Lethal Sin (Dangerous Games Book 1)

by Jennifer Bene

  “I wouldn’t.” The hush that fell over the room at his words was only amplified by the sharp way that Scarpa’s laugh cut off.

  “You would disobey me, Mateo? Again?” There was a threat in that question. It hung in the air between them like overripe fruit, waiting to fall.

  “Yes.” He nodded once. “For her, I would.”

  “I must ask… why?” Scarpa’s eyes were narrow but Mateo didn’t fear him. The only fear he had felt all evening had been whether or not Camille would be alive, and now that he knew she was safe, he was going to make damn sure she stayed that way.

  “Because she’s mine.”

  “You’re walking a dangerous line right now, Salvai.”

  Mateo shook his head a little, shrugging. “There’s no line. She belongs to me, and anyone that wants to get to her will have to go through me.” He glanced over at one of the assholes along the wall. “And we all know how well that turned out for Tony.”

  Scarpa stayed silent for a long moment, and then he nudged Callahan’s face to the side with the toe of his shoe. “Who is she?”

  “C.” Mateo gave her chosen nickname, and watched as recognition flitted over Scarpa’s features, then he smiled slowly.

  “I did think she looked familiar in the photos. How… interesting.”

  “It’s not that interesting. She’s mine. Callahan is dead. It’s done.” Mateo shrugged.

  “She’s a free agent again?”

  “She is.”

  “Would she be willing to work for me?” The question was Scarpa’s offer for an out, but Mateo knew that Camille would never accept another chain around her neck.

  Well, anyone’s chain but his, and that chain was a very real one on the bed in his private room that he couldn’t wait to put on her. His cock twitched at the idea, but he just smiled and shook his head. “No, she wouldn’t. She just wants to be a free agent.”

  Scarpa huffed and threw up his hands, walking back to his desk. “Fine. Keep her, but she better not fuck with my organization. If she does I’ll have you both killed. Understood?”

  “Aw, Scarpa, you know you like me too much to kill me.” Mateo gave his most charming smile, and Scarpa grunted.

  “I don’t like you that much, Salvai. Don’t push me.” Dropping into his chair the older man grumbled and flipped through some papers on his desk before waking up his laptop and scanning it for a moment.

  “Here, fucker.” Derrick arrived and shoved the clean shirt into Mateo’s hands and he winked at him before maneuvering the sleeves through the gaps in his shoulder harness to pull it on.

  “Am I good to go?” Mateo looked up as he finished buttoning the shirt together, and he knew Derrick had tried to embarrass him by bringing him a pink shirt – but he looked damn good in pink.

  Joke’s on you, asshole.

  “I need you to take on another job. How long do you need to clean up this whole mess?” Scarpa paused what he was doing to stare across his large desk, and Mateo reached into his pocket. The speed with which the others drew their guns was somewhat impressive, but Mateo just held his other hand up.

  “Calm the fuck down, guys, it’s an address. Just need you to send the clean up crew to get rid of the rest of the bodies, and then send them by my place for Tony.” Mateo held the scrap of paper in the air and Derrick came forward to snag it from his fingers.

  Scarpa sighed. “I told you that Tony was your issue.”

  “You did, but I brought you Callahan and I think that covers the cost of the cleaners.”

  “Fine, but I have another job for you as soon as it’s all taken care of. How long?”

  “I’ll need a few days, Scarpa. Need some repair work done at my place and to tie up some loose ends.”

  “Would one of those loose ends be that bitch, C?” Johnny grumbled to his left and Mateo had his gun out and pointed at the man’s chest before anyone else had even lifted their weapons again. Johnny froze.

  “Excuse me?” Mateo asked and pulled the hammer back until it clicked.

  “Salvai!” Scarpa snapped. “Put the fucking gun down.”

  “Johnny, I’m going to wait for three seconds and if you haven’t apologized by then I’m going to shoot you somewhere very uncomfortable.” He kept the gun aimed, and then smiled. “One -”

  “Shit! I’m sorry! Crazy fuck.” Johnny’s hands were shaking as he held them in front of him and Mateo eased the hammer off and pointed the gun at the floor.

