Damian groans as he flips over the cards. He is terrible at this game, and I can’t help giggling as I watch him scoop up all my discarded cards and his own. I have one card left and he has a handful.
Damian narrows his eyes at me. “Aces.” He puts down two cards and I put down the last card I hold. “Bullshit!” he yells, slamming his palm on the table. I flip the card and show him the ace. He laid down an ace and a two.
I laugh as he drops his cards and sighs.
“Fuck. I think you cheated somehow.”
I smirk. “Playing you in cards does feel like cheating. It’s not really fair.”
He tosses a card at me and stands to go check on the food. I smile over the rim of my wine glass, watching his tight ass and the way it looks in the slacks he’s wearing. He stripped off his jacket and wears his dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a few buttons undone. I keep finding my eyes wandering to those undone buttons. I’ve had too much to drink already and can feel it going to my head. I know I’m getting tipsy because I’m definitely not as bitter as I should be. I’m even on the verge of enjoying myself. I keep feeling like I should be in mourning or something. After all, my fiance cheated on me. He also had my bank accounts frozen and has probably blacklisted me at every marketing job in the continental US, yet here I am, staring at Damian’s ass and loving every second of it.
“You like pepper?” he asks, raising his voice over the sizzling of pancetta in the skillet.
“Sure.”
He grinds a pepper mill over the skillet and gives it a skillful toss.
“I can’t say I took you for the chef type,” I say.
He turns and quirks an eyebrow at me. “What was it? The tattoos?”
I shrug. “I guess when I picture guys like you, I don’t picture them going home and cooking.”
“Guys like me?”
I move into the kitchen and lean on the island behind him, watching as he tosses the pancetta in the skillet and stirs the lasagna sheets he’s boiling in water. “Yeah, you know. Bad boys. The kind of guys my mom would turn over in her grave if she knew I was talking to.”
He turns, suddenly serious. “I’m sorry about your mom.”
The sincerity in his words touches me and I’m surprised to find myself on the verge of tears. Just like that. “Don’t be. She was terrible. Disowned me when I was younger and I practically never talked to her after.” I don’t mention the reason she kicked me out. I never do.
He goes back to the skillet, talking over his shoulder. “Family should always be together.”
“Yeah. But it doesn’t always work out that way.”
The food is delicious. He made some sort of creamy mushroom alfredo sauce with bits of flavorful pancetta and prosciutto cooked in. Then he twirled in tender lasagna sheets to soak it all up. Every bite is like an explosion. For the first few minutes, I eat in complete silence, marveling at how much flavor he managed to cook into the meal.
“Do you like it?” he asks.
I wipe my mouth, blushing when I realize I’ve just been pounding down bite after bite silently. “This is amazing. You’re really full of surprises, aren’t you? ”
He smirks. “Stick around, I’ve got some other surprises you wouldn’t believe.”
I blush again. I swear, I must have gone the last ten years of my life and blushed two or three times, and those were because of embarrassment. Being around Damian makes me feel like some blushing maiden from a medieval story.
“Why are you really here?” I ask. “It’s not to cook me dinner.”
He folds his napkin and sets it down on the table. “You want the truth?”
“I do.”
“All right. I came here because from the moment I saw you, I knew I needed to have you. I’ve seen beautiful women before and wanted them, but no one has ever stuck in my head like you. I haven’t stopped thinking about you, about the things I want to do to you.” He leans forward and the predatory smirk flashes across his face.
My voice sounds small. Distant. “What would you do to me?” I swallow hard. My heart is pounding in my ears and I have to press my thighs together. His words are doing something to me, something that scares me and excites me at the same time.
“I’d start with your pussy. I’d work you with lips first, and then my tongue. And I’d take my time about it. Once you were done cumming on my face, I’d pin your hands above your head and—”
I hold my hand up, feeling breathless. His smirk widens. If I let him keep talking, I won’t be able to stop it from happening. It will stop being a fantasy and it will be real. And I can’t take real right now. Not yet.
