FAMILY TIES: A Mafia Love Story (Erotic Mafia Romance)

by Jordan, Angela

  Michael was her ex-husband. She could stand naked in Times Square and they could broadcast it nationwide. Michael would never be able to get to her again. I didn’t tell her that though. Instead I said,

  “No, Camilla. It’s not about Michael. It’s about Lucio, he’s been killed.”

  “What? Oh my God! No!” she screamed and jumped to her feet. Then looking as if she didn’t know what to do with herself she dropped back down into the chair. Then she stood up again. “Who, Sammie? Who would want to hurt Lucio? He was the sweetest man who ever lived. Was it her? His wife?”

  “No, his wife is family,” I told her. By “family,” Camilla knew what I meant. She would know better than to have someone in my crew killed, even if he was her husband. I think it was someone with a beef against me, Camilla. I’m sorry.” Tears were streaming silently down her face. She was pale and for a second I feared she would pass out. She sat down again and then she let her body glide down to the floor as she dissolved into a puddle of tears. I sat down next to her and ran my hand down her hair and pat her back. I didn’t say anything. I knew there was nothing I could say to soften the blow I’d just given her. I let her cry and when she was able to speak again she said,

  “What will I do without him, Sammie? I loved him so much!”

  I knew she didn’t expect me to have an answer for that. I assured her that I would do whatever she needed to help her get through this. For the next hour she alternated between sadness and anger. She finally cried herself to sleep. I stayed with her, falling asleep on the couch just before the sun came up. When I woke up, Camilla had coffee made and she looked like she was in a little better place anyways.

  “Make sure that you don’t go anywhere alone,” I told her. “Don’t let anyone other than myself in unless I’ve called to let you know someone was coming over, okay?” She looked frightened and I hated that was because of me. She’d grown up in this life though; her father was one of my father’s soldier’s until he too was found dead. She understood what was at stake. She nodded and I hugged her again.

  “Thank you for telling me yourself,” she said. I gave her a nod; she shouldn’t have to thank me for giving her news like this.

  “I’ll check in on you soon,” I told her. I had to get home and shower before my crew showed up for our meeting.

  CHAPTER SEVEN: ALANA

  I spent my Monday at a high school in Brooklyn. The principle of the school decided the students would no longer have the option of doing sports. They would be offered art and music and dance classes instead. They would be given opportunities to work with some of New York’s finest artists and musician’s because the principle decided that was where the money the school usually spent on sports went. First of all, I could totally see where he was coming from. Excelling in the arts would make the world a better place faster than excelling in sports would, at least in my opinion. Second of all, he was a fool to think that in America of all places he could get away with it and keep his job. That’s the part that made my editor think this was newsworthy. It was going to be a fight. The school board and the parents were on the verge of tarring and feathering him, but because of the teachers union they wouldn’t be able to fire him easily. Most importantly of all, I didn’t really care about any of it. I was tired of covering stories that were barely a blip on the radar of the average American. I was only going through the motions and I’d write up a silly little article that practically no one would read because it was my job…

  All I could really think about today was Sammie Romo and the mafia story and the fact that I’d told Nate I was engaged to the heir to the New York mafia throne.

  I don’t know what I’d been thinking….I was pissed and I wanted to shut him up, but my bravado had waned throughout the day. I still wanted the story and I still wanted to rub it in Nate’s face, but was I willing to give up literally years of my life?

  As I had that thought, I slid into my car and I actually laughed out loud. What life? In the past three years I’d had three serious boyfriends. Each one of them had lasted approximately half the year and I’d spend the next half alone and reeling and swearing I would never do it again. My parents had moved to Florida almost as soon as I was out of the house. My only sibling was a much older sister who lived in France with her husband, two kids and three French poodles. My friends were mostly acquaintances and sadly, there was no one around to really miss me.

  If I agreed to do this, I could be there when Sammie Romo brought the mob to its knees. I’d be known as the journalist who brought down the mob forever and I could add protecting my heart to the list because if I was pretending to be engaged, I couldn’t date therefore I couldn’t hook up with another loser who would break it.

  I thought about Sammie again….tall, glistening olive skin…sculpted muscles….a shiver ran through my body. I warned myself once more that I wouldn’t be sleeping with him…the engagement was all for pretend and sleeping with him would not only confuse the issue, it would compromise my integrity as a serious journalist.

  I’d been driving as I was thinking and before I knew it I was in front of the Glass Towers. Nick Hunter was having Sammie followed. He was working on some kind of story. Before it broke with Nate quoting me as saying, “He’s my fiancé I needed to work the details out with Sammie. I also still had a few questions I needed him to answer.

  “Good afternoon, Miss,” the doorman said. I don’t think it was the same one that had been here when I’d skulked out on Saturday morning…thank God.

  “Good afternoon,” I told him. “I was hoping that you could call up to Mr. Romo—Romalatti’s penthouse and let him know that Alana is here to see him.”

  “Yes Miss, I can do that. Please have a seat and make yourself comfortable. I’ll be right back with you.”

