Chapter Two
Gaetano
“You look tired, brother,” Gio greeted me, doing what he did best: lounging on one of the sofas, his arms spread along the top, looking like he belonged on the cover of a fashion magazine. Two beautiful women framed him, each snuggled into his side, seemingly content to share him with one another.
“There’s a good reason for that,” I replied, but did not bother to explain.
There was a serious flu outbreak in the city, and as usual, those working at the hospital were hit hardest. Our already overworked staff were forced to spread themselves even thinner to cover for their absent colleagues, and I was no exception.
Despite not having slept in almost three days, I was so wound up there would be no sleep for me until I came down from the adrenaline high.
“You missed dinner.” Gio flicked his fingers and the two girls scurried away.
“Sometimes I envy you.” I sipped my Aberfeldy, admiring the honeyed notes and golden color.
Gio chuckled. “Oh, and why is that? Because I get all the pussy and you get bedpans?” He held up his glass of Disaronno in a silent salute, then shot it back in one go.
It was hard not to roll my eyes when looking at Giovanni. He was such a cliché. The typical Italian man, he looked more like a runway model for Lugli or Versace than a mafia capo who ran our legal and illegal clubs for the family.
“You know I don’t deal in bedpans, smart ass. I envy that your job seems so mindless.”
Gio’s smirk quickly became an icy frown. He reached for another shooter that was delivered and downed it. “If that’s the impression I’m giving, it’s because I’m a good actor, Tano. But aren’t we all?”
That was a truth I hadn’t expected him to share.
We all had something to guard, and it was rare that we let that down and spoke on a real level.
Because in our world, we were trained to recognize shifts in tone, and other physical responses so slight that most people would never notice.
But the Vitale boys knew better. The shift of the line in the way we held our mouths could speak volumes to someone who knew what to look for.
Outside of the family, such mistakes could be fatal.
But in our club, with just my brother, I could let things slide a bit.
“Where’s Marko?” I asked.
A shadow of doubt crossed over Gio’s features which quickly shifted to the smirk I was used to seeing on his face, the facade that he wore to keep the world at bay, along with his party boy antics. “Not sure,” he said carelessly. “Out and about.”
“Without you? What’s the matter?” I teased. “You two have a fight?”
“Nothing so dramatic. He’s a romantic, you know. He’s out looking for ‘the one’.”
My brother’s sex life had long been a source of uncomfortable speculation throughout our extended network. Ours was a very traditional life, after all. Giovanni’s natural flamboyance made his close relationship with Marko distinctly suspect, even if no one dared to comment on it.
I knew better, but I couldn’t resist needling him.
“Not to sound rude, brother, but I thought you were his ‘the one’.”
Gio blinked at me. His mouth even pursed slightly, as if he’d managed only the first letter of a stunned, ‘What?’ before he broke out in peals of laughter. It wasn’t an act, either. He laughed so hard, tears leaked from the corners of his eyes.
“You can’t be serious?” he sputtered at last. “Me and Marko? You thought I was gay?” His smile slipped when I didn’t laugh along. “Wait, really? Tell me you’re the only one.”
When I stayed silent, Gio groaned and a string of Italian curses came pouring forth along with a few hand gestures. I couldn’t help smirking as I watched his outburst. I loved being in the driver’s seat during discussions, but with Gio, it was pure entertainment.
“Tano!” he practically yelled. “I am always with women, dating and fucking them as often as possible, so why would you fuckers think for one moment I was gay?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I said over-casually.
“Maybe because you never see the same woman twice, but Marko’s been around for years.
Your face lights up when he’s around. You smile bigger and you laugh louder when he enters a room.
You call him every day, you hug every time you meet.
Honestly, how could you assume we thought anything different?
Yeah, you take women out all the time, but who did you take home for dinner the other night?
Who do you take home almost every night? ”
I knew the answer, as Tony had already given me a complete rundown of the evening. In our family, there were very few secrets.
My brother leaned his head back, positioning his arms once again along the low backrest of the couch. His knee bounced up and down in time to the drumming of his fingers on the faux leather.
I waited patiently, despite having no patience left for anything but finding a way to wind down. I signaled a waitress—there was always one hovering close to Gio—for another round.
When the drinks were delivered, Gio sat up and downed his in one gulp.
“I’ve been a partier for a long time, Tano,” he said with uncharacteristic seriousness.
“You know I started sneaking wine from the cellar when I was fourteen. When this operation fell on my lap, I thought my life couldn’t get any better.
Papa taught me the ropes and said I was a natural schmoozer with the ladies and tough enough to keep the undesirables out.
He left me to run a massive empire that I continually expand, and I’m happy with my life, don’t get me wrong.
But it has come with a cost, just like it has for everyone else, including you.