Someone pounds on the front door.
Damian stands up, looking toward the sound. “Wait here,” he says.
I’ve never been good at following orders, so I sneak behind Damian as he moves to the door. He swings it open and my stomach clenches.
It’s Greg.
After just a week of separation, Greg looks ridiculous to me now. He’s wearing Easter pink shorts, a white polo, and brown boat shoes. His hair is slicked back with too much product to reveal his smooth, contemptuous features. He never seemed scrawny or frail to me before. After all, he religiously works out in the gym three times a week, but next to Damian, he looks like a child.
“Who the fuck are you?” demands Greg. Then he leans around Damian’s wide shoulders and spots me standing there. “What the fuck, Callie?”
“You need to leave,” says Damian.
“Why? So you can fuck her? That’s my fiancée, asshole, let me in.”
Damian puts a hand on Greg’s chest and when Greg tries to slap it away, Damian grabs Greg’s arm and twists it, pinning him face first into the doorframe. He leans close, speaking into Greg’s ear.
“Do you hear that?” asks Damian.
“Hear what?” asks Greg. He sounds like he has cotton shoved in his mouth from being pressed so hard into the wall.
“The sound of your fiancée not telling me to stop before I permanently fuck up your shoulder.”
“Callie,” he whines. “Tell him to stop. Tell this fucker to get off me.”
All I can think of is the sight of those stilettos and long legs, bouncing every time he pounded himself into her.
Damian looks back toward me, eyebrows raised.
“He’s not worth it,” I say. “Just let him go.”
Damian smashes Greg’s face into the doorframe before letting him go. Greg stumbles backward, pressing delicate fingers to his nose and then looking incredulously at the blood. “I think you broke my nose,” but his voice is so stuffed it sounds like he says “dose”.
“Whoops,” says Damian. “I can be real clumsy. You may want to fuck off before I accidentally break something else.”
“Do you have any idea who my father is? The district attorney is a close friend of my family. If I talk to the right people, you’ll—”
Damian steps forward. “I’m not interested in what your friends can do to me. What can you do?”
Greg glares over his bloody hands, still clutching his nose. “You’ll regret this.”
He stumbles away from the porch, looking over his shoulder once before yanking the door of his BMW open. He pulls it shut, still careful not to close the door too hard. Ridiculous. The engine roars and he tries to back out quickly, but overcorrects. He slams on the brakes just before hitting a tree. Then he’s forced to back slowly out of the driveway because he’s not a good enough driver to go any faster.
I can’t remember what I ever saw in him.
5
Damian
I search her name on the computer in the back room of the restaurant. Callie Beccaccio. I find some social media shit, but I don’t want to be that creepy, so I stick to the generic results. I find something about her job. Marketing consultant for B&G Conglomerate Group? The fuck is that? I’m about to search for more when Benny bursts through the door.
“It’s starting,” he says with a smile.
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��Tell me,” I say.
“Carlito Anastasio was just found dead on a pier out in Long Island. No one knows, but there are whispers that it was the Sanatores.”
“Shit,” I say, slamming my fist on the table.
“Shit what? We’ve spent months trying to start a war between them. Why shit?”
“Because Carlito’s sister married into the Ricci’s family.”
Benny falls into the nearest chair, looking dejected. “Fuck. What do we do?”
“I don’t know yet. The whole fucking idea was to let the Anastasios and the Sanatores chip away at each other until one of them was weak enough for us to make a move. If the Ricci’s get involved? They’re fucking crazy. There won’t be shit left to take over. They will burn the whole place to the ground.”
“So what do we do?” asks Benny again.
“Something stupid. I need to handle something first though.”
Callie is laughing with some guy at the bar while she pours him a drink. I clench my fists and go to the guy, tapping him on the shoulder.
“That’s my seat,” I say.
Callie gives me a warning look. I reassure her with a wink.
