by Kiera Silver
It was after eleven, but Armo was certain that Larenz would still be at the club. Dante would have gone home a few hours ago, not wanting to leave Lily alone for too long, especially now. He hated to do it, but he needed Dante’s advice too, so he sent his brother a text before he started the car and headed toward the club.
He didn’t bother to see if Larenz was still at Boulevard 3, because that was almost always where he was on a nightly basis. It had been the same for himself and Dante, before they had gotten involved with the women in their lives. After Katie had disappeared, and he had accepted that she wasn’t coming back, he’d fallen into the habit of returning to the club and staying late each night again.
Now, he’d have to make an effort to be home sooner and spend more time there. For Lucas, of course. The decision had nothing to do with Katie. She was only a body to him now, something to satisfy his desire and work off his need for revenge.
If that was the case, why wasn’t he buried balls’ deep in her pussy right now instead of leaving her lying there to stew in her own humiliation? If he probed too deeply, he’d have to admit to himself that he had pulled away not because he wanted to torture her as she probably imagined, but because he hadn’t liked hearing her beg for anything. It had sickened him to see the naked vulnerability in her expression, coupled with the self-loathing in her eyes. He’d realized he was pushing her to the point where she might not come back, and it had forced him to walk away.
That disturbed him, because if he couldn’t stand to punish her, what was the point of keeping her? That was why he needed his brothers’ counsel, hoping they could help him decide on a sensible path.
When he stopped in front of the club, one of the valets came out to take his keys, and he nodded his thanks before slipping inside the glamorous club located in the heart of downtown. They had spent a considerable amount of time and money on perfecting the interior. It was luxurious, but still energetic, without being over-the-top tacky. There wasn’t a disco ball in sight, and he was proud of their endeavor. Until Katie, and now Lucas, the club had been one of the best parts of his life.
Now, it felt hollow and empty as he crossed the main floor and headed down the hallway to their private office. They shared the workspace, and he let himself in without knocking, throwing himself across the leather sofa.
Larenz had been standing at the tinted glass wall that looked out into the VIP room behind their office space on the other side of the building. He appeared to be studying the dancers on the floor with an enigmatic expression. He was certainly not playing Peeping Tom, of that Armo could be sure. More likely, Larenz was just surveying the partygoers and revelers while calculating in his head the amount of money tonight’s business would add to the Moretti coffers.
Unlike most of the Moretti empire, this business was strictly above board. Mostly anyway. Some of the dancers in the VIP room had been rescued from the skin trade, so they didn’t have proper identification to work legally, but it was mostly a respectable establishment. The three brothers had pooled their time, talents, and resources to make it all happen without their father’s influence or assistance.
Larenz walked away from the glass wall across the room to sit in an armchair arranged near the sofa. “How was your trip? Did you and Peretti come to an agreement about working together?”
Armo nodded. “It was all smooth sailing, except I saw a familiar face.”
“Oh, who was that?”
“Katie Collins.”
Larenz stiffened for a moment before relaxing against the chair again. “I see. How did that make you feel?”
“‘How did that make you feel?’” mimicked Armo in a falsetto voice. “What kind of fucking question is that? It made me feel angry, of course.”
“Rightfully so. She disappeared without a trace. At least now you know, and you can move on. Did you deal with her?”
“Deal with whom?” asked Dante as he stepped through the door and closed it behind himself. He’d clearly been prepared for bed, judging from the fact he wore jogging pants and a hoodie instead of the suit he would have worn earlier in the day.
“Katie Collins,” said Armo as he eyed the bar nearby. Getting stinking drunk wouldn’t solve his problems, but it might make him feel temporarily better. With a deep sigh, he heaved himself to his feet and went to fetch a bottle and three glasses, which he set carefully on the coffee table as Dante took half of the couch he had just been lounging on. He took the other half and poured himself a double, tossing it back before pouring another drink that he intended to sip more slowly.
