Maria (Made Men Book 7)

by Sarah Brianne

Strolling next to him, she couldn’t stop herself from smiling. She would have sworn the hand in hers felt like her mother’s when she reached the beginning of the cherry tree walk. She had been so taken aback that he brought her here, but now, with every step they took, it felt like her mother was giving her approval to be there with Kayne.

  “This was my favorite place to visit when we came here. I made Mom and Lucca walk me down here when all they wanted to do was look at the newly planted flowers.”

  “I can see why. It’s beautiful.” When Kayne had said that, he hadn’t been looking at the perfect row of trees.

  Her heart quickened as her feet stopped. Goddamn, this man was somehow even more handsome when he gave her compliments.

  “Yes, that’s why I made them take me here first. If they didn’t, I’d stop walking until they promised me they would. I might have a little bit of a temper.” She decided to give the poor man a tiny bit of a warning before he thought she was all beauty and no brawn.

  “A little?” Kayne teased with a smile, picking up a long lock of her blonde hair and twisting it around his finger before tugging her lips closer to his. “Some of the fights you had when you went to Legacy Prep are legendary.”

  Blinking, she didn’t know if she was more stunned at the fact that he clearly wasn’t as naïve to her antics as she had thought or that her own fights were legendary.

  “Really?”

  Kayne withheld his laughter. “You’re looking pretty pleased with yourself, Ms. Caruso. Teachers typically frown at fighting.”

  “You don’t?” she asked playfully, looking at him through long lashes, already knowing the answer.

  Dropping the hair held between his fingertips, his eyes went to her full lips. “I don’t throw stones.”

  Was it bad that the idea of Kayne beating someone to a bloody pulp made her hot? Who fucking cared if it did? It was hot as fuck.

  Bridging the sliver of distance between them, she decided to take a cue from her dream and initiate the kiss he hadn’t yet taken. Kayne didn’t pull away, but he didn’t exactly respond the way he had in her dream.

  Thinking his brain had finally outgrown his bravery, she let her lips lightly hover over his. “What’s wrong, Mr. Evans? Afraid someone will see?”

  The whispered taunt against his lips had him grabbing the back of her head to tangle his fingers through hair spun like gold. “There’s only one thing about you that scares me, Maria Caruso … and that’s how I’m starting to feel about you.”

  The kiss he laid on her beat the one he had given her in her dream, fucking hands down. Not only did Kayne show her that he wasn’t scared of her, but that she should be scared of him.

  Twisting his mouth over hers, he parted her lips to thrust his tongue inside, driving hers to the side to explore and sending any idea that she would ever be able to bring him to his knees, plummeting to the region of her body that wanted to jerk him back to the forest of trees to hide exactly how she wanted to touch him.

  She had to grip the front of his camel-colored coat to fight for air when he lifted his head.

  “Something tells me I would have liked that boy who got into fights.”

  Placing an arm over her shoulders, he started walking them up the path again. “Oh, you would have.”

  Maria snuggled under his arm, laughing. “What makes you so sure?”

  “All the girls did.”

  “Cocky, I see ….” Damn, I like it. “Well, there isn’t any particular girl besides me now, is there?”

  He looked over at her in confusion.

  “Kendra?” Maria raised a fluffy brow. “The woman I saw you with at the movie theater.” That was the supposed substitute teacher that Leo had warned her about when he told her she wasn’t his type.

  “No,” he promised her wholeheartedly. “I’ve taken her out a couple of times, but there’s nothing between us. I haven’t seen or spoken to her for some time now.”

  Sorry, Kendra. Maria genuinely wished her well.

  Kayne was turning out to be one of the good ones … At least, so far.

  “Good. Then I guess you can ask me out on another date.”

  Kayne shot her his own look. “That depends. Are there any men, besides your father and brother, I should worry about?”

  Shaking her head, an image of a dimple-faced, tattooed god came to her mind that she blatantly ignored. “Nope.”

