22. Cassandra
22
CASSANDRA
I don’t think I could ever get bored of kissing Rocco.
When I’m not doing it, I’m thinking about it. When I am, I do everything I can to prolong it for as long as possible.
I feel starved when he’s not around.
And he’s not around one hell of a lot.
As the weeks of our second month fly by, I feel like I see him less and less. The time I spend waiting around pining or taking my frustrations out at the gym begins to wear on me.
I must have fucked Rocco in every room in this house, yet I’ve also sung in every room of this house, napped in every room in this house, and redecorated every room in this house.
To make it even more suffocating, every request I make to Donatella, or on the rare occasion, Teo, about leaving is always met with an awkward denial.
“Rocco?” I ask one morning as I watch Rocco dress for the day from his bed.
“Cassandra.”
I check my phone again to be sure. Despite everything, my first paycheck from the Candelabra was deposited into my account. “I was wondering if I might go shopping later?”
His fingers freeze as he buttons up his shirt. “I’m er…a bit tied up the next few days. I’ll take you this weekend.”
“I can take myself,” I insist, sitting up and gathering the duvet to my bare chest.
“What did you want to get?”
“Just some sheet music. There’s this new mic I’ve been looking at for, you know, recording stuff at home, but,” I shrug. “I think Claudio still has my laptop.”
Rocco nods. “I’ll look into it.”
“Does that mean I can head out later?”
He approaches to kiss my forehead softly. “Just wait until I get back, all right?”
“All right,” I resign myself.
“I love what you’ve done to the room.” He diverts my attention to the redecorated bedroom.
I hadn’t done much, only added a few decorative items to make the room feel homier. Donatella and I spent an entire day rearranging the furniture, guided by a book on feng shui I’d found in Rocco’s office library.
Rocco’s office had provided me with the most entertainment so far. At first, the dusty, underused corners of the library had seemed uninviting, but curiosity had finally gotten the better of me.
There weren’t just books on Chinese geomancy; beneath had been files upon files of Italian mafia history.
I’ve made my way through most of the late 1800s and early 1900s. The Guild was formed by an Italian immigrant, Josef Moretti, who I suppose must be Rocco’s great-great-grandfather—a fugitive from the Sicilian authorities.
It’s fascinating, more so because the degrees of separation are so few.
“When will you be home?” I ask, shaking the memory of Josef Moretti taking on the don of the Irish mob in hand-to-hand combat.
“Late.” He sighs. “The Cartel are wiping the floor with us.”
“Damn Tunnel Eaters,” I joke back.
He gives me an odd look. “I’ll be interrogating this evening. Don’t wait up.”
I do anyway. But as he promised, he doesn’t return. At some point, I must fall asleep because I awaken the next morning to a key being placed in my hand.
Rocco smiles down at me. “I’ve got something to show you.”
Through bleary eyes, I rise to greet him with a kiss before he takes my hand and leads me down the hall. We stop in front of one of the other bedrooms, and he gestures me forward.
The key slots perfectly into the door, and I push it open.
“Is this…” I step inside with wide eyes. “A recording studio?”
The entire room had been transformed overnight. Sound dampeners now cover every wall, and a brand new recording deck sits shining in the corner.
I approach the microphone in the middle of the room and admire the headphones that are already perched on the stand nearby where reams of sheet music are already on display.
“Surprise,” Rocco whispers from behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist.
I’m speechless, both at his generosity and…and… “I thought we were going shopping together?”
“I thought I’d save you a trip.” He kisses my cheek before pulling away. “I’ll be back late tonight again, so enjoy. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I don’t know when I reach my breaking point.
But it must have been some time before Rocco arrived home early one evening, and after I sank to my knees before him on the living room couch, desperate to taste him after what felt like days of prolonged absence.
“Fuck, Cas!” he growls as I take his cock to the back of my throat, relishing the way his hands tangle in my hair, pulling at the roots.
I feel his release shuddering through him before he cries out again, and I brace myself for his load.
The groan he makes is so intoxicating I have to force myself not to let my hand dip beneath my pants to take the edge off my own desire.
I swallow him down before releasing him breathlessly, leaning my head against his thigh.
“Rocco?”
“Cassandra.”
I look up at him. “I wanted to ask you something.”
“Jesus, Cas. Not like that.”
“Not like what?” I reply innocently before licking my lips to catch any lingering taste of him.
Rocco tugs me upward to join him on the couch. “You could look up at me with those eyes, and I’d burn down the damn planet if you asked.”
“Would you really?” I tease, bringing my feet up and snuggling into his side.
“Would it excite you if I said yes?”
I kiss the skin of his chest. “Maybe.”
“What did you want to say?”
I pause a moment, gathering my nerve. “I was wondering if I might go back to work.”
The arm around me tightens slightly. “Why do you want that?”
“I think I miss singing.”
“You have the recording studio.”
I look up at him, at the tight, irritated line of his jaw. “It’s not the same, Rocco. I think you know that.”
There’s a pause. “Do you…want to see him again?”
It’s my turn to feel irritated. We hadn’t talked about that night beyond my displeasure at Claudio’s lack of sobriety and choice of company.
