Or that she didn’t matter, when she’d been my only respite, the only good in my life these past few weeks.
The saving grace I knew I needed, but refused to want.
With wooden steps, I made my way to her door and raised my hand to knock just as it jerked open. Tears stained her face.
I’d done that.
It was becoming a nasty habit, making her cry, when all I yearned to do was hold her close and tell her it would all be okay.
But it would be a lie.
And I was done with that life.
Done lying through my smiles and easy jokes, done making this life look like it was all sunshine and rainbows when it was darkness and desperation.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered hoarsely. “I didn’t—”
She pressed a hand over my mouth. That would normally have pissed me off; if it had been anyone else I would have lost my shit and broken a wrist.
But this was mine.
She was mine.
So I let her.
“One more night, and I don’t know what happens.” She gulped. “So, I was thinking if I had one more night…” More tears filled her eyes. “…what would I do?”
I waited and tried not to get too hopeful that she was going to spend it with me instead of slamming the door in my face again.
“And…” She licked her lips. “…I want to spend it with you.”
Her hand fell.
I narrowed my eyes. “You sure about that?”
She nodded and then reached for my hands.
I hadn’t realized they were shaking until she held them in hers and looked down with a confused expression.
“I’m angry,” I admitted. “So fucking angry.”
“That makes two of us,” she whispered. “You’re angry at Mil, and I’m angry at you.”
She’d said her name.
I was too stunned to do anything.
Hearing her name from Luc’s lips…
Felt so dirty.
Wrong.
I closed my eyes, squeezed them tight, and tried to get my emotions under control, and then Luc did the strangest thing; she brought my hands to her mouth.
I opened my eyes. “What are you doing?”
“How many?”
“How many what?”
She didn’t answer; instead, she hauled me to my bedroom and then into the connecting bathroom and turned on the shower.
Without words, she slowly undressed. My breath hitched when her bra fell to the floor, and then she started working on my jeans — button undone, zipper pulled down. She jerked them to my feet and then tugged my shirt over my head and led me into the shower.
I still had no clue what she was doing until she pushed me under the hot spray and said, “How many people? How much blood on your hands?”
My stomach clenched. “Too many to count, Luc. Enough to give you nightmares.”
She nodded and then slowly lathered up the soap and began to wash me. “You know about the whole washing of feet thing, right? I’m assuming you’re Catholic.”
I nodded dumbly.
“So…” She ran the soap down my stomach. “…I figure since you have so much blood, it would be best to just wash your entire body.”
I gripped her wrists. “I don’t understand.”
She refused to look at me and just kept washing. “It’s like a second baptism, okay? The forgiveness of sins.” Her voice caught. “Holy water washing away the sins of the damned.”
Realization dawned as I stared down at her shaking hands.
“If I lose you—” Her eyes flashed up to mine. “—I want to know where your soul’s going, and I refuse—” Her voice cracked. “—refuse to think I didn’t do everything in my power to make sure that you were accepted into heaven, even though you deserve nothing but hell.”
I always believed that Mil was the one who’d broken me, unmanned me, un-fucking-made me.
But in that moment, with this innocent girl and her shaking hands, trying to wash blood from my body, knowing that I would just spill more — that was more than I could take; it was more than I could handle.
The damn burst so hard, so fast, that I fell to the ground and shoved her away, only to have her bring her hands to my face and keep washing as my tears mixed with the water running down my cheeks.
Angry tears.
Bitter tears.
Tears that tasted like revenge when they touched my lips and burned like hell when they hit my skin.
And then she was kissing them away, kissing me, with such hopeful deep kisses that for the first time since before Mil died…
I felt loved.
I felt coveted.
I felt saved.
I gripped the sides of her face with my hands and deepened the kiss then rained kisses down her cheeks before pulling her onto my lap and thrusting into her, showing her the only way I knew how, that this — this between us — was the only good thing in my life.
The only good thing.
She cried out my name as I began to move.
“Chase, that’s not what—”
“Shh…” I grit my teeth. It was not how this started, but it was how I was going to end it, inside her, loving her, claiming her. “…let me love you the way you love me.”
Her eyes flashed open; they were searching, and then they were resting on my mouth as a small grin spread across her face.
I captured her lips again, felt her smile against my mouth as I pumped harder inside her, needing to be as close as possible, needing to feel the way her body clenched around me as if it needed me for survival. She started the rhythm with me as I pulled my mouth away. My head fell back against the tile as she moved. I gripped her hips holding her there. It would be over too fast, — the slick wetness of her body, the warmth of the water trickling between our bodies.
I didn’t want any moment to end with her.
This one especially.
But all good things… they come to an end, don’t they?
I surged forward, filling her fast and hard while she wrapped an arm around my neck to hold on.
“So deep.” She bit down on my neck.
