by Sam Mariano
Francesca comes over to see what all the fuss is about. “Ooh, those are nice. My brother does very well in the gift department.”
“He does very well in all the departments,” I state.
Mia and Francesca exchange a look, then Mia uses her index finger to make circles around her temple, indicating I’m crazy. I just grin, because they don’t even know.
The kitchen seems abnormally busy with all of us in here. It takes until the salads are ready to go out for me to really get it.
Mia pauses by me as she grabs Vince’s salad. “Don’t forget Mateo’s dried cranberries. He’ll send you back in.”
Rolling my eyes, I say, “I know, it’s happened before.”
“Oh, right, you don’t just serve on Sundays. Sorry, I was never a maid, I forget these things.”
“Wait, I’m taking him his salad? I usually stay in the kitchen throughout most of Sunday night dinners.”
Mia’s eyes move pointedly over my outfit and linger on my shoes. “He wouldn’t have given you a Sunday night dinner outfit if he expected you to stay in the kitchen.”
Still a little uncertain, I grab his salad plate and take it out. I watch Mia hand Vince his and put one down for herself, taking a seat. As I approach Mateo’s back, I feel all warm and fuzzy, just seeing him. God, what a sap.
I grin at my own thoughts as I lean down and drop off Mateo’s salad. Then, because I’m still unclear, I lean closer to whisper, “Mia thinks I’m staying for dinner?”
He nods, indicating the empty seat on his right, directly across from Mia.
I was not prepared for that, so I have to go back to the kitchen and grab a salad for myself. I flash Cherie a somewhat apologetic look, but she doesn’t seem to care.
It feels weird to take a seat at the table—not even just at the table, but during Sunday night dinner. Mateo’s very attached to his Sunday night dinners, from what I’ve gathered.
“I love your dress. It’s so vintage,” Mia tells me, taking a sip of her wine. Is she old enough to drink? I don’t think so. I never thought about it before. Oh well.
“Thank you,” I say, glancing at Mateo.
Completely taking me off-guard, he reaches across the table and caresses my hand. Right there, in front of his whole family. Mia blinks at the gesture, then gives me a girly, wide-eyed look that makes me smile.
I mean, it’s not like it’s a big secret we’re sleeping together, but one thing is fucking the maid, another is bringing her to family dinner.
“Adrian,” Mateo says, nodding at the man opposite him at the foot of the table. “Did you ever hear back about Castellanos?”
I freeze. The color draining from my face feels like a physical thing as I stare at the tablecloth, Mateo’s hand still laced with mine.
“Uh… you wanna talk about that now?” Adrian asks, not sounding terribly comfortable with the idea.
“Why not? We’re all friends here.”
The way he says it sends chills down my back. I can feel his eyes on me, and if he’s looking at me and talking about Castellanos, I’m terrified I know why.
He can’t know, right?
No. No, I would know. He’s not that good a liar. He wouldn’t still be doing cute things and inviting me to family dinner if he knew that.
Francesca is the first to speak up. “Castellanos? I thought you guys were okay.”
“Yeah, we were. We’re not anymore.”
“I thought—” Francesca pauses, taking a sip of her wine. “I thought—”
“Like I said,” he interrupts. “We’re not anymore.”
I’ve had a minute to get myself under control, but I still can’t look at him. Instead, I take a drink of my wine, glancing at our damn hands, still entwined.
“That sounds dangerous,” Francesca says.
“It is,” he verifies.
“Are you…planning anything?”
“Of course. He’s left me with no other option.”
Francesca is on my side of the table, so it’s not a subtle thing, craning to look at her, but the dread on her pretty face nourishes the fear growing in mine. “Can’t we just renegotiate?” she asks.
“Antonio doesn’t want to negotiate, he wants to take over. His family doesn’t, but he’s trying to turn them, framing me for shit I didn’t even do. This is beyond negotiation.”
Francesca drops her fork, shoving her plate away from her. “People are going to get hurt.”
“Of course they are,” he says evenly.