  “Just go, Mateo. I’ll call you in a few days with the details.” He waved a hand at him and Mateo shrugged and turned to leave. “Don’t kill anyone on your way out.”

  He laughed and turned to give Scarpa a quick salute as he left. “Sure thing.” The other men gave him a wide berth as he walked out and he couldn’t stop grinning at them like a madman. Sometimes it paid to remind them just why he was on the top of Scarpa’s list when it came to jobs.

  As he slipped into his car he tucked the gun next to him in the seat and covered it with the towel he had snagged from Andrew’s. There was a new lightness inside his chest, a strange joy that seemed to suffuse every piece of him as he imagined Camille’s smile waiting for him. Revving the engine he tore out of the circle drive in front of Scarpa’s place and sped towards his girl.

  His.

  It felt right, and while he still wasn’t sure if this was what love felt like – because their situation thus far had been anything but a storybook romance – he knew she was important enough to kill for. Important enough to risk his life for, and no one else in his life had been this perfect.

  When he finally got to Andrew’s apartment he felt impatient as he banged his fist on the door, but his friend answered with a muttered curse and threw it wide to gesture inside. “It’s the middle of the night, could you not wake up the building?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Mateo spoke as he stepped inside and felt that same flood of warmth and relief he’d felt when the smoke had cleared and he’d seen her alive, on the floor, tied to that damn chair. Camille was sitting on the couch, her blonde hair pulled back in a messy ponytail that made him want to wrap his fist around it and force her to her knees. Unfortunately, the kid was sleeping beside her, and Andrew was staring at him, so that wasn’t exactly an option. “Hey, doll face.”

  “Hey. Finish your errand?” She smiled at him, radiant, and still happy to see him. That was a good sign.

  Mateo grinned and stalked towards her, placing a hand on the armrest of the couch so he could lean close to her lips. “I did.”

  “And is someone going to try and kill me?” she asked, her blue eyes a deadly challenge for someone to try.

  “Not tonight.”

  “Well, that’s an improvement.” Camille grinned and pulled his lips down to hers. The kiss was both calming to his nerves, and havoc to the testosterone levels in his blood. Nipping his lip gently she ended the kiss and pulled back. “So, what did Scarpa say?”

  “I can’t hear this shit! Are you kidding, Mateo?” Andrew threw up his hands and walked into the kitchen to turn on the water.

  Mateo chuckled and let his eyes follow his friend before he looked back at the beautiful woman in front of him. “He got a little upset when I told him I wouldn’t hand you over.”

  “What exactly did you say?”

  “That you’re mine.” The growl in his voice made his chest rumble, and more than ever he wanted her under him, wanted her screaming his name.

  “You think I’m yours?” A playful smile tugged at the edge of her lips, and he reached behind her to wrap her ponytail around his hand and jerk her head back sharply. The soft moan that slipped from her lips caused his cock to stand to attention in an instant, straining his zipper.

  “You are mine, Camille.”

  She grinned and wrapped a hand in his shirt, pulling him towards her until he was dangerously close to her lips again. “I think you’ve got that backwards, Mateo. I’ve got you all tied up in knots and you know it.”

  “If anyone is tying anyone up
in knots, it will be me, and once I have you all laid out I’m going to do whatever I want with you.” He couldn’t tear his eyes from her mouth where her tongue was tracing a path over her bottom lip.

  “Is that a promise?” She taunted, and he snapped his eyes back to hers.

  “Abso-fucking-lutely.” Mateo closed the gap and kissed her hard, pressing her back against the couch and holding her in place with his grip in her hair. She moaned against his mouth and he wanted to strip her and taste her again, feel her skin against his. He wanted all of her.

  When they broke off the kiss they were both panting and she laughed softly, running her hand up his neck to lie against his cheek. “See? You’re exactly where I want you.”

  “For once I have to agree with you, I’m exactly where I want to be.” He kissed her again, ignoring Andrew’s groan in the other room, and he couldn’t wait to see what the next day in his life would be like with Camille Devereaux, because he wanted as many of them as he could get.