  I took a seat on one of the plush, off-white couches in the lobby. They were arranged around pretty glass tables with expensive looking vases full of flowers. I sat there and watched all the designer-clothing clad people bustle back and forth while I waited. Suspiciously, I wondered how many of them were linked to the mob.

  “Miss?” The doorman brought me back to reality.

  “Yes?”

  “Mr. Romalatti asked me to send you up. He said that he’s in a meeting in the conference room next door but you should make yourself comfortable in the suite.”

  “Okay, thank you so much.” The doorman put me in an elevator that he said would take me into the penthouse. He pushed a button and gave me a polite nod. I nodded back just as the doors closed between us. It was a little nerve wracking to have people kissing up to me. I wasn’t used to it.

  The doors opened into the sitting room of the suite. Somehow the morning I’d tried to sneak out of here, I’d completely missed this elevator. When it closed, I saw why. The doors were painted with an elegant floral mural. I would have thought it was just an oversized painting if I noticed it.

  I stood near the window for a few minutes. I was a little nervous about being here alone…even more so about being here in general. I didn’t want Sammie to know how nervous I was so I finally went over and took a seat. I sat perched on the edge of the sofa thinking about leaving again for about fifteen minutes before he finally strolled in the door. Damn if he wasn’t the hottest thing I ever laid eyes on!

  He was wearing a dark blue suit with a brown and blue striped tie. It fit him like it was made especially for him…which it probably was. With his dark hair and eyes and deliciously light-brown skin he looked like a succulent piece of chocolate wrapped in a blue silk wrapper. I had to force the thoughts of unwrapping him out of my mind.

  “Hello Alana,” he said, making it worse by showing his perfectly straight white teeth as he smiled.

  “Hi.” I stood up and he took my hand before I knew it and brought it palm up to his lips. Heat seemed to surge from them and course through my entire body, pooling between my legs. Damn him! I pulled my hand away and said,

  “Listen…I’ve decided that I want this story.
I’m willing to pretend to be your fiancé with certain conditions.”

  He looked amused as he said, “Would you like to sit down and discuss it?”

  “Sure,” I said, “But please stop looking so amused. This isn’t at all amusing.” He had the decency to at least try and stifle the glee etched into his face.

  “I will do my best to not look amused,” he said, still looking amused.

  “You’ll have to try harder than that,” I told him.

  “Absolutely,” he said, suppressing another grin. “So, what are these…conditions you speak of?”

  “I will accept your fake proposal and in public for either as long as it takes, or until I’ve had enough. I will play the role of your happy fiancé. In private however we will only have a professional relationship. We won’t be naked together…ever. We won’t get drunk and we won’t have sex. Once the story breaks, we’re through.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, “But I do have a few conditions of my own.”

  “Okay…”

  “You’ll live here in the extra bedroom,” I opened my mouth to protest and he held up his hand and said, “It’s my turn, Bella.”

  “Go ahead, but don’t call me Bella.”

  The corners of his mouth twitched again as he said,

  “Alana, I will need you here with me to ensure that you are a hundred percent safe and sound. I won’t agree to this if you refuse.”

  I didn’t want to stay here…I wanted to say it was because I didn’t want to give up my own place. The truth is I could care less about my crappy little apartment. I was just afraid that I couldn’t trust myself being that close to him day and night.

  “While you’re thinking that one over,” he said, “I have a few more.”

  A few more? I leaned back and folded my arms and listened.

  “You will attend whatever public function I ask you to attend on my arm. You will not speak to anyone of our deal, and you’ll not date other men as long as you’re pretending to be my fiancé. It wouldn’t look proper if someone saw you.”

  “Why do you call yourself Romalatti?” I said. He seemed taken aback at the change of subject but at last he said,

  “It’s my mother’s maiden name. I was hoping without carrying around my father’s name, I wouldn’t be so recognizable.”

  “How’s that working out for you?” I asked him with a grin.

  “Not so well, I’m afraid. So what do you think of my conditions?”

  “I’ll accept them, for now,” I said. “What do you think of mine?”

  He grinned and said, “I’ll accept them, for now.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT: SAMMIE

  I was looking at this woman as we discussed the details of our “deal,” thinking that she really had no clue how gorgeous she it. I don’t understand how that happens. She should have a man following her around just to tell her how beautiful she is. Her hair falls to just below her shoulders and in the light it’s the color of honey. She has blue eyes, but they have a dark brown ring around the irises. I’ve never seen anything like it and for some reason I find them incredibly sexy. Her nose is small and pert and her lips are full, the kind of lips that any heterosexual male over the age of sixteen can’t look at and not imagine kissing.

  “Well, if that’s all for now, I should go home and pack.”

  “Only pack what’s precious to you. I’ll have my driver take you shopping tomorrow and you can buy whatever else you need.”

  “I don’t need anything,” she said, stubbornly. “I have things of my own. I’ll just pack them and bring them with me.”

  “I’m offering to buy you all brand new things,” I said.

  “And I’m telling you that there’s nothing I need that I can’t buy myself…thank you.”

  “You’re an obstinate little thing, aren’t you?”

  “No, I am moving into your…hotel. I would just like to have my own things around me…something familiar.”