Her eyes flash. “You could get hurt. You’re not invincible.”
“I’m not exactly on the front lines, Francesca.”
Vince takes a drink and slams it down a little more forcefully than he needs to. Cutting Mateo a pointed glare, he says, “Speaking as someone who is, I think maybe this isn’t where we fucking discuss this.”
“Seconded,” Adrian says, like it’s a democracy.
Mateo doesn’t push, though. I get the impression he’s accomplished whatever he set out to, and as he drops my hand to take a drink, I’m more than a little afraid of what that was.
---
Since Mateo rained havoc down upon the dinner table, my first Sunday night dinner is not what I would call a success.
Mia and Elise, having heard their respective love interests may be on the front lines of Mateo’s war, are not talkative in the least. Francesca, apparently worried over the danger her entire family will be in, borders on hostile the entire time. I avoid Mateo’s gaze far more frequently than is standard, and even though I can feel myself being abnormal, I don’t know how to stop it.
The men don’t talk a lot, so it’s a mostly solemn meal.
After it’s over, Mateo gives Mia a present. I can’t help thinking he should’ve done it prior to dinner, so she would’ve been more excited over the cute brown leather messenger bag he got her for her first semester of college—though even after dinner, she’s quite relieved by the envelope of cash he stuck inside for her textbooks.
After everyone leaves, Mateo takes me to his room. I’m pensive the whole way there.
There’s tension in my shoulders, and as if he knows that, Mateo moves behind me, his strong hands kneading the muscles. As his hands relax me, he drops a kiss along the nape of my neck, then drags those perfect lips across my skin, leaving kisses at every stop. My head lolls to the side and I bring my hand behind his head, urging him closer.
So slowly that I ache with impatience, he tugs down the zipper of my dress, sliding the fabric down until my back is bare to him, but for the red lacy bra he bought me.
“I like red on you,” he murmurs, his lips brushing across my shoulder blade.
“Is it your favorite color?” I ask.
“No. Gold is, but any color that’s stretched across your breasts has my attention.”
“Blue’s my favorite, in case you were wondering,” I tell him.
“I was losing sleep wondering.” Firmly grasping my shoulder, he turns me to face him. I search his face for some sign of preoccupation, but he seems singularly focused on me.
“Are Sunday night dinners usually like that?” I ask.
Releasing a drawn-out sigh, he shakes his head. “Not usually, no. I don’t like to talk business at dinner. Typically, I like to keep the women out of it altogether.”
“Well, I’ve never known you to do anything by accident,” I remark with a little smile as I loosen his tie.
“No,” he replies, pensive. “I have a leak.”
My heart misses a beat, but I try to remain calm as I tug his tie over his head and drop it onto the floor. “A leak?”
“Somebody’s been in contact with the other family—Castellanos himself, maybe.”
A vision of Antonio Castellanos standing in my doorway flashes to mind. “Someone in your family?”
“Someone at that table.”
It’s a subtle correction, but it gets my heart pumping all the same.
I’m not a part of his family, but I was at that table.
He made sure I was at that table.
“Can’t you just—” I pause, looking for a more delicate way to word it, but my mind is too scattered right now to come up with anything. “Can’t you take him out?”
Mateo’s eyebrows rise in surprise, and a helpless smile crosses his lips. “Listen to you, all bloodthirsty. You wanna issue the hit?”
I roll my eyes, turning my attention to unbuttoning his shirt, but sweating at how unsteady my fingers are. “I’m just saying. If the guy’s a threat to you, if he wants you dead, maybe… I mean, it’s kill or be killed, so kill him. I just don’t want anything to happen to you.”
“You’ve sure changed your tune since we first met,” he says lightly.
I look up at him, not knowing what he knows, not knowing how he’d react if I told him, but looking at him now, I want to. I want to come clean, tell him Castellanos sent me that first night, that I had no choice. Surely he’ll understand that. He regularly traps people into doing things in the same way Castellanos trapped me; if anyone in the world could understand the pressure I was under to do it, it would be him.
