Chapter 9
Aurora was trying her hardest to remain unaffected, but I saw a flicker or two of realization in her eyes as she briefly entertained that my words might be true.
They were, and I had the evidence to prove it, but I knew she didn’t want to admit that she might’ve actually suspected something similar over the years.
True to what I was quickly realizing, she huffed softly. “You’re lying, and I won’t stand here and listen to—”
“I did say a picture was worth a thousand words.” As she stared up at me with a stupefied expression, I retrieved my cell phone from my pocket, then pulled up a photograph of her precious Drake on Halloween night with another woman.
I’d been watching her for a few weeks as I’d tried to come up with a foolproof way to get my hands on her, and in doing so, I’d anticipated having to show her the truth about her life at some point.
As I stared down at the redhead in a French maid’s outfit, I held my cell phone up to her, but not close enough to where she could grab it.
She turned her head with such irritation, then gasped as she stared at the picture of the redhead riding her boyfriend, or wanna be fiancé.
Her bottom lip slightly quivered as she was presented with the proof.
It was a similar look that others would have once they were taken prisoner and thrown into a Brannington dungeon.
Her head shook slightly, and the moment she went to touch my cell phone, I pulled it back out of her reach. She stared up at me with wounded, but not broken eyes.
“That could’ve been doctored. There’s no way Brae would ever have sex with him. She doesn’t even like him.”
Brae, as in Braelynn. The girl was supposed to be Aurora’s best friend, but with ones like that, who needed enemies.
“You don’t have to like someone to have sex, Aurora,” I pointed out to her.
“Yes, you do because—”
“I’d fuck you where we stand, audience included, and I don’t like you. And on the contrary, you’d ride my fucking cock while not liking me. But, I digress...” I said and returned to my cell phone as she stared open-mouthed at me.
I flipped to another picture, this time from the strip club Drake often frequented.
It wasn’t one of the more exclusive ones, and, in fact, was even located outside the city limits.
It allowed a lot more than most clubs did, and when she seemed unaffected by that, I flipped to the next, which happened to be a video.
I’d watched the various video clips quite a few times, which was the reason I knew Drake would allow Aurora to be used as a chip during that poker game.
He might’ve cared about her, but he certainly didn’t love her.
If he had, he wouldn’t have had one dancer on her knees between his legs as she sucked him off and another grinding bottomless against his mouth.
The quivering of those fuckable lips increased, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she started to cry. To her credit, she didn’t. Instead, she turned away from it and stared angrily at me. The look in her eyes betrayed the “I don’t believe you” energy she was trying her hardest to put off.
“W-why are you doing this to me?” she finally asked softly.
I looked over her shoulder at the two men. “Would you both leave us be?”
“Sure thing, Boss,” both Conor and Liam said in unison, and I waited for them to step outside before I turned back to the blonde.
She was nervously pulling at the long, straight strands of blonde framing her face as her striking blue eyes glistened with unshed tears. Her luscious fucking lips still held a slight quiver to them, and I felt the overwhelming desire to lean in and press my mouth to hers.
I didn’t even enjoy kissing all that often.
That was something I hardly ever did, but I wanted to now.
This girl had the potential to fuck my life up in ways I hadn’t even considered when agreeing to secure her for Kingston and Cillian.
Aurora was unlike any of the women I often fucked.
She was even more breakable, but never looked it more than she did now.
And that was a turn on I was finding very hard to resist.
“Why?” she asked me once more.
“Let me tell you a story, Bellezza. Once—”
“What does that mean?” she asked me.
I shook my head. “That’s unimportant right now.
Back to my story. Now, where was I? Oh, yes.
Once upon a time, let’s just use last night, for example, a weak coward with a gambling addiction sat down opposite me.
He already owed a considerable sum of money to my family, then proceeded to try to beat me, even agreeing to use his unsuspecting girlfriend as a chip in the game.
Lo and behold, he lost the hand, his money, and the girl. ”
She started to shake her head profusely. “He wouldn’t.”
“But he did, and since I’m a man with very little patience, I wanted my prize right away. A few text messages from the man to his girl, and she stepped into a parking garage and into my car. Now, she is all mine just as he’d promised she would be.”
“I’m not yours,” she said to me, and I shrugged nonchalantly.
“Maybe not in the ways I want just yet, but we have some time.”
“Asshole,” she said while shooting daggers at me.
“Back to our story time. Said girl is now delusional as she believes her prince will ride in to save her, all the while he went to a strip club where the usual girls took what little money he had left as they fucked the small dick fucker.”
“You’re wrong.”
“About which part? His small dick, or the fact that while you were being handed over to me to do with you whatever I wanted, he was getting off with other women. I do have videos I can show you of that if you—”
“Noooo,” she cried out as she dropped her face into her hands.
This time, she did start to cry, and I turned away as she began to openly sob into those hands.
Her voice was etched with pain, and the kind I lived to derive from others.
For some damn reason, I wasn’t gaining any pleasure from it at this moment because her bad morning was about to become even worse.
“And that’s not all,” I finally said to her after I’d walked to the kitchen and retrieved a bottle of water from the refrigerator for her. I had also gotten myself one, and after handing Aurora hers, I downed mine in a few large sips before turning my focus back on her.
She was eyeing the bottle suspiciously and I cursed. “For fuck’s sake. I didn’t poison the fucking thing. Drink because you’re as white as a damn sheet. I need you alive for what comes next.”
She slowly removed the cap from the bottle. “What comes next?” she asked as she took a small swallow of hers.
“You’ll be handed off to the man you’ll marry.”
She sputtered at that, and the small amount of water was spit out. “What?”
“Don’t be so surprised. It’s a common thing in our world.”
“Our world? This isn’t the seventeenth century.”
“Ahh, you still believe you’re just the daughter of Noel and Samantha Winslow.”
“I am,” she told me. “They adopted me when I was just a few days old.”
“I’m aware of that, Bellezza. As I said last night, I know more about you than you know about yourself. Let me continue.”
She shifted on the couch, but kept her icy cold eyes on me. She wanted to freeze me out and maybe even cut with their icy shards, but instead, her determination to merely crack but not break was making me hotter and more aroused by the minute.
“Very well. I’m sure you’ve never searched for your birth parents. Your mother you would never find, but your father...”
A few seconds passed after my pause, and I watched the small lump in her throat as she swallowed. Finally, she spoke in the same soft voice. “Do you know who my birth father is? And did he put you up to this?”
“Yes, and absolutely not. You, Bellezza, are the daughter of what used to be one of the most powerful men in Sicily. While pregnant, your mother fled your father’s home and came to America, where she gave birth to you, then handed you off to an affluent couple in a secret adoption.
She was then located, brought back to Palermo, and brutally murdered for her betrayal.
All your father had of you was a hospital bracelet from a New Jersey hospital showing your gender, height, and weight. ”
She took another few sips of her water, and each time I tried to snag her gaze, she’d immediately look away.
The energy radiating off her was confusing.
Somehow, I think that I’d just filled in blanks she had always known, and as if to confirm my suspicions, she cleared her throat and finally looked into my eyes.
“I already knew I was adopted.”
“I surmised as much,” I responded.
“And my so-called father, what does he do?”
“He heads up a branch of the Cosa Nostra in Palermo.”
“What’s that?” she asked.
“Sicilian Mafia. I’ve always heard that most girls grow up wanting to become princesses. Congratulations, Aurora. Today is the day you become a Mafia princess. And soon, you’ll be upgraded to a queen, but in the Russian Bratva instead.”