“I was going ask how it went, but I guess it was bad, huh?” asked Dante with sympathy in his expression.
Armo nodded as the pleasant burn of alcohol made its way down his esophagus. “She has a kid.”
“That was fast,” said Larenz in a neutral tone.
“My kid.” He looked at both of his brothers in turn, making sure they had understood what he said. “Not only did she run away when I was trying to protect her from Parsing, but she took my kid with her.”
“Where is she now?” asked Dante.
“Hopefully six feet under. That’s how you should have dealt with her.”
Armo glared at his oldest brother, who was thirty-nine minutes his elder. “Don’t be stupid. I can’t kill her. My son is still nursing, and he needs her.”
Larenz leaned forward, stretching to reach the bottle of whiskey to pour himself a generous serving before he spoke. “Your son needs her, or you need her?”
Armo glared at him, but didn’t answer, not just because his brother was prying, because he had virtually invited him to do so by arranging this meeting. Mostly, it was because he didn’t know the answer himself.
“A boy? Congratulations, Armo. Here we thought I was going to be the first one to be a dad.” The impending arrival of Dante’s daughter had been one of the main topics of conversation over the last few months since Lily had announced her pregnancy six weeks after their lavish wedding.
“I don’t see what the problem is. Get rid of her and hire a nanny. Easy peasy, as Sophia would say.”
“It’s not that easy.”
Larenz arched a brow. “I don’t see the conflict. She betrayed you, and she did one of the lowest things a woman can do by taking your kid from you. If you hadn’t discovered the boy, would she have ever told you about him?” At Armo’s reluctant shake of his head, he added, “There you go. She saw you do something that could have vast ramifications for you if she ever decided to open her mouth, and she fucked you over. Get rid of her.”
Dante rolled his eyes. “Larenz can be so pragmatic about it because he’s never felt anything for a woman besides desire. He doesn’t understand how you can love someone, even if you’re conflicted about it. I think it’s obvious that you still care about her, and I’ll bet she still cares about you. You should try to put aside all the anger and the bitterness, encourage her to do the same, and see if you can work things out. You used to be happy, and I bet you could be again.”
Armo looked at both of them, not having a reply for either brother.
Fortunately, Larenz suffered from no such constraint. He laughed heartily. “When did you become such a fucking romantic, Dante? Does Lily keep your balls in a jar on the nightstand?”
“Fuck you.” Dante sounded mostly good-natured. “Lily can keep my balls wherever she wants, but she prefers to keep them in her mouth.”
Armo grimaced. “I don’t need to hear those things about you and my sister-in-law.”
Larenz laughed again. “What, you thought little Rebecca-to-be was an immaculate conception? I suppose your son was also conceived immaculately?”
Armo rolled his eyes. “He has a name. It’s Lucas.”
Larenz frowned for a moment, looking puzzled. “That’s your middle name. She named her son after you, even though she had no intention of telling you about him?”
Armo nodded, hoping his brother could understand some of his confusion and confliction now.
“Well, you’ve heard our opinions on the matter, Armo. You’re usually the tiebreaker in our arguments, so I’d suggest listening to your own voice of reason and see what it tells you. As long as you don’t follow Larenz’s advice, you’ll be golden.”
Larenz rolled his eyes at Dante. “Like your advice is any better? You want him to forgive and forget that she ran away and took his child? What kind of pansy-ass response is that?”
“What kind of half-cocked, violent response is it to execute the mother of his son when he still cares about her?”
Armo lifted a hand, suddenly weary of the conversation. He might have initiated it, but he’d heard both of their perspectives now, and it left him with a decision to make. “I’m going home. Thank you both.”
“I’m sure you’ll do the right thing,” said Larenz, looking unconcerned.
“We want to see the baby soon. I mean, I know Lily will.” Dante strove to sound impassive, but it was clear he was curious about his nephew and was using his wife as a pretext. Armo experienced a surge of affection for his brother, knowing that Dante’s mind pretty much lingered on babies all the time these days as he waited for the birth of his daughter.