  “Then, how’s tomorrow?” Kayne hadn’t noticed her lie, since she herself believed it.

  Maria had to mentally think of another way of getting away from Jerry. There was only one thing that big man refused to do. “How about meeting me for brunch at Sky’s”

  “Is that the restaurant that revolves on top of the Plaza Hotel near here?”

  “That’s the one.” A conniving Maria grinned.

  Kayne stopped their stroll. “Any particular reason you chose that place?”

  Playing the sweet, innocent blonde with him was no longer an option. “Possibly ….”

  Poor Jerry was terrified of heights. He would puke up his left kidney if he had to go up the hundred floors or so on the elevator that had another elevator piggybacking on top.

  The gold in his eyes churned. “How long do you plan to keep us a secret?”

  “For now.” Maria didn’t blame him for looking a little bit relieved by her answer. She wasn’t looking forward to her family finding out, which was why she sneaked out of a spa.

  “I’m a patient man, Maria.”

  A gust of wind blew the beautiful, delicate cherry blossoms, dusting the ground ornately while Kayne stole her lips in a deadly kiss.

  “As long as I get what I want in the end.”

  Eighteen

  Do I Look Like I Watch Hockey?

  Opening the big house door, Maria waved goodbye to Jerry, whose car revved off before she even closed the door. Still not sure how she got away with it, her cheeks hurt from how much she smiled. Hell, she was still fucking smiling.

  Practically floating on air, she felt like this was what it must feel like to be high. To be so fucking happy and content.

  Walking toward the living area, she heard laughter filling the space. Leo, Nero, Elle, and Chloe sat around the couch, playing Monopoly at the huge coffee table.

  Smelling the sweet, spicy scent of spaghetti, her stomach growling from hunger pains, Maria went in the other direction, toward the kitchen. She didn’t do carbs often, but tonight she planned to make an exception.

  “Is it ready yet?” she asked Lucca who was behind the counter.

  Lucca stirred the pot of the red secret sauce. “Not yet.”

  “Damn.” Taking a seat at the counter in her favorite spot, she was too high on life to see that Lucca took notice that her expression did not match her words.

  Crossing his arms, he leaned against the counter. “How was the spa?”

  “Good.” She snapped her head back toward the living room when she heard Chloe’s giggle grow louder than the others. “She seems happy.” Turning back to her oldest brother, she gave him a wink. “I guess you sorted everything out?”

  Lucca didn’t answer, going back to stirring his pot.

  “Hey, Maria.” Chloe’s sweet voice came up beside her. “How was your day?”

  “Relaxing. And yours?”

  Opening the fridge door, she got herself a water. “It was okay.”

  Okay? Hm.

  “Come here and try this for me,” Lucca said from behind, holding out the wooden spoon that was covered in sauce, while he hovered his other hand below it to catch any drippings.

  Chloe did as he asked, standing on her tippy-toes and sipping off the spoon. “Mmm … it’s really yummy.”

  Okay, that was kinda cute. Wait. What? Is that cute? Or am I going fucking crazy?

  “Don’t you fucking dare put that back in the pot!” Maria blurted, seeing Lucca was about to stir it again. “I love Chloe and all, but that’s your fiancée, not mine.”

  Taking it to the sink, he narrowed
his eyes on his sister. “I wasn’t.”

  Bullshit. “You don’t fucking do that when no one’s looking, do you?”

  Lucca was able to keep a straight face. Chloe, however, could not.

  “You do!” Maria could see it written all over the pretty, scarred face. “That is vile.”

  There was a special place in hell for people who licked their utensils while feeding a group of people. That was called L-A-Z-Y, all because the cook didn’t want to dirty a new spoon. Even if they were all family, there were still family members she definitely didn’t want to eat after. Like her whore of a brother before he got with Elle. Maria hadn’t even trusted Nero’s hands back then.

  “I don’t.” His lie was ruined when Chloe quickly took her water, heading back to her game and giggling like she was before.

