by Daphne Dawn
“I never considered the Senator was dirty. I never thought about my targets…until you. I fell in love. With all of you.”
I can’t look up now. My eyes are riveted on my lap. I turn and twist the silk handkerchief between my fingers.
“I told him nothing. Even when he had a gun to my head, or strapped a bomb to me, I never told him a word, do you hear me?”
The boys won’t speak. Franco is looking out the window. Marco is watching the road, glancing furiously at me through the rear view with icy eyes. Antonio just stares at me, his big eyes drinking me in like I’m one of his paintings.
As if a painting could come alive and slap him.
I’m so miserable now.
I hunch down in the seat and cry quietly to myself.
The handkerchief is ruined. So is my dress that I put on with such happy expectation.
I expected to get thrashed tonight…in a completely different manner.
Everything is fucked. It keeps getting more fucked up by the minute.
I have no hope that I’ll glory in the bodies of these beautiful men again. I can feel how they’ve closed their souls to me.
It’s clear by the fact that they’re having trouble looking at me. Just days ago, they couldn’t take their eyes off me. All my worst fears have come true.
I lost the boys. I lost them because I lied, because I’m a filthy damned liar who doesn’t know her own heart. No one would ever want me…
How could they? There’s damaged goods, then there’s me. Beyond damaged.
Trash.
Too tired to even cry, I sink back against the seat and watch the lights flickering by the windows. I wish one of them would touch me, but they don’t. The car seat is so small, it must be quite difficult, but they don’t even brush up against me.
No one wants to touch poison.
54
Antonio
We’re gathered in the main office, sitting comfortably with coffee and trying to make sense of everything we’ve just learned. Sofia is asleep in her room.
We don’t know what to do with her yet.
“I think this is exactly what we’ve been afraid of all along.”
Marco sips his fancy coffee, leaning over the desk for emphasis.
“Papa always warned us about emotional attachments. Beautiful women who seem too good to be true. This could damage everything we’ve been working towards.”
“I have to agree,” Franco says painfully, his face twisted with grief. “Whatever she knows, I don’t think we can trust her. Okay, so she says she’s come clean now. But how do we even know that? She might be playing a game we don’t even know about. This might all be some kind of setup.”
“It’s easy to say these things,” I say very softly, “but you’re speaking as if this is some penny whore we’ve picked up off the street. It’s not. It’s Sofia.”
We all go quiet for a moment, staring into our coffee. I can’t tell what they’re thinking, but I can guess. My personal memory goes back to the art studio, of course.
No wonder I couldn’t paint the real Sofia.
I’ve never seen her.
“I don’t like the idea of just letting her go,” Franco speaks quietly. “Where would she go?”
I can’t tell if he cares or if he is just trying to figure out her loyalties.
“She won’t go back to the Senator, don’t be a fool.” I can feel myself getting angry.
“He just tried to kill her!”
“She’s a viper, Antonio,” Marco looks at me compassionately, like I’m a child. “She could just go back to anyplace that has been warm to her. With nowhere to go, she could run straight back to him.”
“What if she’s telling the truth?”
I can’t help it. I must speak my mind.
Quiet little Tony is going to have his say at the table for once.
“Did you see her tears? Did you feel her sorrow?”
Franco blinks and looks away. He can’t look at me as he speaks.
“She’s so very charismatic,” Franco whispers, “but that only works against her. It had us all chasing after her as if she was a siren. We didn’t see the danger.”
“You’re right, Franco,” Marco sips his coffee again.
I don’t think his fancy beans are giving him any comfort this morning.
“She’s hidden her true intentions well. But none of us can refute the fact that she has organized the gala almost singlehandedly. She has everything planned out to the littlest detail. She’s smart. She works fast. She’s a problem solver. She could be a tremendous asset to the business. I certainly couldn’t have done so good of a job, and I would have had to hire three people to do it.”
“She’s beautiful,” Franco whispers, looking out the window.
“She’s incredible,” I say.
I can’t keep the emotion out of my voice. I don’t really care what the others decide.
I’m not leaving her. If they decide to kick her out or have her killed—I’m going with her. I’ve never seen such pain as I saw in the corvette when she broke down.
I can’t live knowing she’s in so much pain—that I’ve caused her pain.
Franco sighs, tortured by his own memories.
“Look—we all have strong feelings for her. That’s obvious. But we’re trying to make a decision here for the business. For everything we’ve worked for. If we send her away, and we don’t trust her, it’s just leaving an open door for her to completely destroy everything.”
“Agreed.” Marco nods. “We can’t just let her walk away, or throw her out in fury. We don’t know how much she knows.”
“The issue is trust.”
I don’t look at either of them. I look over their heads somewhere.
I’m thinking about painting. Doing a new portrait of Sofia, the real Sofia.
Now I’ve seen her pain, I can paint it into her eyes.
The image will live with the full glamour of her soul.
“Do we trust her? Do we trust ourselves?”