With a quick word of parting, he exited the club and made his way home. It was only as he entered the condo that he realized he still wasn’t entirely certain how he was going to proceed. At least for tonight, he wasn’t returning to the bedroom, and he definitely wasn’t going to try to initiate a repetition of earlier events.
Instead, he folded himself onto the loveseat in the media room, cursing the entire time as he wondered how Katie had managed to arrange herself on the torture device. She was several inches shorter, but it couldn’t have been comfortable for her either. It was just another reason for them to work things out.
If only he could decide where she was going to sleep, he’d know how to proceed. Was he completely arrogant to think the decision was entirely his to make? Undoubtedly, Katie would think so. But he still felt cheated by what she had done, and she owed him.
How was he supposed to let go of that, and release the anger he still felt whenever he imagined Lucas growing up without him, and Armo never knowing he had fathered a child with her. It took a stronger man than him to just turn his back on that, to just forgive and forget, as Dante had suggested. He was usually the coolheaded, logical, and easygoing brother, but right then, he was the hot-tempered, hotheaded, and completely irrational one.
It was some hours later before he fell asleep, and not any closer to a decision.
Chapter Six
They met again over breakfast, though this time he was the one in the kitchen first. Unlike her the previous day, he’d prepared enough food for both of them to eat, and though she was still ashamed of her behavior and seriously angry with him, she sat at the table and started eating the omelet he had prepared. She tried to justify it as ravenous hunger, since breastfeeding stimulated her appetite, but she couldn’t pretend that part of her acquiescence wasn’t due to having a chance to be near Armo, even under the tense circumstances.
And it was certainly tense. The tension was thick enough to cut with a knife. Lucas was cradled in the crook of her arm, his mouth latched on to her breast for his own breakfast as the adults ate in silence. She could barely swallow the excellent food from her nervousness, anger, and residual humiliation.
It was only after the clinking of forks against plates had filled the room for several moments that Armo took a long sip of his coffee before he cleared his throat. “I’m sorry about last night.”
She nodded jerkily, not certain that she believed his apology, but surprised that he’d even bothered to go through the motions of needing her forgiveness.
“The truth is, I still want you, Katie. I think it’s obvious you still want me too, but a lot has happened to keep us from acting on those urges right now.”
She glared at him as she wiped her mouth. “I don’t want you, and I thought I made that plain last night.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Oh, when you are begging me to fuck you? Is that when you made it clear?”
She started to push away from the table, uncaring about the remnants of her breakfast, but froze when his hand fell across hers. She looked down, wincing at the sight of the bruises around her wrist.
He let out a harsh breath, his gaze centered on the same spot. “I did that. I’m sorry. I was angry with you. I’m still angry with you, but I shouldn’t have gotten into bed with you when I was in that state.”
She tried to tug her hand free, but he wouldn’t loosen his hold. “No, you should’ve just left me sleeping on the floor alone. Our relationship is over. It’s dead. There’s nothing left between us except Lucas.”
He shook his head. “That sounds good on paper, but it doesn’t feel right. I don’t believe it, and I don’t think you really do either. We need to have honesty between us and be truthful about how we feel.”
She let out a harsh laugh. “That’s rich coming from you. When were you ever truthful before? You hid what you did and kept part of yourself locked away from me. If you’d been honest, there wouldn’t have been a future for us, and you knew it. You deliberately hid the truth, and now you expect me to jump on your honesty bandwagon? I wasn’t born yesterday.”
He let out a soft sigh, looking frustrated. “Fine, you’re right. As I’ve already said, I didn’t tell you what I did because I was sure that you would leave. And since we’re being bluntly honest, I’m the consigliore for the Moretti Mafia. I advise my brothers, who run the show, and I cast a tiebreaker vote when they can’t decide on a course of action. I’m in the mafia. Sometimes I hurt people, and sometimes I have to kill. That’s what I do, but that’s not all I do or all that I am.”