  Gosh, that girl’s personality was becoming more unrecognizable every day. The only thing that hadn’t changed was her outside—still beautifully scarred. Chloe was happy, though, which meant she stood a chance at surviving the life Lucca had planned for her.

  Being at the botanical garden today, her thoughts hadn’t left her mother, that forever burning question still heating her mind. “Do you know if Mom was happy with Dad?”

  Lucca stopped what he was doing, standing as still as ice. “What?”

  The importance of her question in that moment was the only reason she continued to ask it, feeling as if it might be a key to help her own life. “I can’t remember if Mom was happy. Like, truly happy … with her life and our father,” she admitted what she wished she hadn’t forgotten.

  Since Lucca had been slightly older, it allowed him more memories with their beautiful mother than the rest of his siblings. More reason to remember and more reason to never forget.

  In his dark voice, he spoke low enough for only her ears to hear. “That is the only reason I have left as to why I will not kill our father, Maria. As much as I have grown to despise him, the only reason I don’t hate him is for how happy he made her.”

  Solemnly nodding after finally finding out the truth, Maria thought she would have been happy. Instead, she didn’t know how to feel, didn’t know what to do with that information.

  Lucca went back to the stove, turning on the gas to light the flame underneath the filled pot. He watched it begin to boil before he turned back to look at his sister. “Dominic asked about you the other day.”

  Her eyes flew up to his, narrowing them on him to silently tell him why she would give a fuck. “Okay ….”

  “He wanted me to tell you, thank you.”

  “Oh.” She didn’t know what she had expected him to say, but she wouldn’t have thought Dominic would thank her for telling her father that he had been with her during the shooting. “Well, then you can tell him there’s no need to thank me. I was just telling the truth.”

  “All right.”

  Maria watched Lucca do his annoying thing of staring at her a lot lately, and since he was here already, judging, she asked another question about the Luciano boss. “Is it true Dominic can break down his Glock and put it back together in ten seconds?”

  “Why don’t you ask him?” he told her, turning around to his boiling pot of water.

  Wanting to reach into the sink for the wooden spoon to throw at the back of his head, she was just about to dare herself to do so when dirty blond hair appeared out of the corner of her eye.

  “Leo.” Maria wrapped her arms around him tightly, trying to squeeze the dear life out of him while simultaneous not really. It was her way of quietly telling him thank you for the date Kayne had taken her on. “I love you so much.”

  Letting her do it with a smile was his way of telling her thank you.

  Maria didn’t even fucking realize that she had used the L-word, not once but twice in one night … but Lucca did.

  “This is a joke, right?” Maria stared at the hockey colosseum as Kayne looked for a parking spot in the busy lot.

  “There better be a concert going on here,” she warned.

  “You don’t like hockey?”

  “Do I look like I watch hockey?” Maria waved her hand down at her tiny and obviously overdressed designer dress, silently thanking God that she brought her fur coat.

  Kayne took the opportunity to glide his eyes down her body. “Yeah, I should have probably warned you it was going to be chilly.”

  Mmhmm ….

  She knew damn well he had thought of it but chose not to for his benefit. “Luckily for you, I can’t get cold.”

  His brows drew together in confusion.

  Maria tapped her head with a slender finger. “If you stay cold, you can’t get cold.”

  “I’m going to be honest, Maria; sometimes you scare me.” Opening his car door, he walked around to open hers. “That’s why I brought you here.”

  Taking what he said as a compliment, she didn’t, however, understand what the hell that had to do with hockey.

  The crowd was so large inside that it was no wonder her family never attended sporting events that weren’t watched from a box. If Lucca knew where she was without her suit, she was pretty sure he would make her finish her last college semester from home.

  Shimmying her ass on the cold seat, she tried to get comfortable as the crowd started a chorus of shouts as the players took the ice. She started planning their future dates right then and there, because she had no intention of seeing another one of these.

