by Tina Donahue
“Will you?”
Hell no. There’d always be other jobs and buyers. There was only one Lauren.
“Never,” he promised, slanting his mouth over hers, claiming her for his own.
Now that he knew how she felt, there was no fucking way Dante would ever let her go.
Epilogue
Eleven months later…
Relatives, well-wishers and neighbors packed the Avanas’ small backyard to celebrate Sofia’s quinceañera. Today was her fifteenth birthday, a girl’s official entry into womanhood.
“Remember, you’re still a baby,” Dante warned his little sister. “No boys, driving or makeup for years.”
Their five brothers—Hector, Miguel, Angelo, Juan and Eduardo—nodded solemnly.
Lauren could tell the guys were teasing, all of them trying hard not to smile.
Their macho humor was totally lost on their baby sister. Like the teenager she was, Sofia rolled her eyes and looked to Lauren for support.
Smiling, Lauren tried out her Spanish, “No tienes un tatuaje y te irá muy bien.” Just don’t get a tattoo and you’ll be fine.
Sofia screwed up her pretty face.
Uh-oh. “Did I say that wrong?” Lauren asked.
“You nailed it,” Dante said. “And you’re absolutely right. Sofia shouldn’t get a dog. She’s too young and irresponsible for something that serious.”
“Wait.” Lauren looked from him to his sister and back. “I didn’t say anything about a dog. I was talking about tattoos. That she shouldn’t get one.”
“As if I would?” Sofia crossed her arms over her chest. With her sparkly tiara and ball gown, she looked like a petulant princess. “Tattoos are gross. Now piercings…” She sighed wistfully. “Mmmm, tan caliente.” So hot.
Lauren smiled. “Too bad you have to be forty or so before anyone will give you one. Isn’t that right?” she asked Dante.
“It’s worse than that.” He slung his arm around Lauren’s shoulders. She leaned into her man, his size, strength and heat solid and welcome. “Her kids are going to have to be in their fifties before I say okay to any piercing.”
Sofia’s laughter pealed above the noise of the Spanish music and countless conversations. “Get real.” Wide-eyed she looked at Lauren. “How do you put up with him?”
Lauren patted Dante’s hard belly. Today, he’d worn a guayabera shirt of white linen, lightly embroidered, the same as his hotter-than-sin brothers. Come Monday, Dante would be back in a suit. “He knows how to make real food,” she said.
“Not that it’s necessary.” He tightened his arm around her waist. “Lauren isn’t half bad in the kitchen. Although I have to say her Spanish is way better than her cooking.”
“Damn,” Hector mumbled. “You’re in trouble man.”
“I heard that,” Lauren said.
Hector gave her a sexy smile, the same as he did Wicked Brand’s many female clients. He was now one of the parlor’s tattoo artists with as much talent as Van Gogh. To advertise their skill to passing tourists, Lauren had him and Van Gogh inking customers in the front window of the parlor, as long as no intimate body parts were involved. That alone had increased foot traffic by forty percent given their incredible designs.
To entice tourists further, Hector’s drawings and Van Gogh’s paintings graced the parlor walls. On average, they sold several pieces each month with that number continuing to rise.
The local press had covered Wicked Brand on several occasions since Lauren had taken over. Hector had become a legend on the area TV stations. Van Gogh said he’d rather ink his own eyeballs than ever be on camera. Recently, there’d been a spread about Wicked Brand in a major magazine. Lauren now devoted herself strictly to marketing and HR. Jasmina, who was sailing through her college classes, managed the place as Dante once had.
He’d left the parlor eight months earlier to accept a partnership in Scott’s firm, fighting for people who needed a champion on their side.
Money still didn’t matter to him. Lauren didn’t care about it either any longer.
Funny thing, they now had more dough than they knew what to do with. Wicked Brand was turning an enormous profit. After giving everyone a huge raise and setting up medical, dental, 401(k) plans and profit-sharing for the staff, Lauren had plowed a lot of the funds back into the business to help it thrive.
She never wanted the staff to worry about losing their jobs. She never wanted to work for anyone but herself.
