Chapter 12
12
COEN
Well played.
T he two words scrawled across the king of hearts stare back at me.
Taunting me.
Making everything that happened last night, all that I shared with Allegra into a trivial joke—just another fucking game to her.
I flip the card between my fingers, gritting my jaw so hard that it actually hurts, my brain stuck in a constant loop of feeling like a fucking idiot since the moment I found the card sitting on the nightstand when I woke this morning—to an empty bed where Allegra should have been.
All I found were cold sheets and this even colder note.
It’s not that I really expected her to stay long…
But I hadn’t anticipated her not even saying goodbye.
She just…vanished.
Into thin air.
As if she were merely a figment of my imagination.
The only proof I have that any of it happened was the taste of her on my tongue and the smell of us on my sheets. And this damn note .
Whatever the fuck it’s supposed to be…
A goodbye.
A fuck you.
A threat.
I slide the card into my back pocket before making my way up the stairs to Mom and Dad’s porch. Bright flowers spill out of the planters, and Mom’s swing sways lightly in the morning breeze.
Peaceful.
Home.
The old Victorian house Dad meticulously renovated will always be that, no matter how long I’ve lived on my own. No matter how far away I travel, chasing a game or seeking an escape. No matter how restless I may get staying here for too long, this place is where I’ll return.
Always.
I punch the access code into the electronic lock and push the door open. “Mom? Dad?”
Stepping in, I pause and wait for any signs that they’re still here.
Dad is supposed to be “retiring” and limiting his time at the office, but we all know that isn’t really happening, much to Mom’s chagrin. And she shows absolutely no signs of even considering leaving her job at the hospital, so this is about the time of morning they start taking off.
I hope I caught him…
This isn’t a conversation I want to have in front of Isaac at the office.
Mom pokes her head out from the kitchen at the back of the house. “Coen, what are you doing here?”
I close the door behind me and approach as she sets down her coffee mug on the counter. “I needed to talk to Dad.”
Her eyes narrow, the green flashing with immediate concern. Is everything okay?”
No, not at all.
Nothing has been okay for a very long time.
And I don’t even have the guts to go to Uncle Savage and Gabe and tell them about my unexpected visit from Satriano.
I’ll let Dad do the dirty work.
He can relay all the relevant information from the shakedown. After all, he’s the only one who could ever really understand how I got into a position like this. He can’t judge me—much—considering what he did for Abello all those years ago.
At least, that’s my hope.
A sliver of understanding.
I certainly won’t get it anywhere else.
Every day I’ve been back, it has been like walking on eggshells around everyone, with them all watching me with that look in their eyes, as if they expect me to break at any point.
Or they’re waiting for the other shoe to fall.
Mom squeezes me tightly, then pulls back, searching my face, clasping my cheeks between her palms—fully in doctor mom mode now. That look is all too familiar. The one she wears when she knows there’s something wrong and she’s desperate to fix it with a hug, a long talk, or medication, if necessary.
Her intelligent eyes look for any signs of illness or injury. “Baby, you’re worrying me.”
I force a tight smile. “I’m okay, really. It’s been good being back, working at the hotel…”
It isn’t a complete lie.
I actually enjoy it there far more than I have any of the other Hawke establishments I’ve spent time in over the years, slinging drinks, helping wait tables, managing other employees at the various businesses.
Maybe it’s because it’s a casino; somehow, it feels more like home after how much time I’ve basically lived in them. Maybe it’s knowing how important the success of Hawke Hotel is to everyone. Or maybe it’s just because what I do there—help put out fires and manage the property—feels like something I’m actually good at.
Mom doesn’t appear convinced, though.
Squeezing her wrists, I pull her hands down. “Really.”
She lets out a long sigh as footsteps sound on the stairs, interrupting whatever medical rundown she would have probably given me otherwise.
Every muscle in my body tenses, waiting, and I turn to see Dad making his way down slowly. Left hand braced on the banister. Right on the cane he now needs, since one of Satriano’s bullets tore through his hip and damaged the nerves in his leg.
His gaze lands on me and narrows immediately. “Is everything okay?”
Because I would never just be here to say hello to him and Mom…
If I’m here, it means I’ve fucked up again. He doesn’t say that, but he doesn’t have to. The look he’s giving me—and the one Mom did the moment I walked in the door—is enough to convey it loud and clear.
Mom sighs, squeezing my arm before stepping away to the counter and grabbing her coffee again. “He says it is but that he needs to talk to you about something.”
Dad finally reaches the bottom step and makes his way into the kitchen, glancing back at me. “Coffee?”
I shake my head. “No thanks. I’m going to stop by the Grind before I head to the hotel.”