  The crowds were too loud, the players were covered head to toe in a bulky uniforms that she couldn’t see what the men even looked like enough to appreciate the game. When she’d caught baseball at home on TV, the thick, beefy players had turned even her frigid head. Now that’s a sport.

  Startled, Maria bounced in her seat when one player smashed into another, both crashing into the plastic glass. Blood splatter sprayed it as a front gold tooth went flying. The only reason she knew it was gold was because they kept replaying it over and over on the jumbotron.

  Maria didn’t turn to look at Kayne, afraid she would miss another attack if she did. “I’m buying us season tickets.”

  Nineteen

  What We Could Be

  Maria stared at herself in her full-length mirror, smoothing down her off-white, tweed dress that had gold stitching through it. The stitching had big, matching gold buttons adorning it, which complemented her hair. Plus, the short dress made her look like her three favorite things: smart, sexy, and rich. It was one of her favorite designer’s.

  Sliding her slender feet in her nude pumps, she was all ready to make it to her noon class.

  Taking one last, conceited look at herself in the mirror, she watched her bedroom door open behind her through the reflection.

  Thinking she was now daydreaming, she turned to face her thought-to-be illusion. “What are you doing in here?”

  Him coming into her childhood room, and the realization that she wasn’t, in fact, dreaming, didn’t happen until he closed the door behind him.

  Maria stomped her heels on the luxurious carpet, not wanting him to come in any farther; she met him before he could walk a foot into her room.

  “What the hell are you doing in here, Dominic?”

  “Lucca gave me permission.” His hazel eyes assured her, telling her that he wasn’t that fucking dumb after all.

  She couldn’t believe his audacity—that he thought he only needed her big brother’s permission to waltz into her room like he had been there before, like he fucking owned it enough that he blocked her from reaching her door. “Then I’ll scream if you don’t leave.”

  “Scream,” Dominic dared her to let Lucca save her. “But you won’t ever get ten minutes alone with me again, princess.”

  Even in real life, the Luciano must have had a death wish … making her wonder what else from her dream had been real. That wonder was the only reason she didn’t open her mouth to scream.

  “I didn’t think you would.” He stepped closer and almost smiled.

  Never backing away from someon
e in her life, she took one step backward, the dense carpet beneath her heels making her wobble as she did so, and thus making her have to take another step, and another, trying to steady herself from not only the floor but from his presence.

  She didn’t like the look in his eye. It was the same one he had when he had come to her house before his sister got married.

  “What do you want?”

  “To see you … To see if it’s true.”

  If what is true? She narrowed her eyes on him as she got to one of her walls where she was finally able to steady herself.

  “If you really were falling in love.” He had just as much trouble saying the L-word as she usually did. The green in his eyes burned her skin when they gazed over the slight glow on her cheeks. “I suppose it is true.”

  “I don’t know what you’re ta—”

  “Don’t. You. Dare,” Dominic commanded her silence. “Don’t you dare play the fucking stupid blonde with me.”

  Maria’s fierce green eyes that were glowering up at him helplessly softened from finally seeing it. He looked furious and sad. Too serious but broken. Like he was hurting. In so much pain and anger all at the same time. She had only noticed the anger when he had come here about Kat. Now she could see that she had missed the pain when he first walked in all those weeks ago, only having seen the sadness in him when he was leaving. Unlike herself and Lucca, Dominic appeared to feel everything ….

  Watching his pain-filled face carefully, Maria wondered which of their fates were worse: to feel nothing? Or to feel everything at once?

  “How many dates did it take? Two? Three?” he asked curiously when she said nothing.

  She didn’t have the heart to tell him that they had already been on four.

  “I told you what would happen, Dominic.” She knew the source of his feelings he was unable to hide. Not in a million lifetimes would she have guessed Dominic Luciano felt so strongly about her—the daughter and the sister of the men who were the source of all his problems. The last name that adorned her first should have had him detesting the very thought of her, making him spite the Caruso name for all eternity. Yet, she was seeing the complete opposite in his eyes when he looked at her … Except, she had warned him. “But you locked the door.”