What stops me from spilling the secret I loathe keeping is Beth Parsons.
Years before I stood in this bedroom, helping Mateo Morelli undress for bed, another woman did the same thing. A woman he loved. A woman who gave him a child.
It’s common knowledge that he killed her, but there was never a body and he made just enough of a trail to make it look like she ran away. The manufactured trail was enough to keep him out of criminal court, but the verdict was read many times over in the court of public opinion—he killed her. And while there are various unverified explanations as to why, each motive has the same root—she betrayed him.
Mateo Morelli is not a man you betray. Despite the pardon he gave me, Mateo did not become the wealthiest, most feared mob boss in Chicago by being merciful.
I may not be afraid of him in a general sense, but I’m not foolish enough to think I’m more special to him than a woman he was with for years—and she’s dead.
“Could I ask you an uncomfortable question?” I ask, not meeting his gaze as I peel his dress shirt off.
“Sure.” His tone is steady, but my stomach still roils with nervousness.
I take a breath without meaning to—I should be more careful, but I don’t know if I’m allowed to ask about this, and I don’t know how he’ll respond when I do. Finally, I meet his gaze, despite the shaky feeling it gives me, because I have to be able to watch his reaction. “What happened with Beth?”
His eyes widen slightly in genuine surprise, and though it’s a subtle shift, he takes a step back, away from me. My insides wilt with dread. My mind flies back over the exact words we’ve just spoken, but I can’t separate them from the thoughts flying through my head. This probably wasn’t the most subtle time to ask about the woman before me if he’s suspecting me of treachery.
I don’t know what to expect as he moves away from me, turning his back to me. He remains wordless and crosses the room, picking up a small golden box from atop his dresser. My eyes widen a little, horrifying thoughts flying through my mind—does he keep a memento in a box in his room? A trophy?
“I don’t usually answer that question,” he states, holding onto the box as his eyes move over my body. The dress was abandoned in a pool by our feet already, so I’m wearing only the bra and panties. I swallow, because his perusal isn’t warm, but I can’t put a finger on exactly what it is.
Forcing a shrug, I say, “I understand if you don’t want to. I just… wondered.”
“Understandable,” he says, inclining his head.
My eyes lock on the box in his hands, but I’m starting to feel a little ill. “There’s not, like, a finger in there, right?”
Soberly, he shakes his head. “Not the whole thing.” I must blanch, because a short laugh escapes him. “It was a joke—no body parts, I promise.”
I exhale a breath of relief, while trying to roll my eyes like I never believed him anyway.
The amusement fades, and he’s left staring at the box, pensive once more. Finally, he speaks, his tone controlled. “I don’t think I make my expectations of people unclear. I expect loyalty in all regards. It’s not an easy thing, loving a Morelli, and I understand that. I do. Generations of women have tried and failed. The problem with that is… leaving isn’t an option. If you choose a life with one of us, that’s it. No take-backs.”
I nod, swallowing hard. I try to be realistic in all matters, but there are certain myths about Mateo I don’t want to believe, this one especially. I’m not psyched about the possibility that he trafficks human beings, though Maria’s position in his house for the past 20 years doesn’t lend much hope to that one being entirely false. Whatever crimes he commits in this city, I can ignore them if I’m not seeing them. I needed to know he hadn’t hurt Mia, and she assured me he hadn’t. But this one, that he’s capable of killing his own lover? More than anything, I want Mateo to tell me what everyone believes in regards to Beth is wrong, that he simply let her go and gave her a new life for her own protection.
It does not sound like that’s where this is heading.
Cracking open the intricately designed golden chest, he draws out a necklace, an antique-looking gold locket. “I didn’t meet Beth the way I met you, or the way Vince met Mia, or… the usual way.” Glancing up at me, he adds, “Historically speaking, more women end up Morellis your way. But I met Beth out in the world. I was in a bar I’d recently acquired and she was there with her girlfriends. She caught my eye, I caught hers.” Looking from the necklace, he meets my eyes. “I met her much the same way I met you, only without the hidden motive of her wanting to kill me.”
