Savage Grace (Underground Royals #4)

Chapter 1

1

ZARINA

My dress was sticky now.

One too many drinks had been spilled down my front. It was damp, and the material clung to my torso, but it was easily ignored.

Anything was easily ignored in the middle of the dance floor surrounded by other sweaty bodies.

I held hands with a random girl and screamed the lyrics to a song from the 2010s into the air of Club SVN. We had been inseparable all night, but I didn’t know her name.

Didn’t need to know.

I went out alone so often that I had become skilled at making friends wherever I went. Larissa thought I was crazy for going out by myself.

My sister Valerie thought it was downright dangerous—especially considering who I was.

But I didn’t care.

Dark corners of shady nightclubs were one of the few places I could avoid the treatment that I usually received as La Princessa Santino . The baby girl of Melbourne’s most powerful crime family. A thing to be protected, sheltered, hidden away until I could be married off.

But not on Friday nights.

(Or Saturdays)

(Or Sundays)

(...Sometimes Mondays too)

A man approached with a look that was all too familiar. That predatory gaze locked on my body as he crossed from the bar to the dancefloor with two drinks in hand.

I pretended not to notice and kept singing. But eventually, I felt that hand on my lower back and his hot breath on my ear.

“A drink for the most beautiful girl in the club?”

I looked down at the drink and assessed it.

“No thank you,” I smiled.

“Okay,” he said slowly, looking down at it and going rigid with the rejection. “Well, what’s your name?”

“Georgina!”

Larissa turned her head away and rolled her eyes. She was usually amused by my lies, but it seemed she was not in the mood to play along tonight. To be fair, she hadn’t really wanted to come out in the first place.

The man only lingered for a few more moments, the hope in his eyes fading incrementally as I bored him with made up details about my made up life. I could never tell someone like him who I really was.

Georgina worked at a bank and fucking hated her job. But Zarina didn’t know what people who worked at banks did. Luckily, he didn’t seem to catch on to my utter bullshit about ‘HP… uh …WTF’ Financial Software and ‘Interpretive Cash Counting’, though, and lingered for a few polite minutes until he wandered off.

Another man approached a few songs later.

To him, I was Natalie, a successful psychiatrist.

To the next bloke, I was Marie, a backpacker from the south of Germany.

My brother Sammy always said that I was a professional bullshit artist, and perhaps he was right. Because the speed and the detail in which these stories came out was probably a talent that I could put to real use if I wanted to.

But this particular night, none of the men were catching my eye.

Usually, there’s at least one.

And I pick him , not the other way around.

Of course, I never let them know they’d been picked. I let them think that they’re in charge. Even though I know it’s a fucking lie.

After I literally could not dance to another song, me, Larissa, and my new best friend all collapsed into the closest booth in the corner of the club.

“Fucking hell,” Larissa groaned at the stickiness of the cheap vinyl material of the booth seats, wiping her hands on the side of her dress.

Club SVN was not our regular spot.

Not only because of its general stickiness, but also because the DJs were usually shit. They normally played a loop of wordless techno when I much preferred to poorly sing at the top of my lungs to cheesy rap music.

“I’m over this place,” I shouted over the beat.

Larissa and our adopted friend nodded in unison.

“Let’s go to Lilith’s!” I clapped.

“I’m going home, Zar,” Larissa finished the last of her drink and picked up her bag.

“No!”

“Zarina, it’s fucking one a.m.”

“Pleaaaase!” I begged, grabbing the hem of her dress.

My adopted friend also got up and wandered away, probably to find her own group of friends I had herded her away from, and also probably sensing that our night was coming to an end.

“Go home ,” Larissa scolded, swatting my hand away.

I sat back in the booth and pouted, crossing my arms.

“Don’t make me ring your brother.”

“Ugh!” I rolled my eyes again and got up, following her out of the club and into the cool, fresh air.

While we waited for the Uber to arrive, Larissa scrolled on her phone, ignoring me while I paced restlessly.

The black car eventually pulled up to the curb, waving us down with a wide smile that didn’t match the hour of the morning.

“Hurry the fuck up. Get in,” Larissa urged as she slid into the back seat.

“I’ll see you Monday,” I waved before slamming the door shut.

“Bitch—” she tried to catch it.

The car pulled away and Larissa rolled down her window to swear at me some more.

“Love you!” I blew her a kiss.

I could faintly hear her voice still yelling in the distance as her Uber turned into nothing but just another set of taillights in the traffic.

I wasn’t ready to go home. Not yet.

This was the only time I could be free of the role I was expected to play.

Here. Alone on a sidewalk in the middle of Melbourne. At one in the morning.

I could finally drop the Princessa act and be whoever I felt like being. Whether that was a Georgina, a Natalie, a Marie—whoever the fuck I wanted in that moment.

A satisfied smile crept onto my face, and I riffled through my tiny handbag to find that sneaky cigarette I’d stolen from my brother, Antoni.

It was a ritual I picked up as a teenager I never quite dropped, maybe more for sentimental reasons than anything else.

Sure, it was a filthy habit.

Sure, I could probably just buy my own.

But it just wasn’t the same. None of them knew, not even Larissa.

