Chapter 10
Soren
If I’d known I was going to be fucking Carmine Dresvanni at the crack of dawn, I would’ve brought a lunch box or something. I’m fucking starving as I make my way through town to the Carvels’ house.
The first thing I’m going to do when I get back home is make a massive sandwich and shove it in my face. Or, maybe I’ll order a pizza on the way back…
Damnit, I’m spending way too much time thinking about food and not enough time thinking about the hell just happened.
I absolutely railed Carmine on a couch in a Dresvanni warehouse, only for him to have some kind of emotional outburst afterward.
Honestly, I’m not surprised. I really shouldn’t be at least. The guy is going through it.
That’s not what concerns me. Well, okay, it’s not the only thing that concerns me.
If my uncle finds out what I did with Carmine, who knows what he’ll want me to do next. He could demand that I seduce him to death just as easily as he could order me to stay away from him…
Maybe I should.
Maybe it’s more of a risk than I should be taking…getting close to Carmine like this.
It’s what I’m supposed to be doing, but there’s just one problem.
I like it.
As I head up the driveway only to pound on the Carvel family’s door, I’m thinking about seeing Carmine again.
Watching all of his blood that’s not in his dick go to his face.
Flushing him pink and splotchy as I pound into him.
As I wrap my large hand around his throat and squeeze until he’s gasping for air.
I wonder… Can I make him beg? How desperate could I make the man who can’t admit he likes what we did together?
How much blood could I spill before he begged me to lick it up?
What dark and depraved things run through his mind?
Or do they?
They have to. I refuse to believe I’m the only one thinking about killing and fucking him in the same moment.
About screwing him until he’s limp and pressing a blade to his throat…
Maybe I am.
Maybe I’m the one who doesn’t know what I really want.
Shouldn’t be feeling these things.
Soren had said that. That he shouldn’t be feeling what he is. Thinking. Wanting. Liking.
Perhaps I’m not alone in the dark desires I feel when I look at him.
“What the hell do you want?” Victoria answers the door and knocks me out of my thoughts.
I push through the doorway with one hand on her shoulder.
“Hey!”
A singular guard rushes over, pulls out his gun, and points it in my direction. “Come any further and—”
I roll my eyes. “That ain’t the first gun I’ve had pointed at my head today, and it probably won’t be the last, put that thing away.” I turn to Victoria. “I’m not here to cause trouble.”
“All you do is cause trouble,” she insists.
“Last time it was you and Jackson tryin’ to cause it,” I remind her. “Where is he anyway?”
“As if you care,” she accuses me. “He’s…not here right now.”
Good, she’s not admitting he’s missing yet. At least, to outsiders.
“That’s fine, I’m here to talk to Antonio,” I tell her.
The guard still hasn’t put his gun away. “Why should we let you?” he asks.
“One, two of my family is packing more heat than your entire bloodline combined. Two, we’re not enemies. But we do have a common one.”
Victoria scoffs. “The Dresvanni? I thought y’all were helping them out. Getting all buddy buddy.”
“That’s what we want everyone to think, including them,” I tell her. “Eivor has a plan, and…against all rational judgement, he wants you to be a part of it.”
She blinks and a smirk pulls at her face, eyes brightening. “Me?”
“No, Victoria, not you specifically,” I roll my eyes. “Your fuckin’ family. So I need to talk to Antonio.”
“Whatever you want to say to Antonio, you can say to me first,” she insists.
“She’s right. You’re not coming any further before you explain yourself completely,” the guard tells me.
“How’s this for explaining… The Dresvanni have plans to kick your asses outta here,” I say while shoving my hands in my pockets.
Victoria looks at the guard and then waves a hand. He puts the gun away. She looks to me again.
“What exactly do they have planned?”
Talking to Antonio Carvel is like talking to a brick wall. Everything I said seemed to go in one ear and out the other; he’s old, incredibly old, but he’s still alive and therefore he’s still the head of the family.
It’s his younger daughter, Antonia, named after him of course, who really runs the show. She just lets him think he is.
I need all of them to think they’re running this show. The Carvels, the Dresvanni… all of them need to believe that me and the rest of the Fiorellis are on their side and their side alone.
It’s an exhausting process, getting the Carvels to believe me.
To look past their inbred stupidity and find some kind of brain cell in there to cling to the information.
The idea that one of the most powerful families in Italy wants to wipe them from the map and make like their history never existed, though, that’s enough to get them to work with me whether they trust me or not.