I grimace, glancing at the necklace. I’m down a point? Great.
“Anyway, we fell in love the usual way, but I had…reservations about her level of commitment. I explained to her that if she wasn’t ready for it, we should go our separate ways. I told her that once you opt in, there’s no opting back out later if you change your mind—especially with me. I told her that.” Dangling the necklace closer to me, he says, “This belonged to my father’s wives. Belle was his first wife. My mother was Jocelyn. His first wife never loved him, but he fell in love with her. I guess that kind of rejection every day of his life… well, he got mean. My mother was much softer, much more docile, so he used her as a salve. The day I offered this necklace to Beth, I told her the story of Belle. I told her that despite her lack of love, my father expected her loyalty.” His gaze hardens on mine, not mean, just… guarded. “You never have to love us, but loyalty is a given regardless.”
I nod my understanding, though it makes my stomach feel entirely hollow.
“I gave her a choice, something my father never did. I thought it might change the end result.” Dropping the necklace into his other hand, he stares at it. “Some men might offer rings laden with promises. I offered this necklace, to hang around her neck as a reminder—a warning.”
The hairs on the back of my neck stand up, and I can’t look at him, so I look at the necklace instead.
His hand closes around it, clenching into a fist. “She didn’t heed it.” He watches me until I look at him, and I can see this is where he’s taking a stand. He may have allowed me assurances about Mia, he may have threatened me into this life with water instead of gasoline, but here he offers no apologies. Whatever he’s about to tell me, he isn’t sorry for it, and he wants me to know that.
“Beth chose me, she chose this life, and she fell short. She cheated on me, she betrayed me, and she tried to put me behind bars.”
There’s a finality in the last words of that statement, but I don’t want to infer. “So you killed her?” I ask quietly.
His eyes are like a hawk’s, trained on me, waiting for a reaction. Then he gives me a slow, wordless nod.
It’s what I was expecting, but it still knocks the breath out of me—visibly. My body isn’t concerned with his feelings, and I buckle internally, though I r
emain on my feet somehow. I can’t hold his gaze, the fear I never feel for him suddenly sweeping over me with this reality check.
Of two things, I’m now certain—one: if Mateo ever finds out the truth about me, I’m dead; and two: he needs to kill Antonio Castellanos, not just for his own safety, but for mine.
Neither of us speaks for a long time. Mateo is watchful, noting every hitch of my breath, every movement of my eyes as I look anywhere but at him. Me, I feel a little like I’ve been dancing in a ballroom on the Titanic, and all of a sudden it just rammed into an iceberg.
Only instead of a physical wall, I’m hurled against the gates guarding Mateo Morelli, keeping him safe from the world, and perhaps, us safe from him.
He extends his hand, eyes never moving from mine. My gaze flits to his hand, to the gold necklace pooled there, then back to his eyes. I can’t read them, and that makes more nervous than I already am.
“You can have it, if you want.”
I feel my eyes widen, though I don’t intend it. The last thing I want to do is look alarmed, but as he offers this necklace—this warning—I feel a little like I might throw up.
I swallow. “You want me to have Beth’s necklace?”
“If you want it.”
After what he just told me, I’m not so sure I do. I can’t really say that, so I offer a tentatively bashful smile. “I’m just your maid.”
“You don’t have to be,” he says simply.
I stare at it longer than he would probably like after such a telling offer. “So, just to review—every woman who’s ever worn this necklace is dead.”
“Correct.”
A fleeting desperation bursts out of me. “I don’t want to die.”
“Don’t betray me and you won’t,” he states, like it’s simple.
“I never would,” I whisper, because it’s true.
“Good.”
Neither of us moves, him still offering me the necklace, me still afraid to take it. A gift of jewelry is supposed to be a nice thing, but all I can think about are the phantom blood stains it’ll leave around my neck.