You expect me to share that part of my life with…
?” He waved pointedly at the dance floor below us and all the painted ladies gyrating there, some looking up at us, wanting to be seen.
“They don’t want to share it,” he went on.
“They’re here to drink and dance and fuck, that’s all.
And they want to hang on my arm, sure. I’m part of the glitz and glamour, like the fucking mirrors on the ceiling.
But that’s just my job, Tano, that’s not who I am, who I really am.
And Marko knows that, so yeah, I take him home.
God forbid I have one person in my life who wants to hang out with the real me when I’m not this. ”
My brother was either maudlin and pining for the past and our simpler life as boys, or he was drunker than I realized. Either way, I was beginning to think pulling one over on him was a mistake.
“I’m fucking with you, Gio, no one thinks you’re gay.” I shrugged. “Maybe bi.”
“Asshole.”
“And as far as cost goes, don’t include me or Vinny. I’m well aware that we won the lottery on ‘following our passions’.”
“Maybe brother, but you’re CEO of a hospital and head of the surgical department. Your time is so tight you have to add taking a shit into your schedule. I mean, when have you ever had the time or even the disposition to be in a relationship? What happened to that Monica chick you liked?”
And there it was. He turned the tables and ripped off my carefully placed Band-Aid. We had never had this discussion, despite him having asked several times before. But unlike what he was thinking, it had nothing to do with being mafia, or my busy schedule at the hospital.
We met right here at Club Carnage. I’d been out with my brothers celebrating the end of my residency when I saw Monica at the bar. She had long dark hair, my favorite color, and enough confidence to catch my attention.
I asked her to dance and went home with her that night.
I liked her. She liked me. We kept things casual after that, meeting at my apartment for good sex and easy companionship. For a while, I convinced myself she might be different from the women who usually passed through my life.
That was my first mistake.
The second was trusting her.
I rented her an apartment. Spent more time with her than I should have. Shared more of myself than I normally allowed. Then one afternoon I walked in and found her entertaining two paying clients in the apartment I was funding.
Monica wasn’t interested in me. She was interested in what I could provide. The lesson had been swift and brutal.
People were opportunists.
Never take them at face value.
Never invest yourself.
Keep women where they belong—at arm’s length.
I’d kept that vow ever since.
Until I saw the woman in Vinny’s restaurant.
Up until that moment, I'd been blissfully unaware that it had been a very long time since a woman had intrigued me.
Attraction had never been the problem. Club Carnage practically delivered beautiful women to my doorstep. If I wanted company, I could have it before the night was over.
What had become rare was interest.
Genuine curiosity.
The desire to know what made someone tick beneath the surface.
Most people were predictable. They wanted something. Money. Status. Access. Influence. Once you understood their motivation, the rest was easy. Yet the woman sitting in Vinny’s restaurant bothered me for reasons I couldn’t explain.
She hadn’t flirted.
Hadn’t tried to get my attention.
Hadn’t even looked my way.
If anything, she seemed determined to ignore me entirely, which should have made her forgettable. Instead, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. And that bothered me far more than it should have.
Gio watched me, his expression knowing, which I hated. No one got to see me unless I allowed them to. Never had punching him in his smug face been as tempting as it was at that moment.
Control, Tano.
I shifted in my seat and took a sip of my drink. “She wasn’t who I thought she was.”
He nodded. “There are a bevy of beauties on the dance floor who would love to fuck a handsome doctor. Why don’t you go downstairs and pick one out?”
Standing, I stretched and glanced down into the main section of the club. My gaze caught on a woman with chestnut curls that ran the length of her spine and ended just above a pair of ass cheeks that made my cock hard.
With her back to me, I couldn’t see her face but when she let out a giggle that even the booming bass of the music couldn’t drown out, I knew it was the same woman from the restaurant.
She chose that moment to flip her hair back and turn on an angle.
Her eyes took in the scene and then traveled up, up, and landed on mine.
Zap! There it was again. Like being shot in the heart. What the hell was going on with this woman, or me for that matter?
The Dungeon Playroom was now forgotten. I mumbled something to my brother and hustled down the stairs. But when I arrived, she was missing from the table. Scanning the room, I caught sight of the sexiest ass I’d ever seen hustling through the exit. Bingo!
But I was seconds too late to catch her, watching helplessly from the sidewalk as she climbed into a cab.
That perfect ass was the last I saw of her before she slammed the door.
I watched the cab pull away from the curb and caught sight of her face when she turned her head to look back at me through the rear window.
Her eyes grew wide, almost fearful, and then she was gone.
There was a mystery there.
And getting to the bottom of it was more than tempting. Just the thought of gripping those long curly locks in my hand while I spanked the secrets out of her made my cock hard.