6. ~Caterina~
6
~Caterina~
This wasn’t going to be easy.
Scratch that. It wasn’t going to be feasible.
I stared between the schematics of the building that I’d pulled up and the surveillance camera footage covering the building and the immediate area.
After several days of tracking Angelo Simone’s movements, through hacking into city surveillance cameras, traffic lights, even the security systems of businesses—basically breaking laws all over the fucking place—I’d managed to determine the closely guarded secret location where they were holding their victims who they intended to sell like they were products and not actual human beings.
A large ranch-style house in the north end of the city, right on the outskirts.
More than that, I’d been studying the patterns of their movements, the times of their changing of the guard, how many were stationed where and when, along with the rooms they were keeping the hostages.
This was clearly an important new business venture to my father, because security was tight and well-organized. There were a few blind spots when it came to the surveillance feeds, but those had been covered by the human security onsite.
There were fourteen Leone soldiers stationed there at any given time, and Angelo visited the location to check in every couple of days.
Knowing what I was up against, I’d taken the extra step of tapping into the bastard’s phone and I’d determined that they were to transport twenty out of the fifty hostages to a seller within a few weeks.
That would be my best shot to intervene.
But even then, I couldn’t do it alone.
I’d considered contacting Levi. He was certainly qualified to assist with something like this, and I knew I could trust his discretion too. But he was dealing with his own thing at the moment and I didn’t want to interrupt that.
I sank back against my ivory wraparound couch.
I’d find a way.
I just needed to clear my head.
I’d been going hard at it for the last few days, while preparing the design concept for the Brimbank development and coordinating with my architect, while also running my businesses.
I craned my neck, looking out through the balcony doors to see that the sun was close to rising, and I’d yet to get a wink of sleep.
I cursed to myself, then secured my laptop and shut the lid.
Rising to my feet, intending to finally get to bed so I could at least get in a couple of hours’ worth of sleep, I was pulled up short from moving another step when the power abruptly shut off.
What the hell?
I waited a few seconds, but the emergency power didn’t kick in.
I headed outside onto the balcony and peered around, noting that the lights of the buildings in the surrounding area were still on, streetlights, the whole nine.
So the blackout was localized then.
That didn’t bode well.
I rushed back inside and headed inside my bedroom, intending to reach my safe and access my Glock.
I barely got two steps inside when a rush of movement in my peripheral vision had me spinning around, adrenaline flooding my system and making me react on instinct, assuming a fighting stance.
A figure steeped in darkness blocked the doorway.
“I’m not here to hurt you.”
That rumbling, overconfident voice.
I’d know it anywhere.
Unfortunately.
Before I could get a word out, the intruder pulled out a Zippo lighter, illuminating themselves.
“Nico,” I ground out. “What the fuck are you doing in my apartment? If this is another strike on your part in our ridiculous war—” I pulled up short as I took in the look all over his face. There wasn’t that usual self-satisfied smirk. His striking sapphire eyes weren’t gleaming with mischief or malice.
No, he looked… haunted.
“We need to talk,” he told me.
“And you thought breaking into my home was the best way to do that?”
“You wouldn’t have let me in if I’d buzzed up. Besides, I couldn’t risk anyone seeing me coming to you tonight, hence me needing to cut the power so I wasn’t picked up on surveillance.” He pulled out his phone and dialed quickly. In the next second, he was speaking down the line, “Turn it back on. I’ll let you know when I’m about to leave.” He pocketed his phone in his leather jacket and a few moments later, the lights came back on, the apartment whirring back to life.
His gaze darted all around my bedroom.
The large king-size bed over on the far wall opposite with a chic tufted headboard, a cloud-like ivory duvet with plush turquoise accent pillows, along with draped fairy lights.
There was an oversized reading nook over by the window crowded with soft pillows in my favored turquoise and blush, peonies in crystal vases surrounding the area.
His gaze darted to my modern glass vanity with the chic crystal knobs, looking over the jewelry trees and little boxes of varying sizes, ornate perfume bottles.
“What?” I demanded when he arched an eyebrow, amusement dancing in his eyes.
“I didn’t expect it to be so… cutesy.”
“ I didn’t know that word was part of your vocabulary.”
“Seems it is when it comes to you.”
“Don’t flirt with me. I’m still deciding whether to put a bullet in your body.”
Your sexy-as-fuck body.
Stop it.