  And he’d kill to get them.

  Epilogue

  One Month Later

  Camille leaned forward to snag a bit of butter and scrape it across her bread, glancing up as Mateo flipped through something on his phone. “Another job?”

  “Yeah, it is, but it can wait. You just got back.” He grinned at her, setting his phone face down on the table. “And I have plans for your sweet ass upstairs.”

  She laughed, a tingling rush spilling down her spine at his words. It had barely been a month but he was… perfect. He met her on every level of her life, and he never held her back or doubted her. In fact, he pushed her, challenged her, and the best part? He fucked her like a man possessed. To say she was happy would be an incredible understatement, which was something she would have never believed was possible before meeting Mateo Salvai. Raising her eyes to him she prodded him to tell her more. “Where’s the job?”

  “Kind of local, Massachusetts. Just a shakedown for information.” He shrugged and grabbed the bowl of peas on the table to dump some onto his plate. “Going to tell me how things went with the Russian?”

  Camille growled under her breath and cleared a spot on her plate before she held out her hand. “Can I have the peas?”

  “That bad, huh? I told you to use the long range rifle.” Mateo raised an eyebrow at her before offering the bowl. She snagged it and dumped a pile onto her plate.

  “Funny, but the rifle can’t see through brick walls.”

  “You’re telling me he never passed by a window?”

  “What window? He was in an abandoned factory, unless I planned on playing pinball with the bullet, the ones at the top of the building were useless.” She grumbled, irritated that it had taken her so long to fulfill her debt to Nighthawk.

  “What happened at the hotel? I thought you were going to -”

  “He recognized me.”

  Mateo laughed, a deep belly one that had him leaning his elbows on the table like he was preparing for gossip. “Oh, fuck… you have to tell me what happened. Did you try and pick him up in the bar and he pulled a gun? A knife? What?”

  “Never even got that far. I walked into the restaurant downstairs, he saw me… and he took off.”

  “That big ass Russian ran from you?” Mateo grinned and then shrugged, his dark eyes filling with lust as he stared at her. “Smart man.”

  “Yes, he ran. I can’t even remember where I met him before, but there was no reason he should have run unless someone tipped him off that Nighthawk was sending someone or – fuck if I know – but he took off.” She grabbed her knife and cut into the chicken breast, sneaking a bite as she remembered just how infuriated she had been as she had tried to smoothly leave the restaurant and track him. “It took me a whole extra day just to get his fucking trail again, and then I followed him around while he met with people. I could tell he was preparing to disappear again so when he went to meet someone in the factory…” Camille shrugged. “I took my chance.”

  “So, what did you do?” He asked, but just then a loud whirring sound kicked off from his entryway. The mind-numbing noise made her head pound with the combination of jet lag and the lingering frustration of the last few days.

  “Was it really necessary to have them replace the tile again?”

  Mateo huffed and took a drink from his wine. “They didn’t match the tile right the first time.”

  “That’s what happens when you hire people who won’t ask questions about blood stains.” Camille grinned and he sighed.

  “Whatever, it’ll be done right this time, and next time I have to kill someone in the house I know not to do it on my white fucking tile.”

  “You should have the grout sealed,” she added, spearing a bite of chicken.

  “They are sealing the grout,” Mateo grumbled. “Don’t think you’re getting out of telling me what happened. That guy was huge, I saw the pictures. How did you take him out?”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  He grinned slowly, that devilish look taking over his face, making her heart rate triple. “I like picturing you taking someone out. I like knowing just how good you are with a gun, or a knife, and then knowing you’re going to let me tie you to the cross upstairs and whip you just because I want to.”

  Those words brought a gush of wetness between her thighs and she had to swallow and take a sip of wine to get her head on straight. Fuck, Mateo was hot. Even after all the time they’d spent together she’d been waiting for the fascination with his hard body, or his devious tongue, to wear off – but she only found herself wanting him more. Found herself missing him when they weren’t together.

  Dammit.

