by Lana Sky
Her hand flies out without warning, pressing against my chest. I grip her reflexively, dragging her closer, inhaling that fucking scent in stereo. I groan, telling myself a million different lies. This means nothing. It’s not capitulation if I don’t penetrate her. Holding her means nothing. Nothing.
The fact that she relents is irrelevant, her hands on my forearms, her face against the name etched into my skin.
“I’d give you anything to make it right…” The promise escapes my mouth, unbidden. Do I even mean it?
I look down at the sliver of her face exposed to me. The soft bone structure. A dark eye squeezed shut, cheek glistening with tears.
She’s beautiful.
She’s hell, my personal devil here to ensure my soul burns eternally for what I did. I have no right to touch her, stroking the bridge of her nose with the tip of a finger.
I feel driven to keep talking to her, “You won’t have to endure me for long.”
Her head jerks up, her gaze cutting to mine, demanding an answer. Do I mean it as a warning? A mercy?
“You’ll be free in due time, little principessa. Free to marry your prince and live the sheltered life promised to you.”
This is mercy, I decide. The truth, even if it’s not exactly what she’s after. She’ll be freed from her monster soon enough—both her and Vincenzo.
She should take comfort in that.
Instead, her eyes blaze, body stiffening with indignation. Her answer is almost too easy to guess—because I’m seeing only what I want to see.
No, she says, my selfish little witch. You belong to me.
She sinks her nails into my flesh, and I figure it’s just a proxy for what she really wants—to dig her claws into my soul.
“I’ve changed my mind,” I rasp. Suddenly exhausted, I stop resisting, bringing my mouth near her ear, forcing her back to bow beneath my height. “I’ll teach you one more thing—to know when to fold. Some battles aren’t worth winning.”
She’s always been a greedy fucking thing, though.
She doesn’t let go, even as I lean back against the wall, allowing the rickety structure to support our combined weight.
She stays, her eyes seeking out mine in the dark.
I will win, they say. You owe me this.
13
Evgeni
“How does an heiress wind up beholden to a trafficker?” I ask of Briar Winthorp. After hours of driving to ensure any tracker lost our trail, it’s the first time I’ve spoken to her directly.
Though, a better question would be, how in the hell have I become beholden to her?
Somehow, she wound up picking our latest destination. Far from any “slum,” the Norfolk hotel is a venue well beyond my typical price range. I suspect her insistence on it specifically isn’t pure coincidence, either. She’s planning something.
When we first entered the suite, she went directly to the window to “enjoy the view.” Not exactly the behavior of a woman just targeted by a sniper. Unless that attack was all for show.
Or, she’s fixated on something enough to ignore the risks.
When I come up behind her to inspect the view for myself, all I see is the city’s center, the harbor in the background.
“You can start talking now,” I warn her. “I specifically requested a room with no neighbors.”
“And here I was, assuming you just valued your privacy.” To her credit, she’s damn good at obscuring her fear. And her motives. I find neither in her gaze as she turns to face me.
“After sitting on my ass while you played chauffeur for the better part of two days, I need a bath, soldier. You can wait to interrogate me after or join me.” Her sly smile doesn’t fool me. She’s aiming to stall.
When I don’t respond, she strolls across the room, entering the bathroom.
“You could have sprung for the penthouse suite,” she remarks in disgust from inside it. “But this will do.”
She starts to close the door and jumps when I spring forward, blocking its closure with the flat of my hand.
“I think I will join you.” I ignore the rasp in my voice. It’s not eagerness. It’s impatience. With force, I shove the door open, making her stagger back in alarm.
“No more stalling. No more games.”
Her throat jerks around a hard swallow. She’s unnerved but recovers well enough. As she slinks toward the enclosed glass shower, her sly grin returns in full.
“If you wanted to see me naked, you could have asked.” She fingers the straps of her dress before sliding them down her arms and shimmying from the material.
My eyes track the garment’s descent. I’d be a fool not to watch her in case of a concealed weapon—but as her ass comes into view, a potential ambush is the least of my concerns.
Apparently, she views underwear the same way she does morals—unnecessary. Bare skin forms a healthier shape than I’d expect, given how thin she is.
Damn near perfect…
Minus one glaring flaw.
“Here.” I snatch a rag from the counter and approach her, reaching for her hip.
She jumps, whirling around. “Don’t you dare touch me—”
“You’re hurt.” I nod to her lower back.
She contorts her hip to follow my gaze. Her lips purse together, her eyes narrowed over the bruise taking shape there. Dried blood streaks the skin, stemming from a vicious scrape marring the flesh along her left upper thigh.
“You must have landed on it when you fell,” I say.
It looks painful. The rush of adrenaline must have kept her from feeling it—and the injury alone might be proof that our dramatic escape wasn’t entirely faked.
Someone so vain would never willingly undertake the risk of bodily harm.
“It’s just a scratch.” She snatches the rag and swipes at the wound before dropping it and stepping into the shower. “Faux concern doesn’t look right on you, by the way,” she quips. “I much prefer your aggressive side. When you have your hands around my throat. I do like it rough, after all.”