They’re not willing to risk it.
Nevertheless, by the time I get home and fall into bed, it’s almost night time.
I check my phone only to see a text from Carmine.
Staying in. Don’t need you watching.
Thank fuck. I need a night’s sleep, maybe a full twenty-four hours actually.
I shoot him a quick reply.
Got it. Stay outta trouble.
There’s very little trouble he can get into in his own mansion, but as I saw in the library on the camera the night before, there’s at least some.
I shuffle out of my clothing until I’m ass naked and crawl under the covers.
It’s so easy to fall asleep after everything that’s happened in the last 24 hours, but as I fall asleep, I think about the pain in Carmine’s eyes.
Secrets that linger there, unknown, untold.
It strikes me as I’m drifting off that maybe what this is all about is simpler than I realized.
Someone hurt Carmine.
Someone hurt him, and he’s still suffering the consequences.
A burden I know all to well.
Guilt climbs me.
I shouldn’t care about this. I shouldn’t care about him.
After what I set up this afternoon…there’s no turning back.
Right?
“How often am I going to have to see your face?” Alessio Dresvanni says as I’m walking through the front door. He looks even more exhausted than Carmine usually does.
“Forever baby,” I smirk crookedly.
I look to the side and see Carmine standing there, his expression looks conflicted, and his hands are curled, almost in fists.
“Ugh. Just…please promise me if you rip each others faces off, do it outside. We don’t need any more décor smashed,” Alessio mumbles before disappearing in the other direction.
“Can’t promise anything,” I reply in the same tone.
Carmine sighs and motions me down the hallway. “Come on. We need to talk.”
“Oh, talk. How very serious of you,” I say as I follow him into his office. His private study that’s hardly been changed since his father’s death. I know because I’ve been keeping an eye on any changes around the house. It’s good to know my surroundings.
“What’s your problem today?” he asks me as he shuts the door once we’ve both stepped inside.
“My problem?” I ask him. “The last time I saw you, you were acting like you were ready to call this whole thing off.”
He scoffs. “No. I might not want to…engage in that again, but this is all more important than that.”
“Engage…” I mumble. “I guess you could call it that.” I sit down in the chair on the opposite side of the desk while he sits in his.
He’s pouring himself a drink.
“You need that?” I ask.
He glares at me. “Yes, I do.”
To his credit, he does look a bit better. Not like shit warmed over and stepped on.
“It’s been two days. I need to know what you spoke to the Carvels about,” Carmine insists.
“You’re counting the days then? You could have come over,” I remind him.
He shakes his head. “I’m not doing this today. Just tell me how the conversation went.”
I eye him. I know I need to tell him. Lie to him.
Set him up for failure beyond what he could even be imagining.
I’m not ready yet.
I need more time.
“How ‘bout you tell me something first?” I ask him.
His brow furrows and he takes a sip. “Such as?” I watch his tongue dart along his lips.
“Why you reacted that way in the warehouse,” I reply.
He clears his throat. “Like what?”
“Like you were ready to burst into fuckin’ tears…or flames,” I remind him. I don’t break eye contact with him.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says. “We spoke at the warehouse, we parted ways. Nothing happened.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Now, who has the problem?” I reach for one of the empty glasses on the desk. “I need that drink.”
“I’m not sure why you care anyway,” he adds, but pours me a double while he’s talking.
“When I fuck a man and he cries after, it concerns me, Carm.” I take the glass and down it. It’s smooth going down, just a slight burn that settles in my stomach.
“I told you not to call me that,” he hisses, his voice low. “And keep your fucking mouth shut about that.”
“Why?” I ask. “What about it is so bad, so wrong?” I ask him.
I stand up from the chair and round the desk. I press my hand to the wood and lean down closer to him. “What aren’t you allowed to want?”
“I’m allowed to do and want whatever I want,” he snaps at me. “I’m in charge.”
“You weren’t that night,” I remind him. “I was, and based on the load you shot onto your own stomach, I’d say you were pretty into it.”
His face flushes deep red and his grip on his glass turns his knuckles white. He looks toward the door.
“It was a mistake,” he insists. “Letting you be in charge of anything is a bad idea.”
“I don’t think so.” My voice is low.
Carmine tries to stand up but I put my other hand on his chest and push him back down into the leather desk chair.
“What do you want from me?” Carmine growls.
I lean down closer to him. “I want you to tell me what you want,” I whisper. “Tell me what you think about when you see me.”