10. Luca
LUCA
Dear Diary,
Today I stood next to the woman I want while another man reminded her who she belongs to.
Icouldn’t stop thinking about Nyah’s tits in that nightgown.
All full and practically spilling over the top of the satin triangles. Somehow, seeing them wrapped up like that, the outline of her hard nipples poking through, was even hotter than seeing her spread out naked on my bed.
That tattoo on her pussy had been on my mind when I’d fallen asleep, and it was still there when I’d woken up.
A knock came from the other side of my bedroom door.
“Luca?” Lynx called. “I’ve just been told your father is waiting downstairs for you.”
Fabulous.
I took out one of my favorite suits and dragged on the pants. Buttoned the shirt. Jacket. No tie ’cause those fuckers strangled me. Socks. Shoes.
I squeezed my eyes closed for a minute, trying to embrace the feeling that I was stepping back into the man my father trained me to be. I needed any gentleness I’d found in the last year to piss off. It wouldn’t serve me here. Here, I had to be harsh and cold or he’d eat me alive.
I couldn’t be the man who danced with his sister in cottage kitchens.
Lynx knocked again, because clearly I’d been taking too long. “Luca? You hear me or you too busy daydreaming about your father’s fiancée’s naked pussy?”
I threw the door open.
He grinned on the other side of it. I grabbed his arm and dragged him inside my room. But instead of the heat I normally felt between us, all I had was fierce anger. “Do you have a death wish? If my father—”
Lynx rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah. He’s the big bad wolf you and Nyah are both scared of. I get it.”
He was going to get himself killed. And his lack of respect was fucking insulting. “You aren’t that dumb, Lynx. I know you know what he’s capable of. What I’m capable of.”
I forced myself not to cringe at how that sounded.
Once upon a time, words like that would have fallen naturally from my mouth.
But now it felt like an idle threat. Once upon a time, I would have had no problem pulling out a knife and putting a bullet in a bodyguard who dared to speak out of turn the way Lynx just had.
And yet now, I knew I was all talk.
Lynx could say whatever the fuck he wanted, and I wasn’t going to do shit.
But my father couldn’t know that. If he knew how damn soft I’d gotten, he’d use it to destroy me. Hell, he already was by forcing me back here, threatening my sister if I didn’t.
I was under his roof again.
I had to play by his rules if I wanted to survive.
And that meant being his right-hand man. Making sure I had the family’s best interests at heart.
Not thinking about his woman moaning as she fingered herself in my bed beside me.
Not thinking about how I would have liked Lynx to join us on that bed too.
He took a step closer, despite my bullshit threats. “I know you’re capable of getting down on your knees for me.”
Everything inside me wanted to do it again.
But my father was also the biggest homophobe I’d ever met, and if he caught so much of a whiff that his only son was into guys, then we’d both be dead before either of us could blink.
Instead of stepping in and kissing Lynx while I stroked him through his pants, like I might have wanted to, I went eye to eye with him, reminding him who the fuck I was. I leaned in and murmured, “In this house, I only get on my knees to tie my shoelaces.”
Lynx wasn’t deterred. He just smirked at me. “There’s always my place.”
Okay, so mission “intimidate Lynx into respecting me” wasn’t exactly going to plan. Unsurprising, since my heart wasn’t in it. I sighed, deciding to just level with him. “I want you. We both know that. But I would also like to remain breathing. So we aren’t going to do this here.”
He shrugged. “Like I said, I have a place.”
Fuck, I wanted to say yes. But I wasn’t stupid. If I said yes now, I wasn’t waiting until Lynx and I could be alone. Fucking him there would lead to fucking him here. And I never fucked here, where my father and his nosy guards watched everything I did.
I shook my head and pushed past him. “My father is waiting.’
I could feel more than see his smirk.
I’d given Nyah the same look earlier and now I realized how fucking enraging it was.
In the hallway, Nyah’s door opened a moment after mine did.
I eyed her and instantly took out my frustrations with Lynx on her. “No tits out tonight? What a shame.” Sarcasm dripped from my words.
Her dress was some sort of high-necked thing. As fancy as my suit, but in a deep-blue satin.
It was a lot more elegant than the middle finger she flipped at me.
She spun on her heel and walked ahead of me down the hallway.
As soon as I caught a glimpse at her from behind, I knew exactly why she’d done it. I stifled a groan at the sight of her naked back, the dress dipping so low it was in grave danger of showing her ass crack.
