15. Tommaso
TOMMASO
Everything is hazy. All I know as I start to wake up is that my entire fucking body hurts. I don’t remember anything about how I got here, or where I am. Not while my eyes are still closed and I’m simply lying on my back.
What was I doing before this?
Suddenly the image of Alek running toward me in a dark alley comes to me. I gasp as my eyes shoot open.
“Aleksandr,” I croak out.
I hear a shifting beside me. The creaking of springs. "I'm right here." Alek's voice is quiet but close. As my eyes start to focus, I realize we're in his room at the underground base.
The dim off-white light above my head bounces off the dusty concrete walls around me.
At first, a panic rises in my chest as I remember what I’d been up to.
Going after the Carvels on the street. I remember confronting them, asking them what their real plans were with the Bianchis and how they expected to beat us.
More than that, I remember their fists slamming into my face over and over again.
Normally, going after two people isn’t such a big deal for me—I’m known for fighting more than one person at a time—but tonight…
I was off. It was like my head was somewhere else entirely.
I was so worked up that I didn’t realize they had me surrounded and before I could draw my gun, I was on the ground.
I start to move from my place on the bed, but Alek puts a hand on my chest and stops me.
“Don’t move,” he demands. “You need stitches in a few places.” I can hear the sound of him rooting around in a metal tin, the clangs soft and hollow.
I groan softly and lift one of my hands to rub it over my face. I can feel the bruises there, tender and aching, and the sting of my busted open skin. My tongue darts along my bottom lip.
“How did you find me?” I ask him, my voice horse.
He clicks his tongue. “How did I find you?” he mumbles. “That’s really what you have to ask me?”
I feel his hands on my stomach as he pulls my shirt up and I hiss as he sticks the suturing needle into my flesh. I don’t remember being sliced up in that area, but I don’t remember a lot after one of them bashed my head against the asphalt in the middle of the alleyway.
“What else should I ask?” I suck in a breath through my teeth.
Alek stitches me up slow and meticulously, and I can tell he’s done this before. It’s not the shoddy work of someone who only vaguely knows what they’re doing.
“Maybe how I managed to get you here,” he tells me. “How you’re even alive.”
“I can guess that,” I mumble. “If they were still alive, I wouldn’t be here. So, you killed them.”
“Yes, I did,” Alek growls out as he finishes up the last stitch and pulls it tight. The pain flutters up my abdomen but I ignore it. It’s not even remotely the worst thing I’ve ever felt.
“If I hadn’t gotten there when I did, you’d be dead, Tommy,” he tells me.
“I know,” I reply.
“No, you don’t know,” Alek huffs as he grabs more thread and grabs my opposite arm by the wrist, pulling it straight. “When I got there, they had you by the arms dragging your body to do God fucking knows what. I thought…”
“What?”
“I thought you were already dead.”
It’s silent as he begins suturing up the wound on my arm, and I close my eyes as I feel the needle doing in and out of my flesh without an ounce of medication to numb it.
“Well, I wasn’t,” I say.
“No, but you could’ve been,” he growls at me, and I open my eyes just in time to look deep into his. “Going after them was a stupid idea.”
“It wasn’t exactly an idea, I just…” I trail off, my head going a bit dizzy.
“You just did it. You decided you didn’t want to wait on the plan. You were going to take it into your own hands no matter who got hurt or what happened.” Alek pulls the final stitch tight and tosses the used instruments and thread into the nearby trash.
“Those fuckers need to pay,” I say, my voice rough.
“At the cost of your life?” he asks me. “What exactly did you expect to happen? You would convince them not to make a deal with the Bianchis by kicking their ass?” He stares down at me with rage flaring in his eyes.
There’s something else there though. Fear.
“Maybe it would’ve worked,” I insist. “Maybe if it was more than just me fighting. If it was all of us against them. I can’t do this all on my own, Alek.” My throat tightens. I try to sit up, but my body aches, and Alek’s hand moves to my shoulder.
“Don’t try to get up. They got you good,” he whispers. There’s a certain softness in his voice that I’m not used to. That I’ve never heard before. “You’re the one who went off on your own.”
“Because no one else would come with me.” My face scrunches up in frustration. “No one else understands that they’re not going to just talk to us and make nice. They want to fucking kill us. If they side with the Bianchi, they’re going to do just that.”
“They’ve already sided with them,” Alek explains. “You know that. They’ve already made a deal for their weapons and safety.”
“Carmine thinks it can be changed,” I tell him. “He thinks we can talk to the Carvels and get them to change their minds.”