With her salary and Dante’s, which was ginormous, they’d paid off her student loans and had bought a modest home in West Palm Beach, took care of his relatives who needed help and added to the college funds of his younger brothers and both sisters.
Gaby was off to the side, speaking quietly and demurely to her boyfriend.
The skirt of Sofia’s gown bobbed as she boogied hard with a gangly young man. Dante’s father, still strikingly handsome, watched the couple carefully. Dante’s mother, a pleasingly plump woman with a pretty face, wasn’t as discreet. Hurrying over to her youngest daughter, she said something that not only put distance between Sofia and the boy but also kept them from wiggling their respective booties.
Lauren gave Mrs. Avana a thumbs-up. The woman smiled broadly then danced back to her husband who grinned at Lauren. She blinked back grateful tears at how easily they’d accepted her into their lives, loving her as Dante did.
For the first time in forever, she had a family. Her mom could rest easy now, because Lauren wasn’t alone any longer. She wondered again if Frank had wanted this for her and Dante when he’d given her the parlor. Lauren hoped he had, wishing she could have thanked him, needing to forgive.
The booming music the teens had put on stopped suddenly, replaced seconds later by a slow Spanish ballad. The kids groaned loudly. The adults ignored them.
Dante eased Lauren into his arms and moved to the sensuous beat. It filled the sultry air along with the wonderful scents of flowers, Cuban food and his clean musky fragrance. His hips pressed into hers. As usual, he was sporting an erection.
“Careful,” she murmured, her cheek on his shoulder. “Your mom’s gonna come storming over here to tell you to behave.”
He clucked his tongue as his mother frequently did with hers. “I’m a man. I can do what I want.”
Lauren snickered. “Think again, babe. Her balls are bigger than yours, Jasmina’s and your dad’s combined.”
Dante’s shoulders shook with his laughter. “Good point.” He sighed contentedly. “I’ll misbehave tonight.”
That he would and she’d join him whether it was at their backyard pool, in their bedroom or one of countless places around West Palm Beach. So far, they’d made love in the park, at the carousal again, on the beach, in his firm’s office and Wicked Brand’s roof. Moments that had been dangerous and hot.
The best though were the quiet times when they simply gazed at each other, content with their lives finally. They weren’t only lovers but friends who finished each other’s comments, disagreed without causing hurt and were simply comfortable being together. For Lauren, that was the sexiest thing of all.
Melting into Dante, she moved with him through the dance as she was doing through life.
Finally at peace. Finally at home.
About Tina Donahue
Tina Donahue is an award-winning, bestselling novelist in erotic romance, and an admitted chocoholic known to down semi-sweet candy bars in grocery checkout lines. She lives with her family in Palm Springs, California, where tires melt in the 120-degree summer heat and an occasional earthquake puts everyone on notice to bolt things down. When she’s not writing her steamy stories, trying to stay cool, or crawling beneath her desk during a trembler, she loves shopping, eating at her favorite Mexican restaurant and meeting other authors. Before she wrote romance, Tina was the editor of an award-winning Midwestern newspaper and worked in Story Direction for a Hollywood production company.
Tina welcomes comments from readers. You can find her website
and email addresses on her author bio page at www.ellorascave.com.
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Also by Tina Donahue
Adored
Appointment with Pleasure 1: Claiming Magique
Appointment with Pleasure 2: Losing Control
Appointment with Pleasure 3: Illicit Intent
Appointment with Pleasure 4: Seven Sensuous Days
Carnal Takeover
Deep, Dark, Delicious
In His Arms
Lush Velvet Nights
Sensual Stranger
Sinfully Wicked
SiNN
Take Me Away
Taking Eve
Print books by Tina Donahue
Adored
Claiming Magique
Sinfully Wicked
SiNN
Take Me Away
Ellora’s Cave Publishing
www.ellorascave.com
Wicked Takeover
ISBN 9781419993503
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Wicked Takeover Copyright 2014 Tina Donahue
Edited by Briana St. James
Cover design by Allyse Leodra
Cover photography by Anetta
Electronic book publication September 2014
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