He sets to work making it while Mom downs whatever is left in her mug, sets it in the sink, and gathers her purse from the stool at the counter. “Well, I was just on my way to the hospital, but if you need me to stay?—”
“No, Mom. I appreciate the concern, but?—”
She holds up a hand. “Don’t you tell me it is unwarranted or that I’m overreacting. You disappeared for a month , Coen. Not even a damn phone call to tell us you were all right and not dead at the bottom of the ocean or being tortured in Satriano’s dungeon somewhere. Don’t ever do something like that to me again.”
There it is.
One of those things people haven’t been saying but that I can see in their eyes. Hearing her finally voice it makes my chest tighten—the guilt threatening to suffocate me.
Of all the people I left behind when I disappeared from the wedding, Mom was the hardest for me.
And apparently it was for her, too.
I’m surprised it’s taken her this long to finally unleash on me.
Nora Hawke doesn’t get angry often, but when she does, no one wants to be on the receiving end of it. But staring at her tear-soaked eyes now, I can see that she isn’t angry.
She’s devastated that I did it and terrified I’ll do it again.
With good reason.
We all understand this is far from over.
“I won’t, Mom…”
My reassurance seems hollow when I don’t really know what Satriano will demand from me, but it’s the best I can offer her at this point.
Some of the pain melts away from her face, and she kisses my cheek and heads over to Dad. He tugs her into his arms, pulling her fully against him, then dips his head and whispers something into her ear that I can’t hear. It has her cheeks pinkening before she kisses him gently.
“I’ll see you later.” She winks. “And I’ll hold you to that.”
I look away from them, focusing on the patterned tile rather than their affectionate display.
At least it improved her mood.
She slips out the back door to head to the carriage house where her car is parked, and I lower myself onto one of the stools while Dad stands across from me with his own mug, resting his cane against the marble countertop.
He takes a sip, eyeing me over the rim. “So, what did you need to talk to me about?”
I sigh, scrubbing my hand over my face.
Is it too early to drink?
The man in front of me would tear me a new asshole for even joking about that, given his sordid history, but this would be easier with some liquid courage.
It was hard enough being at dinner last night and not saying anything, not letting them know that Satriano had finally made an appearance—and his first demand. I couldn’t do it before Allegra arrived. If I had, the entire night would have been focused on that , and I don’t need her dragged into my mess.
But there isn’t any running from it anymore.
I have to tell him.
“Satriano came to see me.”
His entire body stiffens, his hand tightening its grip on the mug. “When?”
Clearing my throat, I avert my gaze rather than see the inevitable reaction. “Saturday night.”
“And you’re just telling me now?”
I glance up at him and see the smoldering mix of concern and anger in his blue eyes. “I didn’t want to ruin Sunday dinner, especially with Allegra there. She doesn’t need to get pulled into this bullshit.”
Apparently, I didn’t need to worry about it, since she intended on leaving without warning the entire time.
He presses his lips together in a firm line, a muscle in his jaw ticcing wildly as he stares me down. “What did he say?”
Not a lot.
And that’s what has been bothering me since the moment he walked out of my place.
I rub the back of my neck, staring out the window that overlooks the garden in the back where Isaac and I spent most of our childhood. “Well, he wants his money…”
“And then?”
Releasing a little sigh, I turn back to Dad. “And then, he wants me to help him stack games at his casinos.”
Dad’s brow furrows deeply. “ His casinos?”
I nod slowly. “Apparently, he’s been buying them up along the Gulf Coast.”
And he knew I would tell the rest of the Hawkes about this development.
It wasn’t by chance that the man appeared when he did. I’ve been home for over a week, and he chose that moment to come to my place for a reason. Just like he chose now to let it be known what he’s been up to—becoming our biggest competitor.
“Shit.” Dad scrubs his hand over his cheek. “How did we not know about this?”
“How does he get away with any of this without us knowing what’s going on?”
“I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise.” Dad leans his hip against the counter, relaxing slightly, but really, I know he’s just taking the weight off his bad leg. “After all, this shit with him all started with him trying to partner with Cass when he was Falco Enterprises to open the hotel casino across from us. It makes sense he wouldn’t completely abandon that business plan. It’s a surefire way to fuck with us. And there is a lot of money in it…”
“And a lot of ways to rig the system in his favor on the casino floor.”
Dad’s eyes meet mine, and he nods.
The more I think about it, the more obvious this move becomes. And the dumber I feel for not having seen it coming. “There’s a reason the mob went to Vegas and dug their heels in. And apparently, Damon thinks that bringing me in to play and stack the tables is going to help his bottom line.”