“If you think that was flirting, you’re in for a treat. As for shooting me, I’m armed. You won’t make it to that nightstand safe in time.”
I stared at him curiously.
“Your gaze keeps darting over there,” he explained. “You were either considering retrieving your gun or a box of condoms.”
“Definitely the gun,” I ground out.
He ran his gaze over me in just my black silk slip. “I imagined turquoise with it being your favorite color.”
“You shouldn’t be imagining me in my sleepwear at all.”
“And yet.”
“Urgh. Pass me my robe.”
“What?”
I gestured at the hook on the back of the door where my satin black and silver floral robe was hanging.
He turned and lifted it off the hook, then walked to me instead of just tossing it over.
I tensed with his every step closer.
The way his jacket served to highlight his broad shoulders.
The way his white open-collared shirt pulled taut across his abs.
And the sexy way he moved with that swagger of his.
His black, silky hair was wilder than normal, giving it a whole bedhead, sexier edge.
Nico Marchetti was in my bedroom.
In my bedroom while I was half-naked, and more than a little sleep-deprived.
This was fucking dangerous.
It got more so when our fingers brushed as he handed me the robe.
I tried to swallow it down and snatched it from him more roughly than was needed, then hastily slipped it on, tying it tightly at my waist.
With him still in my space, because of course he couldn’t step back like a gentleman, I noted the dried blood in his hair, hard to see with the deep-black until he was up this close. My gazed dropped to his hands and his knuckles were also damaged with dried blood too and a whole lot of bruising.
The sight itself wasn’t surprising because he was a brutal bastard who existed in a brutal world. What was surprising was the fact that he hadn’t done a better job of hiding it. It was cold enough out where he could have worn gloves to cover up his damaged knuckles and he could have obviously washed his hair properly too. Nico didn’t overlook things, especially not when it came to the public image that he presented to the world. The whole playboy image with fake dating socialites and being known as the educated, savvy businessman who helped to run Marchetti Holdings, his family’s legitimate front.
It was deeply concerning. Especially because he’d come here in this state to me.
“Did the bough finally break? Did you throw down with my father’s men? Is that why you’re here?”
“It wasn’t with the Leones, but it is connected to why I’m here.”
Unlike everybody else I’d had in my life before I’d gone out on my own, Nico didn’t sugarcoat things, he didn’t treat me with kid gloves, or like I was a fragile little thing who wouldn’t be able to handle hard reality and the depraved nature of the world he lived in.
In fact, he challenged me.
I wasn’t na?ve; I knew that the last three years of our war hadn’t just been about payback for him. Just as it hadn’t been about hatred. He’d been pushing me.
To be better.
To grow stronger.
To think smarter.
That was the only positive aspect of it, though.
He’d still fucked with me.
And it was still worrying because it was clearly an obsession—on his end.
On mine, I was just making damn sure he didn’t think he could walk all over me and get away with it. I gave back as good as I got.
That was all it was on my end.
Definitely.
Just that.
It would be insane for it to be anything else to me.
So it wasn’t.
In fact, I hated him.
Categorically hated him.
He wasn’t doing any of that positive stuff to help me. It was all just a sort of side effect of him messing with me, wanting to taunt and torture me.
It was all just a game to him.
Although, it sure didn’t seem like he was playing that game right now.
I studied him, seeing beyond all that darkness he put forth in his eyes. Seeing a whole lot of pain. He looked weary, too. World-weary, not battle weary. No, for somebody like him, that would only energize him.
We’re not that different there.
“Why are you here, then? Specifically?”
Instead of answering, he moved closer until his body was pressing against mine and I could feel all that hard muscle through the thin fabric of my robe and slip.
“Why didn’t you strike back at me for the peonies?”
“Seriously? That’s not why you’re here.”
“No, it’s not, but I want an answer.”
I went to step back, but he grasped the belt of my robe, holding me to him.
“Let go.”
“Can’t do that,” he uttered in that low rumble that I hated that I found so sexy, the sound rolling through me. He leaned in and breathed me in. “Three years. Three years it’s been since I was this close to you.”
“Since I kneed you in the balls, you mean? I can repeat that any time.”
“Since you got scared and ran off. But you’re not scared of me , are you, Caterina?”
“Stop,” I said, turning my head away, only to have him grasp my throat in a firm and oh-so thrilling grip.
He groaned as he teased my pulse point with the pad of his thumb, obviously feeling my pulse jumping like crazy.
For a whole lot of reasons, none of which was fear.