  I nodded. I didn’t mean to push her too hard. It was strange for me because I had watched her for so long. I’m not a stalker, but for what I had in mind...not just anyone would do. I felt like I knew her because of it and I needed to keep reminding myself of the head start I’d gotten.

  “Let me call Jon and let him know you’ll need him to drive you. There are a couple of men who will be following you. Just ignore them. They know what they’re doing.” She didn’t look like she cared for the idea of someone following her, but that was too bad. Her safety had to come first. Then suddenly her face changed and she said,

  “Oh! I just remembered something speaking of following people. You already have a tail.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “One of the investigative reporters that works at the paper has someone following you and taking photos. I saw the ones that he took of you and me that night at 230 Fifth and then one that he took of me the next morning as I was skulking out of here.”

  I knew that reporters followed me around. I didn’t let it worry me; it had been that way since I was a child. Nothing they would ever see me do would be newsworthy. The only concern I had was what they thought about Alana being with me.

  “Why did he show you these pictures?”

  “Because he wanted to know what I was doing with you,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “He says he’s concerned for me. I told him not to be, that you were my fiancé.”

  I knew it was wrong, this was a business arrangement, but I really liked the sound of that.

  “You are right to not be concerned. I’m used to being followed by reporters. I don’t talk to them, present company excepted. I can assure you that no one else is going to talk to them either. May I ask who the journalist is?”

  “His name is Nate Hunter.”

  I knew much about Nate Hunter. For one thing, he was considered the best investigative journalist in the city…so of course I’d checked him out. I had found him to have fewer morals than most of the men who worked for me. On top of that he seemed to be an arrogant brute that enjoyed pushing people around. The final nail in his coffin was that for about five months, Alana had been his girl. Right or wrong, the thought of another man’s hands on her…especially one so unworthy, disgusted me.

  She looked about to say something else when the buzzer rang.

  “Mr. Romalatti, I’m here.” It was my driver, Jon.

  “Thank you, Jon. Miss Blankenship will be right down.”

  Once Alana was off to pick up her things I called Tony,

  “Hi Tony. I met with my crew today. None of them have seen any signs of trouble nor have they received any warnings or threats. I told them all to keep their eyes open. Did you have a chance to talk to Paulie?”

  “I did. The boy has his mother’s stubborn streak, I’m afraid. I raised him to know how important blood is, but he seems to have forgotten. He says that he can’t give me information about an “on-going” investigation. I should have grounded the little snot more when he was a kid.”

  I smiled, not to laugh at Tony’s family problems, but just at the way he spoke. Of all the people I would be leaving when I took the journey I planned to go on, I would miss Tony the most.

  “Well, at least three of our crews are on this, we should be able to find something out soon, hopefully before any more blood is shed. I suppose I should have a meet with Carmine too.”

  “Do you want me to talk to Carmine?”

  “No, thank you Tony. I’ll take care of it.” I hung up the phone, dreading yet another task.

  CHAPTER NINE: ALANA

  I had been staying at the penthouse for just over a month. Sammie had been nothing but a gentleman when he was there and we had started working on building his life story from the bottom up. He’d done it all completely clothed, and although that had been my rule, sometimes I couldn’t help but ponder breaking it.

  He told me about being born into Mafia royalty and what that was like growing up. He’d played with the kids of his father’s associates
and as far as he knew when they were all kids…they were family. He didn’t find out what his father actually did for a living until he was ten. By the time he was twelve, he was running money for the Ricci’s, the people who owned the hotel that we lived in. Marco was a capo in those days and ran the crew in the neighborhood that Sammie runs now. He had done something for Sammie’s father that earned him the right to run the hotel and stay out of the street business. Sammie hadn’t gotten that far into the story yet, but I was really interested to know what.

  He’d described the hierarchy to me and he’d begun telling me about Tony, the man who was acting as boss now but who had been his father’s Underboss for over thirty years. I could see the fondness in Sammie’s eyes when he talked about the old man. The whole situation was so surreal to me. My entire life I’d lived with a black and white notion of right and wrong. If someone was a criminal…they were wrong. I had a hard time wrapping my head around how you could love someone that you knew had done terrible things. I finally asked Sammie about it one night and he’d said,

  “A man is not made up of the things he does in his life. The most useful thing that my father ever taught me comes from a quote by John Maxwell. It said, “A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.”

  I thought about that a lot as I got to know Sammie. He was such an enigma to me. He was well-educated and soft-spoken. He was passionate and charming. He was generous. When he talked about his child especially, he had wistfulness in his eyes. The only thing he would tell me about his son was that his name was Nico and he was three years old. He said that Nico’s mother had died and that the boy lived with Sammie’s sister in Italy. Beyond that, if I brought up the subject, he would change it.

  Sammie was always gentle with me not matter what I asked. If he didn’t want to answer it, he would gently change the subject. He never lost his temper in front of me and some days I actually had to remind myself that he was a killer. He hadn’t told me that he’d actually killed anyone, and I hadn’t asked him…yet, but his reputation preceded him and from what I did know about the mob, Sammie wouldn’t be as widely feared and respected if he hadn’t. That worried me most, because I feared that I was falling for him. My judgment in men left a lot to be desired, I knew this.