“Well”—Dad sighs—“I suppose there are worse things he could ask you to do…”
That’s exactly what worries me.
Satriano won’t battle us for supremacy in this hotel and casino war. He will just eliminate us any way he can—and now he has an inside man.
“It’s too easy, Dad.”
He nods, his salt-and-pepper hair shifting with the movement as he sets his mug in front of him on the counter. “I know, son.”
“This is only the beginning.”
Without any way of anticipating what his end game might be.
We’ve never been able to, when it comes to Satriano. He appeared from the literal grave after Isaac killed Leonardo and slowly worked his way into our lives while observing us undetected. Then he struck—hard and fast—and caused irreparable damage in his bid to take over New Orleans from Roselli.
Each blow hurt the Hawkes more and more.
Dad is living proof of the damage he caused.
Yet, the man continues to string us along. To play us in some sinister chess game where we can’t see the board or strategize our next moves.
“You haven’t told anyone else about meeting with him?”
I shake my head. “I didn’t know how to. I can’t—” Emotion lodges in my throat, and I try to swallow past it. “I can’t keep apologizing when nothing’s getting better. Things are only getting worse…”
My hands start to shake, all the frustration and guilt and need to destroy the man who now has me in a chokehold finally boiling over.
“Fuck!”
I grab Dad’s mug and chuck it across the kitchen.
It shatters against the tile, ceramic and coffee splattering across the pristine floor, the same way it feels like I’ve been splintered since the moment I made the biggest mistake of my life.
Dad barely flinches.
He casually glances at the damage. “I understand how you’re feeling, son. I’ve been there. How do you think I felt when I discovered what I had done? What those actions had wrought?”
Tears burn in my eyes, ones I’ve been holding back for months, refusing to let fall because it felt like caving, like surrendering. “What the fuck do I do? I can’t tell him no, and God only knows what he’ll ask of me next.”
Dad offers me a grim look. “You know we’ll figure something out. We always do. I’ll talk to everyone today. We’ll come up with a plan now that we know about his hotels. We’ll dig. We’ll find his weakness and a way to take him out.”
That reassurance should make me feel better, but somehow it doesn’t.
Mostly because no plan ever seems to be enough to counteract whatever Satriano is planning.
And something tells me it goes far beyond what he’s already asked of me.
* * *
ALLEGRA
The lock on the hotel room door beeps as I swipe my card across it. I push open the door and step in, letting it close behind me with a heavy click that seems to echo through the still, silent, impersonal space.
There’s nothing homey or friendly about it. Not at all like the warmth I felt in that penthouse at the Hawke Hotel.
This place is sterile.
Feels empty, despite being fully furnished with high-quality finishes and pricy accessories.
Still, I breathe a heavy sigh of relief at making it inside this door safely.
Thank God, I didn’t stay at the Hawke Hotel.
Coen would’ve come after me.
I know that without a shadow of a doubt.
At least this way, I have a chance of getting out of here without having to see him again. Without having to look into those infinite blue eyes and find all that passion that filled them last night, along with something far different than the hatred I found there when I arrived only two days ago.
Less than forty-eight hours since I touched down in NOLA.
Things changed.
We went too hard, too fast.
Like a runaway train, we barreled down an unknown track, completely unaware of where it led or what might await us at the end—and it turns out it was heartache.
For both of us.
Because I heard his words last night as I fell asleep.
His demand that I come clean and tell him everything.
As if it’s that easy.
I step farther into the suite, tossing my purse onto one of the chairs before I make my way into the bedroom and straight to the bathroom, kicking the door closed behind me and cranking on the water in the shower as hot as it’ll go.
It still won’t be able to match the scalding heat of that man.
Dammit.
The moment I left the Hawke Hotel on Saturday, I should have headed straight to the airport and flown back to New York. I should have ignored the pull to Coen. Declined the invitation to dinner from his family. Locked away my own desire to see him again and to learn more about him.
He was just supposed to be a mark.
But somehow, Coen Hawke has marked me.
He’s permanently seared himself into my skin, and I don’t know if it will ever be possible to shake him or this feeling.
I have to try.
And there’s only one way to do that—I have to put as much distance between us as possible and keep it that way.
The plane should be ready and waiting on the tarmac within an hour. With the car service already waiting for me outside after bringing me back here from Coen’s this morning, it won’t take long for me to flee New Orleans and put Coen Hawke squarely where he belongs—locked away in the mistakes of my past.
Steam starts to flood the bathroom, and I slip out of my dress, letting it fall to the floor so I can step under the hot spray.
I need to wash that man off me.
His touch…
His scent…
It’s already hard enough to think clearly without it clinging to me.