At least not toward him.
The all-knowing bastard was right.
“Say it,” he demanded on a growl.
“No, I don’t fear you,” I found myself admitting.
As his eyes lit up, a siren-worthy warning went off in my brain.
This was dangerous. So fucking dangerous.
“I don’t fear you. I hate you.”
The look in his eyes turned to raging flames.
But I found out in the next second that it wasn’t for the reason I’d intended to elicit in him.
It wasn’t anger at me. He actually looked enraptured by it.
“If you hate me, why stop our war?”
“I need to focus on expansion. And our war continuing while I’m trying to do that would take time away that I can’t afford. Besides, it was going nowhere.”
“Interesting. Not the business excuse, but that last part.”
“It’s not an excuse.”
“You stopped because you were frustrated. You wanted it to go somewhere. You wanted us to go somewhere.”
“There is no us.”
His lips quirked. “You have no idea how wrong you are about that.” When I moved to counter that, he used his hold on my throat to suddenly shove me against the wall. As my back jarred against it, he crowded me, slapping both hands down either side of my head, then leaned in, his hot breath fanning over the side of my neck. “I held back to give you time. You weren’t ready three years ago. You weren’t ready to admit to this thing between us, or to admit to your base desires.” He nipped at my ear, sending a shock of sweet pleasure through me. “You’re just as sick and twisted as I am.”
I turned my head away from him and the far too appetizing sensation of his warm breath fanning over my skin and his invigorating minty scent enveloping me. It was hard enough to deal with him all up in my space as it was, without that adding to the headiness of it all too. “Get. Off. Me.”
“Look me in the eyes, as you utter those words, and I will.”
His easy offer surprised me, and it had my gaze unwittingly snapping to his.
I opened my mouth to speak the words.
I meant to.
I really did.
But all that fire blazing back at me, the heat from his body, that hard muscle fitting so deliciously against my softness and bringing back memories of that night in the restaurant, had me yearning for a whole different outcome.
Of course, it had all been what he’d intended.
“You’re a manipulative bastard.”
“When necessary, absolutely.” He fisted both his hands in my hair. “Now, give me your hate, Caterina.”
“Devil fucker.”
“That’s right. Give me it all,” he said, tugging at my hair and making me wince at the bite of pain.
It was doing more than that.
The slight pain was calling to that twisted side of me.
His continued pushing and playing was sparking both fury and the need to rise to the challenge in me.
And him being up close in such a teasing and tempting way was a constant assault on my control, chipping away at the thick walls of denial I’d erected around myself since the night we’d collided in such a carnal way at Il Forno.
The denial that I’d wanted him then, that I’d needed it to go further, that it had gotten me off in a way I’d never felt before to be subjected to that depravity, to experience that kind of unleashing that I’d always denied myself—and to myself.
I fucking snapped, smashing my arms up and out, dislodging his grip on me. It ripped some of the strands of my hair out in the process, which just served to fire me up more, and then I slammed my hands into his chest, propelling him onto the bed.
With him stunned into inaction, he laid there staring out at me, and I took full advantage of it, leaping on top of him, then ripping his shirt open, buttons flying every which way.
The moment my fingers touched his chest, it cut through his shock and he lunged up, then yanked my belt from my robe. He shoved it off my shoulders, his eyes darting from my face, to my breasts, to my thighs, unable to keep his gaze steady because he was so overcome.
He’d hoped for the best, that he’d get what he wanted from me, but at the same time, he clearly hadn’t expected it to actually happen. He thought I’d run again or retreat into denial.
Not this time.
With everything going on, the stress of the expansion, this fucked-up thing that my father was involved in and the fact it was impacting me and also on me to stop it, then Nico showing up here tonight while I was so affected by it all… I needed a release.
So. Fucking. Badly.
Our gazes clashed.
“You can let go, principessa.”
I dug my nails into his pecs, and it earned me a sexy groan.
Groaning was going to be the least of it.
I proved that in the next moment as I raked my nails down the length of his chest, over his abs, all the way down to the waistband of his pants, drawing blood all the way down as I dug in deep.
“Fuck,” he cried out, grasping my thighs and grinding his very hard cock beneath the hem of my slip, right against my bare pussy.
Pleasure ignited there, but it was intensified from seeing his reaction to my viciousness. He wasn’t shocked. He wasn’t disgusted. He wasn’t turned off in the least.
He didn’t just want it; he encouraged it.