I ignore the part of me that reacts to her words. My cock jolts, but celibacy is the reason, not her in particular—it’s been a while since I’ve fucked anything, be it a woman or my hand. Approaching the counter, I run the water cold and wet my fingers—all while watching her in the mirror.
“You never answered my original question.”
She sneers. “Why didn’t I stay with my sister and enjoy the secondhand benefits of her perfect, happily ever after, you mean?” She whips that curtain of hair around her shoulder and turns on the faucet. With an exaggerated moan, she puts her back to the spray, bearing her front to me. This part of her is unmarred, her nipples hardening as the droplets of water make contact.
“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not cut out for peace and tranquility.” She winks. “I much prefer chaos and danger.”
“Chaos,” I echo. “Like supposedly leaving your son in the hands of a monster?”
She stiffens, glancing away. “You can ogle my ass all you’d like, soldier, but don’t make the mistake of thinking you intimidate me. I left my son. You killed a young girl. In the grand scheme of evil deeds, one seems to outweigh the other.”
I shut off the water, and she grins in triumph. Her aim is to rile me. All to distract from that topic.
“Your son,” I say, not taking the bait. “Do you even care about him, or are you just worried about protecting your own neck?”
She strikes the glass barrier of the shower with the flat of her hand. “How dare you!” Anger paints her cheeks red, her body tense.
I almost believe she’s truly insulted.
Then she drops the act with a mocking laugh and leisurely arches her back beneath the water.
“I left my son,” she says as though it were an act equivalent to forgetting a toothbrush. “Don’t expect maternal theatrics from me. I am not my sister. You won’t be able to use Ali to play on my heartstrings.”
“Ali,” I echo, recalling the l
ast time she mentioned the nickname. Short for Alexander. “You don’t give a damn about him?”
She raises an eyebrow. “Do you give a damn about the things you leave in the past? Like Amina… Wasn’t that her name?”
Damn it. I flatten my palm against the counter, and she giggles.
“This isn’t about me,” I snap.
“Then I suggest you carefully weigh where you want this conversation to lead, soldier.” Despite her playful tone, I recognize a warning when I hear one.
“Don’t tell me that you don’t enjoy probing, personal questions—” She grabs a bar of soap and drags it across her breasts. “Though, I don’t blame you. I prefer probing things of a much different variety.”
Her nipple hardens further with the contact, repelling the droplets of water that baste it.
I look down at the counter, watching my fingers flex against the polished surface.
“Antonio Salvatore,” I say, steering the conversation to a different topic. “You knew his name but not one of the Saleris. Did you work with him personally?”
She laughs. “Work is a loaded word. I much prefer ‘play’ to describe my relationship with dear Tony.”
It’s a deliberate nod toward the one subject she seems to prefer—sex. So, I’ll play.
I turn to face her, keeping my hands at the ready in case she tries to run. “You fucked him, I’m assuming. Did this Jonathan use you as a whore to further his aims?”
Her smirk falls.
“No,” she admits, turning around to wet her hair. “I was to keep an eye on him. Make sure he was scouting the properties he was supposed to—”
“Properties?” I take a step forward, noting the shiver that wracks her spine in response.
So much for her haughty demeanor.
“He wanted him to buy them. One in particular, but the seller was proving difficult—”
“Donatello Vanici?” That certainly rings a bell. Even Mischa had his eyes on the section of the port Vanici had gotten ahold of.
Despite the offices having been burned to the ground, it seems the interest in that particular piece of land hasn’t abated any.
She shrugs. “Perhaps. I was to convince Tony to keep his attention on the end goal.”
“How. If not through sex… Blackmail?”
She presses a hand to her chest in mock horror. “Do I look like the sort to do something so heinous?”
No. She looks like the sort to use her body as a weapon and toy with her nipple to distract me. It works.
Objectively, her body is a work of art—and as soon as I think the thought, I cringe from it. Shaking my head, I refocus.
“I’m assuming your man had something on him. What?”
For minutes she doesn’t respond, humming contently as she washes herself. Finally, she shuts the water off.
“Could you hand me a towel, please? I’d rather not catch my death.”
I snatch one from a hook on the door and throw it at her.
Laughing, she catches it, but drapes it around her hips, leaving her breasts bare. At the same time, she inclines her head to meet my gaze with sudden seriousness.
“Tony liked girls, and he liked them young. Young and… Not necessarily willing.”
Her words land bluntly, but I know instantly it’s the truth.
That sick son of a bitch.
“The Saleris supplied them,” she continues, running her fingers through her damp hair. “Regularly. They also disposed of them, but they kept the records. Detailed, meticulous records. My role was to periodically…remind him of those records.”
“So you worked for the Saleris?”
She shakes her head. “I never met them. Not directly, anyway. I only ever interacted with Tony and…him.”
“You don’t like to say his name,” I point out, curious as to her reasoning. Is the hesitation part of some sly little game? Or true fear.
She whips her hair back, obscuring her face, and I can’t decipher her reaction.