I look at both my brothers now. I firmly imprint upon them with my gaze where my choice lies. I think they want to make the same choice, but they’re just angry. Upset about being lied to. Used. It’s a useless male dominance trait.
I have no use for it.
“Whatever we decide, we have to do it soon,” Marco says, checking his diary.
“Everything’s coming together soon. We can’t have any issues.”
I think about Sofia, and I think about her pain. I can’t believe my brothers aren’t thinking the same thing as me. Maybe they are, but they just can’t admit it.
“What about the Senator?”
Marco and Franco turn to me immediately.
“What about him?” Franco says. He has that look he gets when he’s about to fuck off and put five grand into a card game somewhere.
“He’s the one we have to get. He’s the real danger to us.”
“And he hurt Sofia,” Marco says quietly. “Really hurt her.”
“Yeah, he’s a scumbag, alright. Do we have a positive ID yet?”
“No,” I answer. “But as soon as Sofia wakes up, I’m going to talk to her.”
Marco reaches for one of Papa’s cigars.
He’s too fit to actually light it, but he twirls it in his fingers and smells it.
“Yes. We’ll get rid of that son of a bitch for sure. He’s the real danger. And then if we decide we can’t live with Sofia, at least she won’t be able to resume working for him.”
I nod slowly.
I only need a few details, and I can find this man.
I want this job. I don’t want to pass it to a hitman.
I want the satisfaction of finishing off Sofia’s torturer all to myself.
55
Sofia
Tears run down my face, and I feel like such a fucking idiot.
I definitely don’t feel like the badass agent I’m meant to be at the moment. I knew my damn charade would come back and bit
e me in the ass. And it has.
I slam the fucking car door after I get out. I don’t say a damn word to any of the guys and run straight into the house and up to the room where I’ve been staying.
It’s late, and suddenly, I feel exhausted.
The bed looks so inviting, and I vow to only rest for a few minutes.
When I wake again, the whole ugly truth comes back to me. What the fuck am I still doing here?
I need to get out.
It takes me less than ten minutes to pack my bag. I can’t believe I fell asleep and didn’t make a quick getaway.
I pick up the bag and start downstairs so I can get the hell out of this place. I want to put it as far behind me, as fast as I can.
But I hear something, a noise of some kind.
I can’t describe it, but it’s pretty fucking loud.
I drop my bag on the floor at the bottom of the stairs in the foyer and follow the sound. I’m not sure what kind of a noise it is, but I’m not leaving until I figure it out.
My insides tell me it’s not a good noise.
I follow the sound down the hallway leading to the kitchen. As I get closer to the noise, it gets louder and louder, so I know I’m heading in the right direction.
The closer I get to it, the more I realize it’s a beeping noise.
Like one of those fucking alarm clocks that doesn’t have the music option.
I find the noise in the closet where the furnace is located off of the kitchen in the back of the house. As my eyes find the source, I suck in my breath.
What the fuck?
The noise is coming from a bomb.
What a fucking perfect spot to place one, right where the gas line comes into the house. I have two minutes to deactivate the bomb.
I sprint back to my bag and look for my pocketknife.
I haven’t seen a bomb like this one before.
Then again, I haven’t deactivated very many bombs as an agent.
I look at the wires and try to figure out which one I should cut. There are six different ones in four different colors. The bomb’s ticking makes me even more nervous than I already am.
I sure as hell don’t want to screw this up.
I carefully move the wires around to see where each is connected. With two seconds left, I clip the only yellow wire. At the same time, the numbers on the timer and the noise on the bomb stop.
I’m so fucking relieved.
I lie down on the floor and relax. I thought I was going to piss my pants. Of course, if I hadn’t gotten the right wire, it wouldn’t have mattered.
“Are you all right?” a man’s voice asks behind me.
“I just fucking deactivated a bomb,” I say.
I sit up on the hardwood floor and see Marco standing in front of me.
“What do you mean you just fucking deactivated a bomb?” he asked me.
He has a puzzled look on his face.
“Just what I said.”
I give him a what the fuck do you think I said look. I can tell Marco is confused.
“I mean, we’ve already defused one bomb that was on me back at the warehouse.”
He’s still just standing there.
“I was upstairs packing, and I heard a noise. When I got downstairs. I tracked it down to this closet. I deactivated it just as you got here.”
Marco helps me up off the floor and gives me a hug.
“I’m so fucking glad you’re okay.”
“I know who planted the fucking bomb, Marco.”
I don’t give him a chance to do anything else.
“Who?” The puzzled look on his face has disappeared.
“No one is going to fuck with me anymore. I have a plan, and I’m going to take care of the person who did this.”
I pick up the bomb and take it to the kitchen.
“So what do you plan to do with it?”
He looks at me.
“Remember the senator I told you about? He’s the one who did this. He’s the one who tried to blow up your house.”
Marco just stares at me, so I continue.
“I know he has buildings here in the area. There’s one building that’s a casino and hotel complex. It hasn’t been finished yet, but it’ll be the best fucking place. It’ll get rid of the bomb and I’ll get even with the senator at the same time.”
