia, was a big deal. Maybe even a deal breaker, but I hadn’t been able to tell her. No man had treated her like she deserved to be treated, so I didn’t want to spoil our good day with bringing up how I sold drugs and had murdered people. Such subjects weren’t usually good dinner conversations.
“You need to forget her. If she’s as good as you say she is, you need to keep her away from this business. We do dirty work.”
I really wanted to tackle my brother to the ground now. My anger rose, the beast inside me calling for blood, any blood to stop this weakness flooding into my heart whenever I thought about her.
“She’s leaving tomorrow, but I’m trying to convince her to stay,” I told Santiago, knowing full well he wouldn’t like it.
“Don’t be a fool. Look around you. You can have any woman here. Pick one of them, or a whore off the street. It will serve you better, and you won’t regret bringing in an innocent. Because we’re not innocent, Diego. Do I have to remind you what we’ve done to get to where we are?”
“Or what we will do in the future?” I cut into his glare. I pushed back. “I don’t care. I need to go see her and convince her to stay.”
“Are you sure you haven’t been dipping your nose in our supply?” he called after me, as I pushed off the stool and headed toward the door.
“Thanks for helping me figure things out,” I yelled back to Santiago.
It wasn’t what he wanted me to figure out, but I’d come to my conclusion. With this connection between us, we needed to see it through. And I certainly wouldn’t be dating some whore off the street. If that were my future, forget it.
My pulse racing, I gunned my car to the resort. My palms started to sweat on the steering wheel. I’d not been this nervous since my first kill, the night I took out one of the gang leaders, dressing up as a busboy and then strangling him in plain view.
We had been nobodies back then. Just killers in the shadows. This night, the city belonged to me, and I wanted to share it with only one person—Krista.
I parked the car and tossed the keys while running to the valet. I slipped through a group with their suitcases at check in. I raced to the elevator and pressed the button frantically.
Fuck it. I needed to convince her to stay face to face.
I just hoped I wasn’t too late. In my mind, I pictured her on an early flight to try to get away before I could convince her.
Finally, the doors opened. I squeezed through the occupants, muttering sorry as I did, and I heard one comment on my rudeness as I hit the door closed button.
She would be mine tonight. All mine.
I jammed on the number for her floor.
As soon as the number beeped and the doors swung open, I hurried down the hall in long strides with my heart hammering. I knocked, perhaps a little too forcefully.
When I heard rustling inside, I allowed myself to breathe. My racing heart slowed. But that anxiety still tumbled around in my gut, like I’d woken up in the middle of the night to the sound of gunshots.
Krista opened wearing a violet silk nightgown. Her hourglass shape filled it, and she still wore the necklace I bought her, even to sleep. She tilted her head at me questioningly.
“Diego?”
I stepped inside and she backed up against the wall. My breath shallow, I saw hers hitch, and her eyes pool with what I recognized as lust and fear.
“Tell me that you’re staying.”
The seconds ticked by in slow motion. I watched a bead of nervousness roll down her delicate throat. Her expression hid her intentions well.
“I’m staying,” she finally said.
I took her then, crushing my lips against hers. She moaned against me at first, a purring against my lips, then opened and allowed me in. I rushed against her, claiming her, and then swung her around so that she would fall on the bed as soon as I pushed her.
My restraint had been tested for days when we were together. But tonight, I couldn’t hold back any longer.
I gently shoved her hips and she fell onto the bed, all mine to take.
Her thighs trembled as I approached and towered over her. Krista bit her bottom lip nervously, seductively, and it drove me wild. My cock already pressed against my jeans, and the second she unzipped me, I knew I would be ready to plunge myself inside.
But I wanted to savor her and this moment. I didn’t know how long we would be together. I intended to make these moments last no matter how greedily I wanted to have all of her right now, so I pinned her to the bed and claimed her lips again.
Chapter 5
Krista
* * *
I finally submitted. Like I should’ve a long time ago.
I supposed it was only a matter of time. He’d claimed my heart at first sight. Now he would claim all of me.
My hands roamed from my breasts to between my thighs, as if to guard myself. As his tongue caressed me, I let go, allowing myself to bask in his loving, his lips trailing down from my collarbone to my stomach in a line of fire.
He rose again to devour my lips. I moaned against him, my hips shimmying to try to contain the building pressure between them. My arousal darted to my core, tightening, sucking in for him to take me.
Diego planted firm kisses behind my ear. I panted. My legs curled around his plump, yet muscular ass and pulled him in again.
“Yes,” I moaned. I let my secret slip: “I’ve been waiting for this.”
He kissed me, a lingering, powerful kiss. I inhaled sharply, letting his masculine, spicy scent fill my lungs.
His calloused fingertips brushed against my nipples in my thin nightgown. He groaned as he watched me shiver in anticipation.
“So fucking hot,” he growled. He was a beast let loose as he tore my nightgown over my stomach, revealing the hot and tender flesh of my belly. He kissed me there, then sucked in as he grasped my hips
, locking me down to the mattress.
“Fuck yes,” he said before he sucked a nipple. Sucking it past his lips, he twirled his tongue against it, his other fingers plucking my left tit.
I let out a long, drawn out cry. It felt amazing—at the same time—my vulnerability kicked in. I clamped my thighs together to attempt to beat that rising emotion inside me. It was building up to something immense.
My cheeks were on fire. I looked down at him engrossed with sucking on me, his eyes closed, deep in rapture as his tongue flashed over my nipple. His hard cock pressed between my thighs, and I couldn’t contain my eagerness any longer—I ground against him to get off.
I found my sexuality again. It was like the first time it truly, deeply felt good. I ground my hips, pushing the hard bar of his cock against my swollen, needy sex.
“What you’re doing—it feels so good. Don’t stop,” I panted.
Diego didn’t respond. Thank God. He only continued to suck and flick my nipples, working over my breasts so well I thought I’d come from only nipple stimulation.
That’d be absurd. But I felt my pleasure coming to a head. It lingered there on the precipice.
“More,” I said, thrusting my hips at him.
He got my point.
Diego unleashed my breasts. Growling, he hooked his fingers through the elastic band of my underwear. I kicked my legs out to help him get them off. The next second he threw them somewhere in the room.
Since my legs were already spread, he drove in between. His tongue ran along the edges of my thighs. Fuck, there was no way I’d take this for long. He’d already tortured me and had me begging.
“Please,” I moaned as I shut my eyes harshly. “I need you to fuck me.”
I got onto my knees to wait for him to strip off. It wasn’t lost on me that he might need extra help before he took me, except when he took his cock out, it was thick, long, rigid, and ready to plunge inside me, deep and hard.
That was a beautiful cock.