“They won’t listen to us anymore than the Bianchis will,” Alek says with a sigh.
“That’s what I’m trying to get them to understand. That’s why I went after the Carvels. Talking to them won’t work and someone has to show them that they can’t get away with this shit.” I push up on my arms despite Alek’s warning, and sit up. Not wanting to lay here like an invalid anymore.
“And it just had to be you?” Alek asks me.
I stare at him. “Who else?” My eyes shift down to his lips and back up to his eyes. “Why do you care so much what happens to me?”
“God,” he shakes his head and looks at the floor for a moment before meeting my gaze again. He leans in close to me. “Someone has to.”
I feel his breath against my face and it causes goosebumps to rise on my skin.
“I don’t want to argue with you,” I say.
Alek moves away from me, standing up from the bed and raking his fingers through his long hair.
“Fine. I’ll leave. You rest.” He’s not asking me if I want him to leave, he’s telling me how things are.
His voice low and cold. I hate the way he won’t look at me now.
The way his eyes shift about the room and land on everything but me.
“No,” I whisper. “I…I don’t want you to leave.” My voice sounds smaller and more vulnerable than I’m comfortable with, and I look away from him too.
“What happened to don’t come to you unless I have information?” Alek asks me.
I bite down on the inside of my cheek for a moment. “I shouldn’t have said that,” I insist. “I was an idiot.”
“Maybe you were right,” he says. “Maybe we shouldn’t see each other unless it’s about business. It’s dangerous. I could’ve been outed tonight if I hadn’t killed those two. Even then…maybe someone saw us.”
I shake my head. “I don’t care if it’s dangerous,” I decide.
“What changed your mind?” Alek asks.
I take a deep breath and finally look at him. He’s still not looking at me and it’s driving me crazy. “Can you at least look at me?” I keep my eyes on his face. “Please, Alek. Just look at me.”
Alek’s gaze finally drifts over to mind, and I see hurt there. A hurt that I’m almost certain I caused. My heart aches.
“I can’t stand the thought of something happening to you while I’m not around,” I admit. “And I…I don’t think I can stand the idea of anyone else having you.”
“That’s selfish, isn’t it?” Alek steps toward the bed. The heat in the room rises, along with the tension. The air thick and warm.
“Fuck if it is,” I say, a growl emanating from low in my chest. “Does it matter?”
Alek sits down on the bed beside me, leaning toward me. “Maybe I’m selfish too,” he says. “Because the thought of you with anyone else makes me want to fucking kill someone.” His jaw tightens.
I lift my uninjured arm and brush my fingers along his jawline. “I would kill for you,” I tell him.
Alek leans in even closer and his nose brushes against mine. “I would die for you, Tommaso.”
His lips capture mine in a firm embrace. It’s a deep and possessive kiss. It makes the bruises on my face hurt, but I don’t fucking care. I press myself closer to him and kiss him back just as fervently.
Alek slips his tongue into my mouth with ease, and I follow his lead. Letting him dominate the kiss. Something about it is different than before. More emotional. His hands slide onto my sides and I feel his thumbs caress my skin through the fabric of my shirt. Every inch of me flushes with heat.
I dance my tongue around his, but let him push his tongue against mine greedily, and moan into the kiss.
When I try to wrap my arms around him, the pain makes me flinch. Alek pulls back from the kiss and I lean in trying to stop him, but fail.
“You’re injured,” he whispers. “You shouldn’t…” He trails off, and his eyes flick down to my lap.
My cock throbs within my jeans and the fabric confining it hurts. Every part of me, even the bruised and bloody parts, want Alek.
“I want to feel you against me,” I tell him. “I need to feel you.”
I brush my fingers over his shoulder and down his chest to his groin, feeling his own erection there. It sends a shiver down my spine.
“Let me take care of you,” Alek says. “Let me worship you, Tommaso. Every single inch of you.” He leans back in and kisses me; his lips suck on my bottom lip until it starts to bleed again. His tongue trails along the wound and he licks the blood up as though it’s what he craves.
I moan into the kiss and let myself melt into him.
“Anything,” I whisper against his mouth. “Anything you want, Alek.”
Suddenly my blood-stained shirt is being pulled over my head and arms and tossed to the side. Alek’s head dips down to my neck and he kisses along the bruised sensitive skin there.
Each kiss ignites a fire within me. His tongue licks and laps at my skin from the crook of my neck to the front of my throat where he finally sucks me into his mouth and leaves a bright red mark of his own there.