“So perfect,” I rasped and sent her over the edge in the only way I knew how, by finally giving her another piece of myself while guiltily still holding the final chess token.
Because I knew, if I gave her all, and if she took it…
When I died…
It would destroy her.
And I refused to repeat history.
“Let her go,” she whispered across my neck.
My voice said, “Okay.”
But my heart asked, “How?”
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
“My mood felt as black as my soul.”
— Ex-FBI Agent P
Luciana
I woke up with Chase’s warmth, with his lips on my hips going downward, with his head between my thighs, with his taste still on my mouth.
With tears in my eyes.
No matter what he did.
It felt like death.
Everything was cold around me, even though I had blankets on top of me, even though he was doing things to my body that made me sweat with pleasure.
It didn’t matter.
Because my heart knew the truth.
Today was the day.
The day he would walk out that door and possibly never come back. The day he would decide it all.
I gripped the sheets in my hands as his mouth sucked.
“Chase!” I arched on the bed. “Whatever happened to alarms?”
“Ding.” His tongue swirled. “Ding.” Another swirl that had my body shuddering as he sucked. “Ding.”
“I’m awake. I’m awake!” I yelled, gripping his hair with both hands as he chuckled then blew against every sensitive part of me until my teeth clenched with pain.
“Almost.” He slid his hands up to my breasts almost as if he was doing a child’s pose over my entire body. He squeezed while he licked, driving me over the edge s
o fast that I almost kicked him in the face.
He lifted his head with a smug grin. “Now you’re awake.”
“Yeah.” My chest heaved. “Ready to start the day.”
I would remember this carefree smile on his face, the way it lit up his icy blue eyes, the way his tattoos swirled down his arms and chest, the way his body moved with unrestrained power and grace as he crawled up my body and pressed a kiss to my neck then whispered in my ear.
“I’ll cook breakfast.”
The final meal.
That was what it felt like.
I kept my smile firmly in place.
I didn’t want to ruin this moment, this potential last moment of happiness, the moment I needed more than anything, so when he was gone, I’d be able to store the memories together and smile about the time we had.
The good.
I quickly dressed while he pulled on his jeans then walked around the bed and met me. I’d barely pulled on a pair of leggings and his white t-shirt when I was in his arms again, getting the crap kissed out of me.
I clung to him, gripping his shoulders with my hands so tightly that I felt them go numb.
He pressed a kiss to my forehead then and tilted my chin toward him. “It’s going to be okay.”
He was halfway out the door when I asked the dreaded question. “Hey, Chase?”
“Yeah?” he called. I was too chicken to turn around.
“What are you doing in two weeks?”
He was silent.
My head fell.
And then arms wrapped around my waist from behind as he whispered in my ear, “You.”
Tears slid down my cheeks as I almost collapsed to the floor. He wasn’t going to go through with it? At all? I was too afraid, too hopeful, to turn around.
“I’m still going to the commission, but…” He didn’t need to say anything more.
I flipped around so fast, flung off my clothes in a frenzy, and mauled him like a psycho.
He lifted me into his arms and tossed me onto the bed then hovered over me with a predatory look that gave me chills up and down my body.
And then he attacked in the way he always had.
With precision.
Perfection.
Absolute dedication to every part of my body.
Chase’s touch made me crazed with pleasure. He could look at me, and I was ready to orgasm on the spot. It was in his darkness, his power, his possession that I found love.
Not his light.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
“Today it would end. Today it would finally end. God, let it end.”
— Ex-FBI Agent P
Chase
Sometimes a lie is necessary in order for someone to live, in order for them to cling to hope.
As I walked out that door, got into my car and drove to the old warehouse on the lake, I knew that lie would be the best one I’d ever told to not only her, but to myself.
Because I still had a job to do.
A purpose to fulfill.
And the greatest kindness I could give Luc would be the hope that I would come back, that I wasn’t driving to my death.
That my brothers weren’t going to be the ones to do it to me.
I sighed as I pulled into the parking lot.
Always last to the meetings. I liked it that way; it gave me time to think, time to assume the worst, and time for Tex to fill everyone in. I shoved my hands in my pockets as gravel crunched beneath my feet.
One of the men guarding outside nodded at me and opened the heavy metal door.
The entire room was soundproofed.
Flat-screen TVs lined each of the four walls.
And five long tables were placed in the middle of the room.
Along with another five on the other side.
It was no surprise to see Nikolai on one side of the room — he was more Italian than Russian anyway. He just hated to admit that he was one of us almost as much as he hated to admit he drank more wine than vodka.
He tilted his head in acknowledgment as I joined the Abandonato table and let my eyes roam across the room.
Tex was seated in the middle of the Campisi table, his men behind him looking bored as hell.