It was my dirty little secret.

I stepped back a little and leaned against the front of the club with the cigarette between my teeth, fishing through my bag for the lighter (also stolen from Antoni).

“Fuck,” I mumbled to myself when I realised it wasn’t there.

A flame flickered before my eyes and I looked up, seeing a tattooed hand holding a lighter in front of my face. I was a tall woman, and in heels even more so, but he towered over me.

The corner of my lip twitched as I leaned forward, letting him light the end of the smoke for me. I took it between two fingers after taking a drag and leaned my head against the wall, assessing him. His white shirt hung loose around his torso, hiding what I was sure was a well-built wall of muscle.

“You know—” I started, but he had already started walking away.

I watched him and bit the inside of my lip in frustration. The mystery man turned, smirking at me over his shoulder, and I shook my head at him, letting out a laugh.

“Tease,” I mumbled to myself.

I zipped up my bag and took the short walk down the street to Lilith’s Club.

People didn’t understand why I felt the need to frequent a strip club so often, but it was just another place that felt like a safe space for me.

Of course, it helped that it was owned by my sister-in-law, Rome, and that I had become pretty good friends with all the girls who danced there.

They never judged me either.

They never had these expectations of me that maybe my family or childhood friends did. Women in the mafia were expected to be pure, put together, and ready for marriage. And that’s exactly the person I was.

I was exactly who my mother had raised me to be, and I was exactly who my father would love to have bid off as a wife for the highest price.

But now he was dead.

My brother Antoni was in charge and didn’t exactly have the same ideals as my father. Where that left me , I was still figuring out.

I swayed, closing my eyes and letting my head and shoulders move along to the music as I climbed the narrow stairs up to the club. I was riding a buzz that I did not want to come down from.

The dark club that was illuminated neon pink, casting a warm glow over my skin as I stepped into the main area of the Lilith’s.

I waved to Bea, who was upside down on the first pole near the entrance. She brightened, shooting me a quick wave in return before she dropped to the floor in such a way that my knees got sympathy pains. I snaked my way through the huddled groups of men, avoiding all eye contact, and quickly spotted Rome standing by the bar.

“Hello,” I cooed, leaning against the stool next to her.

She shook her head at me but smiled, pulling me in for a hug.

“Mmm,” she sniffed at me. “Stealing Toni’s smokes again, are we?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I fluttered my eyelashes.

Rome rolled her eyes and patted the seat next to her, turning her attention back to the woman she was having a conversation with. Gwen slid me my usual drink, and I closed my eyes again, swaying to the music and rolling my shoulders as I fell into the groove.

I could only barely hear Rome speaking beside me, but made out a few words like ‘Money. Debt. Protection. Kill ’.

The usual buzzwords of our family.

There was always some crisis, someone to protect, someone to kill. They were all involved, all a part of it, except for me—the silly little princessa who could not be trusted.

“We have no idea where they’re even storing the stuff now. Toni’s been working day and night to find out where they might be putting it all.”

“Maybe they’re not storing it,” I suggested, leaning in close and resting my chin on Rome’s shoulder.

“Zar,” she chuckled, shrugging me off. “You don’t even know what we’re talking about.”

“You’re talking about the Redline Angels and the new shipment of weapons that went out without Toni’s authority, blah.” I rolled my eyes, still swaying and vibing.

“Well—”

“Maybe they’re not bothering to store it. Maybe they’re moving it off straight away,” I said, booping her on the nose with my finger as I slid off my stool, drink in hand, to find someone more interesting to talk to.

Rome looked at me, and then looked back at Gwen, and their conversation intensified.

I rolled my eyes.

Jesus.

Nearly two a.m. and they were still talking about that boring shit. I grew up around it and still did not understand the appeal. I didn’t understand the drama that came along with it either.

It seemed like most of their problems could be solved by sitting down and having a chat.

But no, everything was so serious.

“Don’t worry about it, Zar. Play with your toys.”

“Don’t worry about it, Zar. Here, go shopping.”

“Don’t worry about it, Zar. Here, have a drink.”

Eventually, they got what they wanted and I stopped worrying.

I was moving through the floor once again, grooving by myself and riding my buzz, when I felt a stubby finger tap me on the shoulder.

“Hi there,” a man in a suit drawled. “What’s your name?”

But I was busy.

I was looking towards the back wall, where that tall, dark, and handsome stranger who had offered me a light was leaning oh so casually. I pursed my lips at him and he smirked.

Had he followed me here?

The man beside me cleared his throat and tried again. “Excuse me? Miss?”

“Mmm?” I hummed, not taking my eyes off the stranger.

“Your name?”

The stranger beckoned me with one finger and a come hither motion.

I looked at the man in the suit once. “My name?”

“Yes. Your name.” There was a bite of frustration in his voice now.

The stranger pointed to the spot in front of him in a silent order. Usually, I was not one who enjoyed being told what to do. Usually, I would’ve playfully rolled my eyes, perhaps tossed my hair over my shoulder and walked away, only to turn back and shoot him a teasing glance.

But when he cocked his eyebrow in a show of impatience, I went straight to the spot where he pointed. For this man, maybe I could be a good girl.

Just for one night.