CHAPTER 34
Quinn
“Again,” I say to Finn.
“Doesn’t the party start soon?” He asks, exhausted. I’ve been training him for over an hour, after he had a full day pulling out a dead tree stump by himself which is brutal, back-breaking work.
I glare, “Oh I’m sorry, did you need to go shower and dress and put on fucking perfume? I said again!”
“Yes, boss. Sorry, boss.” Finn quivers under my angry stare.
See? Is that so hard?
Not like when I glare at my wife and she fucking laughs.
I taunt her, push her, scold her, even insult her, and every time on the mat she looks up at me, lips parted, like she…sees me. Not Skulls Quinn the psychotic megalomaniac. Me.
She bats her lashes at me and I fucking fold like a dollar store deck chair.
“Ha! Got you!" Finn says, finally knocking me off balance. Because I’m distracted.
“Good.” He offers me a hand but I wave him off. “Now go put on your perfume, you smell like tree stump and asshole.”
He laughs and obeys, running quickly out the gym door. Again, it’s a breath of fucking fresh air, someone just…doing what I say.
Finn’s a good kid, really.
Damn it.
I pull out my phone and send a message.
Quinn: Pull Finn off latrines.
Mac: Roger
I’m not mad at Finn. Or this party I’ve complained about all day. The men needed an outlet. Everyone’s jumpy because we know the Russians are attacking soon. We’ve narrowed it down to two safe houses that also double as holding for some of our product before it moves into Canada.
It’s happening in the next two weeks, based on intel we got from a low-level Russian errand boy. Plus, I want to get the two groups, my chosen guys and Zeno and his group, drinking together right off the bat.
“Ugh,” I groan as I get up, disgusted with myself. This is why I didn’t want to get married. Women scramble your brain so your priorities are upside down, inside out, soon everyone is getting shot at or blown up.
I should be mad about the party, the Russians, the fact that my wife is still spying on my men every chance she gets.
But no.
I’m mad because I really really really want to touch my wife.
But I sure as hell am not going to.
·····
Fuck me dead.
I waited to come out here. Showered in the gym, missed the appetizers in the kitchen. Made sure I wouldn’t see her in my bedroom. Now, under the glow of the heat lamps we have mounted all over the big covered porch, steam swirling from the heated pool she…
I’m a dead man.
Fucking dead.
She’s not in a gown. Or something silky or red, overtly seductive. She looks like….dammit, she looks like a Quinn. Like me.
Black. Leather. A short dress that has sleeves and covers up to her neck, but it’s tied together with little ties in the front.
All the way down. I can see her smooth skin underneath, like the whole thing is a corset.
Like if I just tucked my finger in one of those holes and pulled, it’d be off in half a second.
Those high boots women wear that make any heterosexual man think about what it’d be like to fuck said woman wearing nothing but those boots.
I know she saw me see her, because there’s a faint blush to the tops of her flawless cheeks. She’s talking to Sheila and a couple of the other girls. Smiling, probably making a witty joke at my expense.
I walk in the other direction. If I want to stay sane, stay focused on my task, actually getting to know Zeno better and welcome his men to our ranks, I cannot be around her. I cannot see her or smell her or hear her laugh.
So I find her cousin instead. I pull him and his closest buddy off through the side doors into the gym.
It’s an easy conversation starter since my gym is full of cool shit.
Men love it in here. We talk with Collin, swapping war stories about the Russians, the DelGados, and the Canadian and Mexican syndicates.
Would we talk shit about each other if we weren’t partnered up?
Undoubtedly. But we are, so we rib on everyone who is not present.
Mac joins, keeps our drinks full and cold.
After a while he gives me a weird glare so I wrap up the tour of the facilities.
I stretched it over an hour. As I lead the group back outside to the lounge seating, I almost stop and blurt, “Let’s stay inside! ” like a moron.
This is it. I was right about not marrying.
Dead. Man. Walking.
Then she approaches, the moment we’re seated.
I brace myself but she ignores me completely.