Dante sat at the Alfero table. Frank stood behind him, most likely offering his support as the new boss. He held his head high in pride, and I couldn’t blame him. Dante was making out to be a boss that people feared, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.
The chair creaked as Phoenix leaned back. Nicolasis stood behind him. Most from Italy had flown in. Though he chose his home base as Chicago, Phoenix had more men in Europe than he had here, not that it mattered; he held all the power, all the secrets.
His men looked ruthless, and I knew, firsthand, that if you crossed them, you would be dead before you realized you’d even been shot.
And then there were the De Langes.
No leader.
Nobody to call boss.
Pain filled my lungs as I looked at the empty chair, the one Mil used to fill, the one she used to rule like an iron throne that she’d always wanted but never admitted she needed in order to survive.
I closed my eyes and shook my head as rage took over.
Nixon shot me a glance from the right, a silent warning to keep my mouth shut and stop looking trigger-happy.
But I couldn’t help it.
Each De Lange associate looked at me with a mixture of fear and complete hatred, and I couldn’t blame them.
I wanted them dead.
All of them.
The fact that they were even here meant that they didn’t think I would follow through on my promise to end their line.
The fact that Phoenix looked just as pissed as I did was the only thing keeping me from opening fire.
Five other Families from Italy were present. Their jurisdiction wasn’t a part of the Cosa Nostra, but what happened between the most powerful Families in the States affected them greatly.
It was a courtesy to give them a vote.
And they knew it.
My eyes landed on the Vitela family, then the Buratti men, old enough to be grandfathers to each of us, with black eyes and dark hair slicked back with oil. One of the bosses held a cigar in his mouth.
It was every horrible mob movie come to life. Once I would have laughed, made a joke, but I wasn’t that guy anymore.
I nodded to the Rossas and Di Masis, and then my gaze landed on pure treachery.
“What the fuck is he doing with the Sinacore Family?” It was out before I could stop it.
Andrei just smiled and shrugged at me while the boss looked genuinely confused and then shrugged. “He is Family.”
“He is Russian,” I spat.
“Half.” Andrei grinned. “Surprise.”
Phoenix broke eye contact with me. Great, just great.
“And everyone knew this?” I yelled at the entire room.
“It was kept quiet,” the Sinacore boss said in a low voice, “until certain things were set in place. He sought sanctuary with us after the death of the De Lange boss. And once more information came forward…” He eyed Phoenix. “…we thought it best to do what we could to unite what was left of his family with ours.”
I was too pissed to think straight.
Nixon stood and glared in my direction and then nodded to Tex. “Shall we get started?”
What? We weren’t going to even talk about it?
I hated the smug grin that spread across Andrei’s face. What the hell was going on?
“We are here…” Tex stood. “…to discuss the end of the De Lange line.”
The De Langes didn’t even flinch.
“Stay standing!” Tex barked to the men, fifty-eight of them left, fifty-eight souls I couldn’t wait to wipe from this planet. Fifty. Eight. “Your crimes are as follows: drug smuggling, prostitution, sex slavery, plans to kill each of the men in this room, and dealing illegally with other crime families for information. How do you plead?”
“Guilty.?
?? One of the men stepped forward.
I clenched my fists.
“We’re just as guilty as every one of you in this room. What we do with our family is our business. We follow our boss.” He eyed me. “And when our boss tells us she’s working with Russians, we listen. When our boss tells us we’re open for business on the slave market, we do it. We are only guilty of listening to a power-hungry boss. So if loyalty makes us guilty, then kill us now.”
I almost pulled my gun out.
Tex nodded. “The bosses will vote. It needs to be majority in your favor. If not, then we will allow the executions to take place.”
Finally.
Tex started calling out the names of each Family.
Alfero. “Guilty.”
Nicolasi. “Guilty.”
Sinacore. “Not guilty.”
Di Rosa. “Not guilty.”
My stomach filled with dread.
Vitela. “Not guilty.”
Baratta. “Not guilty.”
I clenched my teeth.
Abandonato. Nixon looked at me straight in the eyes as he said loudly, “Not guilty.”
My best friend.
My brother.
My betrayer.
Campisi. “Guilty.”
I closed my eyes.
Tex sighed. “It seems that you’re free to live another day.” He eyed the De Lange family. “Who will take over as boss?”
A man stepped forward.
How was this happening?
How?
I reached for my gun.
“Wait,” Nixon hissed next to me.
I was shaking so hard I felt like my body was making noise as one of the De Lange men stepped forward. “I nominate myself.”
The rest of the men rolled their eyes.
A few laughed.
And then a fight broke out between two of them while the rest of us watched.
“Sometimes,” Nixon whispered, “it’s best to let someone destroy themselves from within. Then again, you already know that, don’t you?”
I shoved him. “It’s weird that you think your vote counts, when technically I’m the boss to this family, right? Blood bond to lead.”