“Fine. So, the Saleris were the ones putting the pressure on Tony,” I reiterate. “But couldn’t that backfire? All he’d have to do is blow the whistle, and they’d both go down.”
She laughs, and her gaze returns to mine, glittering with amusement.
“I may not know the Saleris personally, but I do know that name. I’m assuming you do as well. Tony would have no sooner walked into a police station than found himself mysteriously hung in a holding cell with no witnesses, all records misplaced. You know how this city is run, soldier.”
I do.
It’s a shithole where the rats are in charge, the Saleris paramount among them.
“Well, you got your wish.” I start for the door. “I’ll call Mischa. If Tony and the Saleris were working together—”
“Wait!” Her hand latches onto my forearm, still wet. “Are you that much of a fool? You can’t.”
I raise an eyebrow, inspecting her from over my shoulder. Her mask has slipped again, those eyes wide with genuine fear.
“Isn’t that what you wanted?”
“I wanted to see him in person,” she clarifies. “But now it’s too late. They’ve already tracked me, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they know where we are. I don’t have long to make a move. You try to reach Mischa—”
“And what? You lose your little game of leverage?”
“No,” she replies softly. “We’ll all be dead. If he knows I’m out, he’ll rush to enact his plans. You tell Mischa, and he’ll already have one of his spies whispering in his ear. Then he’ll kill Mischa’s pretty little daughter. Willow. Does that name ring a bell?”
I snatch her arm, unfazed by her startled gasp. “What the hell do you mean?”
“I mean, he’ll kill her next and frame the man she’s with. All to distract Mischa as he merrily goes about his final plan. After we’re both killed, of course.”
“Talk then! What is his plan?”
She sucks in a breath and releases it in a rush, “He’s on a tight timeline, so he can’t wait for permits and follow zoning laws like a normal businessman would. He also needs to make a splash in the city so that the people who matter know outright to fear him. He needs fireworks, you see—”
“Enough games.” I drag her closer, watching that throat quiver as she swallows. “Talk. What is he planning?”
“To blow up the city,” she says. “And kill several birds with a very large stone. How is that for ‘fireworks’?”
14
Don
We don’t sleep. We just endure minutes of each other, painfully close. When dawn finally creeps in to displace the shadows, she disentangles her limbs from mine, turning her back to me.
I enter the hall like a man possessed, feeling so damn old. I’d kill for Fabio’s bottle of Librium. Cyanide. Anything to dull the confusion muddling my head, turning every thought on its head.
First Liv’s letters. Now the memories of what I did to Safiya.
Maybe I’m too much of a coward to remember. To face what I’ve done and dwell in it. The blond little waif haunting me now with her watchful dark eyes is merely my punishment. She’ll make me pay for my sins one way or another.
But for the moment, I’m not thinking of her.
I’m thinking of Liv. She’s here, back from the dead, enraged by the way I’ve let another desecrate her memory. Blazing with judgment, her eyes watch me from the bottom of the staircase. It’s so real…
When I blink, she doesn’t vanish. What the hell? I take another step and realize why—the same eyes are staring at me in real life, just in a very different face.
“Fabio,” I say, aware of the woman in my wake. How long has he been here? “Come to dispense with more mothering?”
“No,” he says, but the sternness of his tone sets me on edge. Only one of three things could ever draw this level of seriousness from him. Death, money, and Vin.
“He’s awake, Don,” he croaks. “Vincenzo is awake, and he’s lucid.”
I grab the b
anister, gripping it tight as a million different emotions barrel into me all at once. Relief. Guilt. Dread. “You mean he’s speaking?”
He nods slowly. “He wants to see you—” His eyes move to someone behind me. “Both of you.”
In the grand scheme, I never deserved Vincenzo. Hell, after how badly I’ve failed him, I have no right to even stand in his presence.
Fabio, and his insistence on “timing,” got it wrong this time. The best thing for Vincenzo would be to let him come to terms with the piece of shit his uncle is and secure him a future without me. I have the insurance papers finalized.
All that’s left is to ensure he can collect.
The second I cross the threshold of his room, one look at him dispels every other thought in my head. He’s still pale as a ghost, but his eyes are open, that signature shade of brown.
“Vinny…”
“He’s sedated,” Fabio warns, coming up beside me. “But—”
“You look like hell, Uncle Don,” Vin says tiredly, his words slurred but still delivered with his trademark grin. It’s weak and strained with pain, but it’s there.
Crossing to the bed, I grab one of his hands and suppress a shiver. He’s still so damn cold. “You’re not looking too hot yourself,” I croak, noting the bandages on his head. Still, I force a smile of my own. “We need you back on your feet and at that fancy university.”
“Same old Don,” he rasps, squeezing my hand with what little strength he has. “Always the hard-ass…”
He trails off the exact second I register the scent of roses. She always had a certain presence about her, louder than any fucking sound. It’s her stare. That subtle sensation of being watched—really watched by someone noting every detail. Every twitch. Every flaw.
Looking at her, it hits me how fucking blind I was not to see her true identity before. I’d referred to her only as tigre. Maybe Vin knew the truth all along; he just didn’t trust his own eyes.