“Zeno! You didn’t say hello, you asshole!” He gives her a quizzical look before they hug so she adds, “Oh yeah, I gave up. They all know the real me now. Sucks for them.” She pulls out of the embrace and punches her cousin in the arm. Hard.
“Damn, ow!” He replies, “Sorry, your man pulled me inside the second we got here.”
She barely looks at me then back at him and goes on, “You look bigger, is this new?” She pinches at his sleeve, “I like it.”
“You always told me it’s suits or nothing, so I got a new one for this.”
“Nice.”
She then smiles and jokes with all his guys. Only two men are her actual cousins, all of them are her admirers. That’s for fucking sure.
My blood is boiling by the time she’s completed the small circle.
And I’m suddenly itchy in my leather jacket.
What did he mean suits only? She wants me in a suit? Do I own any nice suits?
Wait, why the fuck do I care! Focus, man!
“Zeno, Mac, let’s go talk about tomorrow.” I turn and yell, “Finn!”
He appears. I look around at Zeno’s guys and a few of my top soldiers who’re going to be teamed up with them for the next few weeks.
“Finn here is our most recent fuckup. He’s your little bitch for the evening, in charge of getting you whatever you want for the night. And I do mean whatever you want.”
Cheers erupt around me.
I glance at Luna and see it, the second of confusion and maybe fear, before she puts her mask back on, her armor. She’s so damn gorgeous. And she’s wondering now if the rumors are true. They are.
We’re made men. We drink. A lot. I let the men get high and I let the women who want to participate… participate. This is the life we live in the mafia. There has to be a release from the constant threat of death day in and day out.
What I really want to know is how she’ll respond.
Wait. I should probably…
“Luna,” I say, taking a few steps into her space. Her tits brush against me which I can see through the holes in the damn dress. I use all of my might to pull my eyes up to her face. “Drinking is fine. Smoking is fine. No lines. No sex.”
“Um,” she doesn’t back up, lifts her chin to go toe to toe with me. “How about I do whatever I want like we both know I’m going to do?”
I reach out and grab her, squeezing her hips in my palms. Not hard, just not not hard.
“What if I ask nicely?” I try.
She leans up and, smelling like heaven itself, I imagine, I’ll never know since I’m not headed there, whispers, “Take my virginity.”
“No,” I say, because if I say anything other than that one syllable, my voice will reveal me as the desperate man I am.
She shrugs and tilts her chin in that dismissive, queenly way that I love, “Those are my terms.”
I inhale through my nose and decide to go for a jab instead, anything to keep from caving, “I did hear your wrist has been hurting.”
Her eyes blow wide, “I knew it! I knew you were listening! How! How if this whole place is stuck in the 1950s?”
“Surveillance is reviewed and recorded off site.”
Why are you telling her your secrets! Shut up! Walk away!
“And did you tell your men to get their shit together in the garage? Because one of those morons is going to get you all killed.”
I narrow my eyes at her. She must not realize she’s doing it. Helping me. Or she can’t stop herself. I know she wants me physically. I know she respects me. I know she feels…something. I just don’t know if I’ll ever be able to truly trust her.
My shoulders sag.
Because no, I probably won’t.
I release her hips and step back to yell, “Anyone give my wife a pill, a line, a smoke, or try to touch her or put anything in her mouth that’s not alcohol, you’re dead.”
A chorus of Yes, Boss rings out around us. As it does, my wife clenches her jaw. Her arms twitch at her sides, like she wants to cross them and cover herself. But she’s Luna Mancini. She is not insecure. Not with others, anyway.
“I hate you,” she whispers.
“Yes, so much so you want my men to tighten up so they don’t get me killed.”
“That’s for Zeno, not you!” she growls as she stomps away.
I watch her go and don’t look around to see if any men are enjoying the show as well. I would love an excuse to shoot someone right now, but this is a party.
“Huh,” Zeno says as I finally rejoin him. I raise a brow so he goes on, “I’ve never seen her get mad in public before. She’s always…Luna, you know?”
“Yeah,” I say.
“Did you break my cousin?” He asks, only partly joking.
“No,” She is breaking me. I lift my chin so Mac will lead us out. “Let’s go.”