Before I could think about it, I left Lynx to trail us and took four long strides to catch up with her, tucking her arm into mine. “You wear that dress for me, princess?”
“I wore it for your father.”
“You plan to tell my father you were naked in my bed last night?”
She stopped and stared at me. “Are you?”
I wasn’t that stupid. “No.”
She breathed out a sigh of relief and yanked her arm out of mine. “We have an understanding then.”
“Only because I value keeping my eyes. And if my father knew I’d seen you naked, he’d scoop them out with spoons. Along with any other man who’s seen you without your clothes on.” I glanced back at Lynx behind us. “Probably best you pretend you don’t know about that little tattoo of hers.”
A pink blush swept across Nyah’s back.
Lynx was polite enough, at least with her, not to say anything.
I led the other two through the house, to the wing my father used as his office and living quarters. At the heavy wooden door, I stopped short and forced myself not to take the deep, steadying breath my nervous system needed.
I’d hated this room ever since I was a kid.
Nothing good ever happened inside these walls, and I doubted that was about to change.
“Listen,” I said quietly, not directing my words at either of them individually, because both of them needed to hear it.
“Once we get inside, don’t speak unless you’re spoken to. Got it?”
Nyah scowled at me. “What, like we’re subpar citizens, not good enough to utter a sound in front of the king?”
I rolled my eyes, but it hid the worry that lit up inside me. She was too independent. Too sassy. While it amused me, my father was going to see it as a challenge.
Just like he had in Isabella. Just like he had with our mother.
I knew exactly how Carlos Guerra broke women who didn’t respect him. Men were easily dealt with. A simple gunshot to the temple took care of the problem.
But women he broke slowly. Painfully. With every harsh touch. Every cruel word.
Nyah might have thought she was tough enough to take on my father, but she was so very wrong.
I grabbed her arm roughly, hauling her around so she faced me. “Hear me when I say this, princess. Shut. Your. Mouth.”
Her eyes flashed venom at me.
Good. She could hate me all she wanted, as long as she kept that side of herself directed at me and not my father. Something inside me enjoyed it anyway. Lit up at the fire in her eyes. My dick gave warning that I was going to get hard if she kept looking at me like that.
It was just one way I was different than my father.
I liked a woman who could challenge me.
But Nyah wasn’t my woman.
I let her arm go, and she snatched it back, pulling away from me.
Behind me, Lynx shifted his weight until his chest brushed my back. His voice was a whisper, so low Nyah wouldn’t have heard, and yet his tone was a dark threat. “That’s the first and last time you’ll touch her like that. You understand me, Mr. Guerra?”
I ground my teeth, irritation rolling down my spine. I hadn’t hurt her. I’d merely gotten her attention.
But since I had no intention of touching Nyah Matish again, I didn’t bother explaining that to him.
Fuck them both. I was trying to help them. If they didn’t want my help, they could go to hell.
I knocked twice on the door and waited until it opened.
I didn’t acknowledge any of the other men in the room, though I was well aware of Enzo, my father’s youngest brother.
He was barely ten years older than I was, and I hadn’t seen him for years.
His presence here sent a trickle of dread down my spine.
But I kept my gaze focused on my father, sitting behind an elegant mahogany desk big enough to fuck on.
An image of lying Nyah out on that desk and taking her hard popped into my mind. Thanks to last night, I knew exactly what she’d look like spread out on it like a feast.
I’d been more into guys for the past few years. I couldn’t remember the last time a woman had made me feel anything.
Trust me to get a hard-on for the most unavailable woman on the planet.
It would pass. She’d marry my father, I’d throw myself into my work, and hopefully I’d only have to see her at events. And by then, she’d be on my father’s arm, wearing his ring, completely his property.
I said nothing, just like I’d warned the others. And thankfully, they followed suit, all three of us standing there waiting for my father to pay attention to us.
A glass of half-drunk whiskey sat to his left, a thick cigar in an ashtray next to it, the scent of its smoke lingering in the stillness of the room. He scribbled the expensive pen across a page, dotting a period at the end of whatever he was writing, and only then did he acknowledge our presence.
I stifled the urge to roll my eyes. I’d seen this act a million times. This show of power. Like we weren’t worth his time.
He focused on Nyah first, his gaze turning hot and drifting down her body.
The urge to step in front of her so he couldn’t see her surprised me. I beat it down, even though my fingers twitched to wrap around her wrist again. This time protecting her, rather than just getting her attention.