Just like he had with our war over the last few years.
And because we’d been doing fucked-up things to each other from afar all that time, it wasn’t hard for me to get into it, to let that frame of mind loose, to let myself loose.
I sank into it and leaned in, slicking my tongue over the blood now trailing down his chest, following it from his pecs all the way down to his waistband.
“Yes… incredible,” he growled, tightening his grip around my thighs and grinding rougher against me, the friction driving me fucking crazy, just like the taste of him on my tongue was.
I was halfway done licking him up when he suddenly yanked me up by my hair.
In the next second, he was grabbing the bust of my slip, then ripping it down to my waist, exposing my breasts.
“Stunning,” he breathed, taking them in.
Instead of reaching up to touch them, he dropped his hands.
I frowned, and he smirked.
And then he was running his fingers through the blood remaining on his chest.
He had me gasping in the next second as he brought those coated hands to my breasts, then rubbed the blood all over them.
“Oh my God,” I choked, arching my back and pushing harder into him, watching them being painted, touched, and teased all at the same time.
He started rolling and pinching my nipples as he went, sending shudders through me, and I ground on his dick through his pants roughly, the desperate need for that sweet friction climbing with every passing second.
A sudden snarl came from him, and then he was rolling me beneath him.
Before I could even catch my breath, he was there, descending on me, smothering my breasts, then licking and sucking at them like a ravenous animal.
Holy. Hell.
“Nico… shit,” I cried out, tugging at his hair and writhing beneath him, completely beside myself.
I felt his hands ripping open his pants between us, but he didn’t stop with that talented tongue and mouth for a second.
He had me gasping in the next moment when he freed his cock and I felt it bare against me, all that hardness sliding through my soaking wet folds. He snarled like an animal, then started nudging against my clit over and over, sending sparks of intense bliss through me that had me moaning out and digging my nails into his scalp.
“Say it,” he demanded, lifting his head to look at me. “Say you need me to fuck your dripping wet cunt.”
“Fuck me,” I panted. “Don’t… don’t hold back.”
He stared at me for a moment, a struggle taking place all over his face.
“What?” I asked.
“I’ll hurt you if I unleash all the way.”
“I don’t care. I want it all. Now.”
His eyes turned black, sending an outright thrill through me.
He shifted his weight and grasped his cock with one hand, ready to tear into me.
“Nico!” a voice boomed from over by the door.
Nico stilled on me, then swung his head in that direction. “Julian, what the fuck are you doing here?”
Julian? I shifted a little so I could see past Nico’s big bicep previously blocking my view and, sure enough, there Julian Carver was leaning against my bedroom doorway, arms and legs crossed as he shook his head disapprovingly at Nico.
It was strange seeing him dressed down as he was right now, in a pair of designer gray jeans and a white tee that was tight enough to show a pair of hoops through his nipples. It was a great deal stranger that a man I’d only encountered in passing a few times was now standing at the threshold of my bedroom. The owner of the revered Carver Group.
“Get out,” Nico demanded of him.
“No can do,” Julian bit back, playing with his wild, dirty-blond hair. “You need supervision where this is concerned, remember? Especially after what went down earlier tonight. Milo called me. He knew you wouldn’t listen to him when it came to this. But me? Well, I’m another story when this subject matter is on the table, aren’t I?”
“Get. The. Fuck. Out.”
“ No.”
The interruption and their continued facing off had the insanely heady spell that we’d both been enveloped in breaking. Smashing to pieces all over the place.
Holy shit. What had I done? What had I allowed to happen here?
“Off,” I told Nico, starting to panic, my hands shaking, my whole body really.
When we’d crossed a line three years ago, I’d thought there’d been no going back, but this was another level entirely. Being alone with him, being caught off guard by him coming here tonight while I’d been embroiled in all the madness of my father’s disgusting activities… it had blown right past all my defenses and most definitely my good sense.
Surprising me, he grabbed my robe that had been tossed on the edge of the bed and covered my half-naked body with it, before he then lifted off me and pushed off the bed, doing up his pants over his raging hard cock. His shirt was just hanging there from the damage I’d done to it earlier, and his chiseled torso was slick with my saliva and his own blood.
“Get out of her bedroom,” he ordered Julian. “Give her some privacy. I know that’s a foreign concept to you, but you’re doing it.”
Julian pushed off the wall as Nico approached him. “I’m assuming this wasn’t her reaction to the crazy news tonight?”