She blinked for a moment, overwhelmed by his bluntness, but also terrified. She couldn’t handle the overflow of information, and what the show of trust might mean. On the other hand, maybe it was no show of trust. If she didn’t respond the way he expected, he was still going to eliminate her. That was the only sensible course of action open to him. If he couldn’t charm her, he’d have to get rid of her. So it wouldn’t matter what he told her now, because he would be confident she’d never have a chance to repeat it.
Right? Or was she now being paranoid?
“Now that we’re being honest, and I’ve shared, why don’t you tell me the truth about Lucas.”
She frowned in confusion. “What truth about Lucas?”
“Were you really going to hide his existence from me? Or would you have eventually given in and contacted me?”
Katie paused, trying to proceed delicately for fear of provoking another angry outburst. That she feared it irritated her, and she stiffened her posture. “No, I had no plans to tell him or you. I know how that sounds, but normal people would agree with me. I couldn’t let my son grow up being raised to follow in his mafia father’s footsteps. I had to protect Lucas. I’d still be protecting him if that was an option, if you hadn’t… How did you find me?”
He looked angry, his lips compressed into a tight white line, but he surprised her by answering. “I was staying at the Belvedere hotel, and I saw you on my floor cleaning some of the rooms. I found out your work schedule, and then I waited for you the next day. Like always, you were late, but you eventually showed up, and I took you.”
“Why? Since we’re being honest,” she said with a hint of mocking.
“Originally, it was just to tie up loose ends. You saw me shoot an FBI agent.”
She gasped to hear him so casually admit it. “How could you do that? I mean not just the moral or ethical implications, but how do you get away with a crime like that?”
He shrugged. “We have cleaners, and there are steps to take, and I highly doubt anyone gave a rat’s ass about David Parsing’s disappearance.”
“I’m sure the Federal Bureau of Investigation would care that you murdered an agent that was trying to bring you down.”
Armo shook his head. “Parsing wasn’t try
ing to bring me down, at least not me personally. He wanted to cripple our organization and take over since we refused to buy his silence and cooperation. All he wanted was a stake in the business. He had no interest in pursuing justice or ending our operation. Parsing was a realist, and knew the Moretti’s were the lesser of evils. The Moretti’s don’t touch drugs or the skin trade. We stick to money-laundering, guns, and a few other endeavors that aren’t legal, but aren’t going to hurt a lot of innocent people.”
She rolled her eyes. “Let me guess, you rob from the rich and give to the poor while you’re at it?”
He shrugged a shoulder. “In a way. Surely you remember my mother’s foundation that I took over? I still run that. That’s where I focus most of my attention.”
Katie shook her head, unable to fathom the rationalizations he provided. “So because Agent Parsing was dirty, that makes it okay to kill him?”
He glared at her. “No, what makes it okay to kill him was the fact that he approached you. My people had been following him for a while, and when he tried to go after you, it didn’t take long to get him to admit he had planned to kidnap you that day and hold you for leverage, to force me and my brothers to set up an agreement giving him a chunk of our profits for him doing absolutely nothing. I killed him to protect you and my family, but you didn’t bother to wait around to hear any of that. You just tossed the watch and ran.”
Katie was shocked, “I didn’t toss the watch.”
He arched a brow. “What?”
She shook her head, still marveling that this was what she’d focused on out of all the things he’d said. “I didn’t toss it. I tripped, and it fell off. I didn’t realize I had lost until I was already away from the building, and I couldn’t go back for it then. I just wanted you to know I would never throw away your gift.” It was a stupid thing to fixate on, and of all the things they’d discussed, the watch was insignificant, but she felt the need to stress to him that she hadn’t rejected his gift as some sort of symbol of rejecting him.