The guy turns. “There are open seats all over. Fuck off.”
“Whether I have to kick your ass or not, I’m sitting in that stool in the next ten seconds. So why don’t you go get yourself one of those open seats and skip the embarrassment.”
He takes me in from head to toe, scowls, and then gets up, leaving the restaurant without even touching the drink Callie just poured. I sit and down it in one shot.
“Really?” she asks, putting her fists on her hips. “Am I supposed to be impressed by that?”
I smirk. “You weren’t?”
“No. You can’t just punch and threaten your way through life.”
“Those aren’t my only two techniques.” I take a second to admire the healthy amount of cleavage she has on display, biting my lip.
She sighs, pulling her shirt up but I can see the red staining her cheeks.
“When are you going to just admit that you want to fuck me?” I ask.
She sets a glass down a little too hard. “I don’t need another asshole in my life. So if that’s what you are, just get lost, okay?”
“You were wrong about me before, weren’t you? What was it you said, ‘Damian, you’re so full of surprises, I can’t believe I was so wrong about you!’”
She smiles a little, eyes still on the bar for a moment before she lifts her long lashes and meets my gaze. “I definitely didn’t say that.”
I lean back, resting my arm on the back of the stool next to me. “I’m paraphrasing, but that was what you meant. I saw it in your eyes.”
She turns to take a sip from a water bottle.
“Why don’t I get you off early sometime. Maybe tonight?” I ask.
She almost chokes, spitting some of the water out and wiping it away with the back of her hand. When she recovers, she’s scowling at me. “Do you think about anything other than sex?”
“You’re the one with your mind in the gutter. I’m just talking about getting you off work. I am your boss after all.”
“What if I say no?”
I raise my eyebrows, leaning back and folding my arms like it’s a tough question and I’m hesitant to answer. “Refusing a direct order from your boss? People have lost their jobs over less.”
She rolls her eyes, but still goes to grab her coat and leans into the back and yells for Julia to cover for her.
I hold the door for her, mainly so I can look at her ass when she walks past.
She stops when she sees the car, turning to give me a questioning look. “Is this yours?”
“You like it?” I ask.
She tries and fails to hide an excited smile. “It’s okay.”
I don’t have many weaknesses, but cars are one of them. I know I should really be stockpiling all the cash I can for when we make our move to take over, but I couldn’t help myself when I saw this baby at an auction. Glossy black with chrome detailing and it was owned by a collector since he drove it off the showroom floor in 1969.
I open the car door and gesture for her to get in.
“I can open doors on my own, you know.”
“Not when you’re with me,” I say.
I get in and start the engine.
“With you?” she asks. “What exactly do you think this is?”
“Whatever you want it to be,” I say, gunning the gas so hard that her hands flash out, bracing against the door on one side and my thigh on the other. She squeezes the hard muscle of my leg tightly, not letting go even when I ease off the gas and pull on the main road. I grin at her, but she only scowls and pulls back her hand.
This girl.
What kills me most is she won’t even admit to herself how bad she wants it. It’s all over her. I can practically smell it on her. Fuck. I bet I could even taste it. I downshift, loving the way the car bucks against me as I push it harder. Maybe that’s what draws me to cars like this. The harder you push them, the louder they scream, but there’s no denying that they were made to be pushed, made to be tested to their absolute limits. Hell, it’d be a shame not to.
I bite my lip, looking at the way Callie’s black cotton skirt is riding up her thighs as the car purrs under her.
“It looks like it’s going to storm, maybe you should slow down,” she says.
I check the rearview to look for clouds but notice a black car behind me instead. There are two adult men in the front seats, and I can’t explain why, but the car is making my trigger finger itch. On a hunch, I swerve to take a turn down a random side-street, cutting between a row of small houses with well-groomed lawns. Callie gasps.
“I said slow down, not try to crash the car!” she says, clutching my thigh again.
I pull up beside a house and park on the street, watching my rearview.