  “Alright.” She shook her head and grinned up at him, pushing back the arousal so she could focus. “I left the car near the woods and snuck up slowly, watching for any lookouts, but he’d planned the meet up too quickly. It was just him and the other guy, their two cars parked out front.” Camille licked her lips and leaned forward on the table, running her fingers up and down the stem of her wine glass.

  He groaned. “Keep going.”

  “The door was cracked open and I barely had to move it to get inside, and I could hear them laughing. When I stepped onto the main floor I could see them standing around a table and so I snuck along the wall behind some old equipment until I was close enough.”

  “Tell me what you did, doll face.” The low growl in Mateo’s voice had her body humming and she loved the way he reacted to her, to who she was and what she did. There wasn’t an ounce of fear in him, no disgust, no condemnation. He was proud of her, and no one had been proud of her in too many years.

  “I shot his friend first, clean through the chest, and he went down hard. The Russian turned around and pulled his gun, but I ducked out of the way when he fired. So… I shot him in the leg, and I don’t speak Russian but I have a feeling he wasn’t saying very nice things.” She grinned and Mateo met her eyes before he shoved back from the table.

  “Come here.” He patted his lap and she stood and walked over, obeying because she felt like it, and whenever she did what he said, the rewards were always wonderful. Although disobeying had its fun too. When she didn’t immediately sit down he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her onto his lap, her thighs parting around his strong body, and his hard cock was unmistakable against her core. “Keep talking.”

  “He lifted the gun to shoot me again, so I shot his gun arm and he dropped it.” Her breath caught as he leaned forward to kiss across her collarbone, his hands brushing over her hips and waist.

  “Keep talking, Camille, or I’m going to stop touching you.”

  “Asshole,” she grumbled, and he reached up to tweak her nipple hard. She yelped, but the rush that followed was anything but unpleasant. “Fuck, fine! I moved in close to finish him off, but -”

  “Why did you get close to him? You knew he was bigger than you could handle.” Mateo grabbed the bottom of her shirt and tore it over her head, but she growled and grabbed his hand when he went
to move it towards her breast.

  “I handled him just fine.”

  “Really? What’s this?” He pressed his knuckles into the deep bruise over her ribs and she had to grit her teeth against the urge to groan in pain.

  “Okay, so he got a hit in.”

  Mateo snapped her head back by her hair. “You’re smarter than this. You know not to let a guy that big get his hands on you. Why didn’t you just kill him?”

  “I wanted to get the money for Nighthawk.” She hissed between her teeth as his fist tightened in her hair, causing the tender ache to spread until she felt her clit pulsing as she rocked her hips against him. He stilled her hips with a hard grip.

  “He said he didn’t care about the money.”

  “It took me two weeks longer than I thought it would to go and take him out. I wanted to return with more than just a kill.” She smiled slowly and leaned forward, increasing the strain on her hair. “And I got it.”

  He grinned, relaxing his grip to run both of his hands up her ribs. With a quick flick of his wrist her bra was off and his eyes flashed as her breasts came into view. “Tell me how.”

  Camille gasped as his mouth captured one of her nipples, teasing her with his tongue before tormenting her with small bites. “You’re making it really hard to concentrate.”

  “Trust me, you’re the one making this hard.” He laughed low and then thrust his hips up, rubbing his hard cock against her through the layers of fabric separating them. “Come on, tell me.”

  “Fuck… okay! He kicked me in the ribs with his good leg, but it put him off balance because the other leg still had the bullet in it so I kicked him in the knee and he went down like a ton of bricks.” She smiled as Mateo let out a low moan against her breast, nibbling and sending little zings of pleasure to nestle in the heat between her thighs. “Once he was on the ground I trained the gun on him and told him to tell me where the money was that he owed Nighthawk.”

  Mateo shifted her closer to him, starting to rub against her in earnest, and all she wanted was for him to fuck her – but he loved to drag shit out. He wanted to hear her beg, and she wasn’t ready for that yet. If she got her way, he’d throw her over his shoulder and take her upstairs to finish this properly.