The more I think about this fucking situation, the madder I get. The senator will fucking pay for what he tried to do to me and what he just tried to do to the Monatello brothers.
“So what’s your plan?” Marco brings me back to our chat.
“I’m going to take this fucking bomb and put it in that complex. There shouldn’t be anyone there, because it’s still in the process of being built.”
“And what’s the purpose of that?” Marco asks, his brows deeply furrowed.
“You have to fucking ask?” I can tell he’s still not following me.
Marco gives me a blank stare.
“I don’t want to hurt anyone. Not like the senator tried to do to me. I only want to make my point. I want to destroy something of his. Something he’s building to destroy others people’s lives.”
“Oh, I fucking get it now.” Marco nods his head. “But I still think you should blow that bastard up for what he tried to do to you.”
“But that’s not me. I may be this badass agent, but I try not to kill people. I don’t like killing people if I don’t have to. Destroying their shit is a different story.”
“I like your fucking style,” Marcos says. He smiles at me. “That’s the best way to get even with someone who has fucked with you.”
I smile back at him. “Now let’s go get this bastard.”
“Wait a minute. I think we need to let the other guys in on it, too. After all, we know what’s going on, and we like nothing more than to see this bastard get what he deserves, just like you.”
“I prefer for this to stay just between you and me. I don’t want anyone else to know what’s going on.”
“I really don’t think that’s an option. We’re all in this together.”
He gives me this shit-eating grin.
And all I can do is nod.
56
Antonio
Sofia looks amazing in the flickering shadows at the back of the limo. We’re on our way home to the mansion. The gala was a great success, even though we spent the whole time answering questions.
The senator had been arrested before we even served dessert. We only heard about it though; he didn’t dare show his face at our gala dinner.
The silver of Sofia’s gown twinkles against the soft light. As we pass under the street lamps, her earrings glint. They’re almost as beautiful as her smile.
She’s sitting between Marco and Franco, leaning against Marco and teasing his ear and neck with her lips and teeth. Franco is stroking her tits, gently easing the strap of her dress off her shoulder, so they pop free. He immediately goes for her nipple.
I watch her rock her head back and gasp, her hand sliding down into Marco’s pants. As she leans back, her legs part just a little. I can’t resist an invitation like that.
I slide forward to my knees and touch her legs softly, savoring her smooth skin through the white stockings. I slide my hands up to the bare skin of her thighs.
She moans, Franco working both breasts now with his hands and tongue. Marco groans as her fingers free his cock from his pants.
I glide my hands down under the dress and grab her ass. She slides forward, opening her legs further for me.
As I slide my lips over her pussy, I can feel she’s already wet. I lap at her clit slowly and gently, hearing her moan. Then, I bring one hand up to slide two fingers into her pussy.
Marco is starting to gasp as she works him with her right hand. Franco is pulling the beautiful dress off both shoulders, kissing her tits and caressing her nipples.
As she rocks under them with pleasure, I lick her clit firmly, pushing my fingers in. I watch her face as I do, my thumb
replacing my tongue. Her eyes roll to the back of her head, and she smiles.
I push harder with my fingers, gasping as she pushes back against me.
I pull my hand out, then slide both along her thighs again. I go deep with my lips and tongue, licking her cunt slowly and gently. She tastes so amazing.
I’m so hard now. I want her badly, but we’re almost home. I draw out the pleasure for me and for her, lapping again at the deep slit, feeling her getting wetter as Franco keeps plays with her tits, and Marco comes, her right hand jerking his cock.
The limo rolls to a stop, and we get out slowly. Sofia walks towards the door with her gown hanging around her waist. Franco had slipped off both shoulder straps while he was eating her tits.
No bra, no panties. The silky white stockings are her only underclothes.
She goes through the door, turning back to make sure we follow. She heads straight for the big lounge room with its comfortable leather couch. She leans down to pull off her stilettos, and I come up behind her, gripping her hips and rubbing my cock against her ass.
She laughs, grinding back against me. Franco walks around us, taking a seat on the lounge in front of her and opening his pants. His cock is throbbing, and Sofia swallows it whole.
I draw the dress up until it’s scrunched around her waist, bearing her ass to the room. The white lace-top stockings look amazing against her white skin, and her pussy is wet, pink and waiting for me.
Marco comes in and sits down next to Franco, watching with a smile.
I drop my pants and grip her hips. I guide my cock into her, and she moans around Franco’s cock, spreading wide for me. I slide into her tight, wet pussy, feeling her hot muscles grip me.
I stroke slowly, then faster and harder, slapping our bodies together. Franco reaches for her head and slams her lips down on his cock. I can tell by his moans he’s coming down her throat.
I grip her ass cheeks and thrust hard and fast. One hand grips her shoulder as I fuck her as hard as I can.
Vivaldi is playing in my head. The entire orchestra is building to a memorable crescendo finish.