I thought Rocco had dropped it because it had been a complete waste of time. But the reek of jealousy in his voice gives way to a whole new explanation.
After everything we’ve been through, had I not made my choice in men crystal clear?
With a huff, I shuffle up on my knees and throw one around his waist, straddling him. He doesn’t meet my eye, even when I lower my chest closer to his face.
“Rocco.”
“Cassandra.”
“I don’t want to see him,” I say firmly.
Finally, he glances over at me. “You’re looking at me like that again. It’s distracting from your point.”
“Do you want me to close my eyes?”
“I want you to stay here and be safe.”
My body sags back on my heels. “Rocco, if I have to stay here for another month, I think I’m going to go insane.”
“Then let me take you to South Africa. You’ll love it there.”
“Sure. If you come with me,” I counter.
Rocco’s frown deepens. “You know I wouldn’t be able to stay.”
“Because the Cartel is giving you such a headache? The Tunnel Snakes are acting up again, aren’t they?” I cross my arms. “Honestly, I’d prefer to take my chances with Amos Rubio than hide away here.”
He raises an eyebrow at me, and I shrug. “You’re not as discreet as you think you are.”
“You mean you’ve been snooping in my office.”
“Because there is nothing else for me to do here!” I try again. “Please, Rocco. I came to Brooklyn to sing. I haven’t been on a stage in almost two months.”
“Cas,if anyone with fucking eyes sees us both at the Candelabra, they’re going to know we’re together.”
I scoff. “Is that really so awful?”
“I’m trying to keep you alive, Cas.” Rocco’s hands squeeze my thighs. “If anyone realizes how much you mean to me, you’ll have a target on your back for the rest of your life.”
I swallow my disappointment. “So that’s it? We can be together, but only if you keep me as your dirty little secret.”
He growls beneath me. “That is not what I want.”
“Then how the hell is this supposed to work?”
The question hangs between us like a knife, the edge of which we’ve both been dancing along for weeks, begging for either one of us to acknowledge it.
“Cas…” But Rocco fails to come up with an answer.
Can I blame him? When every night, I fall asleep wondering the same thing and come up completely empty.
After a moment, I brave another question. “How does this usually work?”
“Dating?”
“In the Mafia,” I clarify. “Surely someone else has been through this before.”
Rocco scratches the back of his neck. “My parents had an arranged marriage. My mother was from another prominent family. She had her own bodyguards that ensured her protection, though I don’t think she needed it.”
I tilt my head slightly. This is the first time I’ve heard Rocco talk about his mother.
“She was mafioso in her own right,” he continues, the ghost of a smile on his lips. “And only put up with my father’s bullshit long enough to have me.”
“She left him?” I ask before I can stop myself.
Rocco’s eyes darken. “No one leaves the Guild.”
The threat of his words sits uncomfortably in my stomach.
In the past weeks, I couldn’t bring myself to take any of Mia's or my mother’s calls. The depths of their potential deceit could be world-shattering, and if I’m being honest with myself, I’m too scared to face them.
But if my theory is true, that my parents were somehow involved in the Mafia too, then how the hell had my mother been allowed to leave?
I shake off that particular rabbit hole. “But you’re the don, aren’t you?”
“I am now,” he corrects. “But the oath we take when we join is an old one. Even if I pardoned someone, it could set an uneasy precedent for those who’ve spent a lifetime in reluctant servitude.”
“But surely it’s better to let them go? If they don’t want to be there, they can’t be of much use to you.”
Rocco shrugs. “Even if they did leave, my father would call a hit somehow. He's a miserable bastard like that.”
So casually he talks about his father’s destruction. Would he really kill someone for breaking their oath? It’s not something I’d ever want to find out.
“Remind me never to sign anything when your father’s around.”
I meant it as a joke, but Rocco’s face grows serious. “I wouldn’t let you take the Guild’s oath.”
“Why? Would you get sick of me?” I tease him, trying to bring some lightness to the situation.
“It would be a life sentence.” He stares at a point over my shoulder. “And apparently, two months is already grating on you.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “At least then I’d actually be able to do something instead of sitting around the house all day.”
He shoots me a warning look. “Trust me. It’s not a life you would want.”
There’s a part of me that wants to argue for the sake of it. But really, what qualifications did I have that would make me an effective mafioso? My one attempt to help had been a complete disaster.
So, instead, I change the subject. “I just want to sing again. Is that really so bad?”
“It’s dangerous, Cas,” Rocco sighs.
“What if I had bodyguards?” I press. “Your mother had them, right?”
His hand weaves through my hair and gently combs through the loose, brown waves. “It would take some time to make preparations.”
A glimmer of hope ignites within me. “I wouldn’t need an entire entourage, just someone to make sure I got home okay.”
“You will have whoever I say you need to have. I won’t negotiate on that.”
I grit my teeth, imagining how humiliating it would be to arrive anywhere surrounded by Rocco’s mafioso guards. “I don’t want to put you out. It’s just one performance, so there’s really no need. I’ll be back home before you know it.”
His eyebrow quirks up. “You assume I’ll be waiting for you at home.”
“I only meant…you’re away half the time, and I know you’re busy…so.”
“My favorite singer will be performing at the Candelabra. I wouldn’t miss that for the world.”