The thought of you walking around the rest of the day with my cum dripping out of you is pretty much the highlight of my existence up until now…
His words from the other night haunt me as if he were standing in the shower with me right now, saying them in my ear as he pumps inside me with purpose.
I reach between my legs and feel the evidence of last night, still slick inside me. Proof that it was real. That he was real. That the pleasure and connection were very, very real.
Maybe the only real thing in my life anymore when so much of it is acting and playing games.
“Fuck…”
Hot tears pool in my eyes, and I drop my forehead against the tile, letting the spray beat down on my shoulders and back. My limbs quiver with the memory of his touch, of his cock slamming into me, of the way his mouth moved over every inch of my body and centered right between my legs where my hand is now.
Dammit.
The throb.
The ache.
The need still lingers there.
Even after a night like that, I still want more.
Despite my best efforts not to give in to the need, my fingers roll across my clit of their own accord, knowing exactly what I crave.
A tiny moan slips from my lips, and I remember how it felt to have his hand there, those calloused fingertips, that wicked tongue…
All those sinful parts of him.
Coen Hawke is absolutely nothing like I thought he would be. How a man can be so intense, so brutal in so many ways, yet also bring so much pleasure is one giant mind fuck that I am not prepared to try to sort through. Nor do I have the time.
Need to leave.
But at this moment, another need overpowers that self-preservation instinct. I brush my fingers across my clit, my hips bucking at the sensation and memory of what he so expertly did there.
Rough.
Harsh.
So.
Fucking.
Good.
I slip two fingers inside me, rubbing my thumb over my clit as I thrust into myself, groaning at the feel of my already swollen flesh after an entire night under him, and over him, and in front of him. A glorious night of coming more times than I could even count…
My orgasm comes quickly, barreling through me, leaving me shaking and gasping under the waterfall.
I pull my trembling hand away, stepping back fully into the water and turning my face up to it.
It does nothing to wash away the memories that I feel are likely going to cling to me for far longer than I would like them to.
Leave.
The Hawkes are the type to go to great lengths to keep me here if they want me to remain in New Orleans. Coen could easily find me, using his connections and resources at the various hotels in town. Even though I’m here under a fake name, I don’t have any doubt he could track me down—given enough time.
And I need to be gone before he does.
I quickly shampoo and condition my hair, then scrub my body of the remnants of the man who will not be so easily forgotten from my dreams.
Don’t.
The more I think about it, about him , the harder it’s going to be to get on that plane. Already, the thought makes me almost queasy. I turn off the water, climb out of the shower, and towel off, wrapping myself in a big, fluffy hotel robe before tugging open the door and stepping out into the bedroom and the much cooler air.
Goosebumps immediately cover my skin, and I glance at the clock on the nightstand that seems to taunt me.
Each passing minute is one Coen could show up at my door.
I dig through my still-packed weekender bag and pull on a thong, a pair of leggings, and a loose T-shirt, then throw everything from the bathroom counter into my luggage.
It isn’t much, and it doesn’t take me long to be fully packed and ready to go.
Always be prepared to make a quick exit.
It was one of those life lessons that always seemed so strange as a child, but I finally understand its importance.
I step out into the living room portion of my suite to grab my purse and go meet the car outside, but I freeze at the familiar eyes staring at me from the chair across the space.
Icy.
Cold.
He leans back casually, but given the posture and what I know about the man, it’s anything but casual. This is an ambush, a very intentional one.
All I can do is stand here like a deer stuck in the headlights, watching them race closer while there’s nothing I can do to stop them or leap out of the way. “W-what are you doing here?”
One brow rises slowly. “I could ask you the same thing.”
Shit.
“I…thought you were out of town…”
The corners of his lips twitch, but it isn’t with amusement. It’s annoyance . I would recognize that look anywhere. “Is that why you came? Because you thought I wouldn’t know?”
“No—”
He doesn’t give me any time to object or explain further. “ Sit .”
My spine snaps to attention at the command in the single word, and I tighten my hand on the strap of my bag, desperate to cling to literally anything solid right now when it feels like everything is spinning out of control.
There isn’t any way to escape what’s about to happen.
Too much has already been set in motion.
Things I can’t take back.
I was so terrified about Coen finding me, about him confronting him about last night and why I ran this morning.
But I was worried about the wrong person…
Slowly, I lower myself into one of the chairs facing him, and his gaze rakes over me, assessing and finding me wanting.
My unexpected visitor releases a long, low sigh, his eyes scanning over me. “I’m disappointed, Allegra. You were supposed to get close to him, watch him, make sure he wasn’t going to fuck me over. What you absolutely weren’t supposed to do was fuck him .”