“What are you doing?” she asks.
I say nothing, still watching as the black car takes the turn and drives slowly past us. A few dozen feet in front, the car hits the brakes and suddenly pulls to the side of the road to wait. I’m being tailed. I don’t know if it’s the Sanatores, the Anastasios, or the Riccis. All I know is it’s bad. Benny and I were supposed to be completely off the radar. If anyone is tailing me, it means someone at least suspects we’re involved. But how?
“What’s going on?” asks Callie.
“Stay here,” I say. I reach past her and pull my .44 from the glove compartment. She winces when she sees it, eyes going wide.
I grit my teeth, squeezing the grip of the gun as I tuck it into the back of my pants. I glance around the quiet neighborhood, making sure no one is outside. It’s clear, for now. I walk to the parked car and rap on the window with my knuckles, leaning down to point at the guy behind the glass. “Open the fucking door.” I say.
He gives me the finger and starts to reach for something in his jacket pocket, so I rip my gun free and smash it through the glass, grabbing him by the collar. His buddy in the passenger seat reaches to pull a gun on me but I’m too fast for him. I point the .44 between the passenger’s eyes. “Move and I splatter your brains across this window.”
The passenger at me, but he’s smart enough to stay still.
“Roll down your window—other hand, asshole! Good. Now toss the gun out.” He does as he’s told. “Both of you, out of the car. This door,” I say through gritted teeth. What, did the fucker think I wanted him to step out on the other side of the car right next to where he threw the gun?
I take a step back, keeping the gun leveled at them as the driver steps out and the passenger has to crawl over the stick shift to get out. I can tell they are mafia muscle from one look. The driver is pretty jacked with a jaw like a brick, the passenger is more wiry with the cold look of a killer in his eyes.
“Who sent you?” I ask. From the corner of my eye, I notice a woman step out the front door with two tiny dogs on a leash, pause, and then hurry back inside.
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br /> “Damian! What are you doing?” yells Callie.
I move my eyes toward her, gesturing for her to get in the car. It’s not safe for her here. Damn, it wasn’t even safe for me to stop and—
It feels like a brick wall crashes into me and then my head is rebounding off the pavement. The big one is on top of me, reaching in his jacket for some kind of weapon. My vision is blurred, but I still see the other one running around the side of the car for his gun. I’m in a shit position as far as leverage goes, but I’m able to hook my elbow around the big guy’s wrist, squeezing and rolling. He realizes real fast that he has to roll off me or his wrist is going to snap like a twig as I twist, using my whole body to push into him.
The weight comes off me as we reverse positions and I scrape my gun off the ground from where it fell and jab him in the teeth with the muzzle. The hard steel punches right through and he claps his hands to his mouth. I dive to my stomach, pressing my cheek to the ground so I can see beneath the car. I see the gun lying on its side and two feet. Just when a hand reaches to grab the gun, I squeeze the trigger.
Boom!
The sound echoes out in the quiet neighborhood. The wiry one is standing now, holding his wrist as blood spurts from the gunshot wound that took off his index finger. I jump and slide over the hood, pistol whipping him and putting my foot on his chest. I kneel down, still putting all my weight into him as I press the cold barrel to his forehead. “Name. Give me a fucking name.”
“Ricci. Cristiano Ricci,” hisses the man, wincing against the pain and the expectation of a bullet.
I feel ice in my chest. “What do they want with me?”
“Fuck if I know. We were just supposed to keep an eye on you.”
Callie is standing behind the passenger door, leaning forward and covering her mouth. Damn. She has already seen too much. I can’t make her a witness to murder too.
“Get in the car, Callie,” I shout.
“Why, so you can kill him?” she asks. I can hear the emotion in her voice, it’s thick and pained.
“Just get in the fucking car.”
“No,” she says. “If you’re going to do it. You’re going to have to do it while I watch.”
Mine (Citrione Crime Family #2) Page 4