“Shut it.”
While the two of them were immersed in one another, I’d managed to cover myself fully in my robe and secure it around me.
I climbed off the bed and looked between them, demanding, “What news?”
“We weren’t done,” Nico told me. He gestured at the bed. “Lay back down.” When I went to open my mouth, he said, “We’ve come this far. We’re not stopping now.”
“The mood is shattered, N. I know you’re not thinking straight at the moment, but try to read the room,” Julian told him.
“Not thinking straight? News? What’s going on?” I asked Nico. Then I glared at Julian. “And what’s so serious that you thought you could break into my apartment?”
“Actually, I didn’t have to break in. Nico left the way wide open in his haste to get to you, and from not being in his right mind.”
“Not the point,” I bit back at him.
“No, it’s really not,” Nico agreed.
“Don’t make me force you out of here,” Julian warned him.
Nico sneered. “Do you really think you have the means to do that?”
“Physically, no. But there are other methods I can employ.”
Nico waved his hand dismissively. “Just get out.”
“N, you’re not in your right mind. Just try to stop and think.”
“Get. The. Fuck. Out!” he roared.
Julian shook his head. Then it looked like he was actually going to do it.
But the moment he stepped into the corridor, he turned back, looked right at me and revealed, “A fucked-up decree came down from on high earlier tonight. From your father and Nico’s. You and Nico are to marry.”
I stilled.
What?
“I… what are you talking about? That’s… no. That can’t be right.” I looked at Nico. “It’s not true, is it?”
He didn’t need to answer. The resigned look on his face said it all.
“Oh my God, that’s why you came here? To seduce me so you could get out of it? To ensure I was damaged goods?”
He frowned. “Damaged goods. I don’t… ah, the whole virginity thing. No. That’s your father’s old school approach, not my father’s. He doesn’t give a flying fuck about that. Besides, I already know you’re not a virgin.”
“You… what?”
“Levi?”
I choked. “How do you—”
“You’re my obsession, Caterina.”
“I… go. Just go. The both of you. I can’t… this marriage is not happening.”
“It absolutely is.”
“As powerful as you think you are, you can’t force me.”
“ I didn’t want it like this either, believe me. I didn’t want our fucked-up worlds interfering at all in this thing between us.”
“There’s no thing . And whatever happened here tonight was a massive mistake. It’s done. All of this is. Now get the hell out of my apartment! Go!”
I’d left my father’s world behind. I’d already been partially dragged back in when my mom had come to me with the human trafficking situation. There was no way I was going to be pulled in further, let alone all the way. Especially not in this way, as some sort of business trade as a forced bride. I mean, it was despicable! The very suggestion of it.
Nico strode to me, a whole lot of intensity radiating off him in waves. “Tonight wasn’t a fucking mistake,” he hissed at me through clenched teeth. “It was a fucking revelation.”
He fisted his hand in my robe and jerked me against him.
“Nico!” Julian called, rushing in.
Nico threw out his free hand. “I’d never hurt her. Not like that.”
Julian stayed close, though, watching warily.
Nico’s full attention went back to me. “Listen carefully. I came here tonight to warn you first and foremost. Your father wants to destroy everything you’ve built. He’s afraid of you. Something you’re planning to do, something you know, I’m not sure. But that fear has led to him making this deal, this fucked-up marriage. My father wants me reeled in so I don’t interfere in what he has planned. We’re in a similar situation, Caterina. We need to play the game. And we need to play it carefully. You try to walk away from this and it will decimate everything you’ve worked for. You’ll lose it all. But you play the game with me and it will be safe. You’ll be safe.”
“I don’t care about being safe. Especially not if it means me being treated like a puppet, like some sort of trade between the families. Not if it means me being caged.”
“It will just look like that on the surface, but it won’t be your reality with me. I give you my word.”
“And how can I just trust that? Especially after the last three years? For all I know, this could be your big move, your endgame. To take me down using my father, to tame me using this marriage.”
His lips quirked. “Believe me, the last thing I’d ever want is you tamed. You’re a force of nature, and that’s what sparked my obsession with you in the first place.” He fingered my hair, twirling a lock around. “Besides, I also came here to make a deal.”
I cocked an eyebrow, trying to ignore the intensity of him right in my space and touching me, especially when we hadn’t yet come down from where we’d been headed earlier. “What kind of deal?”
A sadistic smile spread over his face. “A deal that will bring their entire world crashing down around them.”