Chapter 12
PRIEST
I’m in a vile mood by the time I meet up with Rocco and Saint.
My energy is dark, and I know it. In the kitchen of the safe house, I rage-pour myself a cup of coffee, slamming everything I can until I actually crack my cup and coffee starts seeping all over the marble counter.
Grinding my jaw, I dump the coffee in the sink and get a new cup, filling it.
Saint flashes me a shit-eating grin from where he’s sitting over a bowl of half-eaten sugary cereal. “Case of blue balls?”
“Fuck you.”
“Hey, look, it’s not my fault if the wifey isn’t putting out.”
“Wifey? What are you, a nineteen-year-old girl talking about her best friend? And the next time you fucking talk about my wife putting out, I’ll feed you your teeth. Understood?”
“Nope. Last time I checked, I was a twenty-nine-year-old man with a giant dick and a face women can’t resist. Also, I highly doubt you’d be able to feed me my teeth, but I invite you to try.”
He shovels a spoonful of cereal into his mouth.
“How can you eat that shit?”
He swallows. “How can you not eat this? It’s fucking delicious.”
Rocco pauses in downing his eggs and bacon. “You eat breakfast with Mrs. Andriani, boss?”
“No.”
I’d intended to eat breakfast with Luna. But then she pissed me off and turned me on, and I ended up finger-fucking her on the breakfast table and storming out with a rock-hard dick and a foul temper.
Yeah, not one of my finer moments. I can still taste her, and it’s all I can do to keep from going back for more. So fucking sweet.
“Maria sent enough to feed an army.” Rocco gets up like he’s going to serve me.
“Sit. I’ll get it myself.”
I heap whatever I can find onto a plate and storm over to the table. There’s not much left, and it’s cold, which pisses me off even more. But I eat it anyway because we’ve got work to do, and today’s going to be a long one.
Saint starts drinking out of his cereal bowl like a little kid.
I glare at him. “Swear to God, I’m going to break that fucking bowl over your head if you don’t stop slurping.”
He blinks innocently and keeps at it.
“I’m serious, Saint. I’ll break your nose a second time.”
It’s still lightly bruised from his run-in with Luna’s head. She may have the soul of a poet, but she’s tougher than a grizzly bear.
Saint puts the bowl down. “She didn’t break it. She only bruised it.”
I shrug. “If you say so.”
“I do say so, because it’s the truth.”
“Mmm-hmm,” I agree around a mouthful of cold scrambled eggs.
The last thing he’d ever admit is to having his nose broken by a girl. Not going to lie. I get an evil amount of enjoyment from the fact that my wife headbutted the shit out of him.
My wife.
Fuck.
It still doesn’t feel real, even if I’ve been sleeping beside Luna every night. She hasn’t slit my throat yet, which is a minor miracle likely aided by the fact that everything sharp has been removed from the room. But Saint is right. I do have a case of blue balls. Asshole .
“She didn’t break it.” Saint makes an elaborate show of slurping the last of his milk.
“I think she did, boss,” Rocco says.
I grin at him. This is why he’s my right-hand man. I can always count on Roc to have my back.
“He’ll say whatever you want him to say,” Saint grumbles, setting his bowl back down on the table. “But listen, as much as I’d like to argue with you two about my pretty face, we’ve got more important things to do. Like figure out who the fuck clipped Tomasso Revello.”
I need the reminder. Luna has me off my game.
We’ve spent the last week in defense mode, trying to figure out what the hell went down that day.
Working out of the safe house isn’t ideal, but the main goal is to keep me alive and make sure Luna is safe.
If I go down, hell will break loose, and the Revellos and Andrianis will be in an all-out war.
“What do you have so far?” I ask Saint.
“We got access to more security footage from the businesses surrounding the cathedral.”
“Not every business yet? It’s been a week.”
Saint shakes his head. “The Feds have been sniffing around.”
I set down my fork. “Fuck. Again? I thought you talked to your guy.”
“I did talk to my guy.”
“Then why the hell are they poking around in the surveillance cameras we need to access?”
“Relax. He’ll get us what we need in another day or so.”
“This is taking too fucking long. Is Lucky still on Amedeo and his men?”
“Like a hawk.”
I nod, feeling edgy and restless. “And Scorpion?”
“He’s put a call in to his Bratva connection.”
“You think the Bratva would have the balls to take down Tomasso Revello at his daughter’s wedding?”
Saint shrugs and flicks a look in Rocco’s direction.
I look from Roc to my brother. “What aren’t you two telling me?”
“Nothing,” Saint says quickly.
Too quickly.
“It’s not nothing. Out with it. Right now, or I’ll re-break your nose.”
“You can’t re-break what isn’t broken.”
I pick up my fork and wield it like a weapon—which, coincidentally, wouldn’t be the first time I’ve used a fork this way. “I’ll gouge out your eye.”
Saint sighs. “Antonio and the boys set up an underground casino in Bratva territory.”
I slam my fist onto the table. “The fuck? We have an understanding with the Russians.”
My brother winces. “Correction. We did have an understanding. One that we’ve technically broken.”
“Fuck. Where’s Antonio right now?”
Antonio is our cousin on our mother’s side, a Rossi.
For years now, the Rossis have been under the umbrella of the Andriani crew, with the understanding that they follow our code.
Our friends are their friends. Same with our enemies.
And there are lines, like a tentative truce with the Bratva, that they don’t fucking cross.
Or else.
Saint pulls out a burner phone, ready to call Antonio, but I hold up a hand to stop him. “No. This isn’t a phone kind of conversation. Take me to him.”
Saint sends a wary look in Rocco’s direction.
Irritated, I slam my fork down before standing. “And stop it with the fucking morse code, or you two will be next.”
I crack my knuckles, abandoning my sad breakfast. Slamming my fist into my cousin’s jaw could be just the distraction I need. He’s lucky if that’s all I do to him.
Stupid asshole.
Luna
I know the second he’s back before the door to my glorified prison cell opens. I can feel a shift, like the way the air changes just before a storm. I’m in the middle of doing yoga, which I’ve reverted to as a way to pass the time and release my pent-up energy. Currently in downward facing dog.
I have just enough time to unfold my body into a standing position before the door bursts open.
He hesitates before entering, eye-fucking me with that pale-blue stare.
He’s wearing blue jeans and a white undershirt that shows off his muscled arms. As he stands there at the threshold, I see my chance. It’s now or never.
I bolt toward him, running as fast as I can, determined to escape.
But he’s faster.
With lightning-swift movements, he enters the room and slams the door shut, and I’m suddenly barreling into his chest. Caught in his arms instead of running free.
“Fuck,” I burst out.
“So eager to see me, baby?” He grins, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. There’s a coldness there, a sharpness that was missing this morning at breakfast. “If I’d have known, I would have come home to you sooner.”
He smells incredible, and I have to resist the urge to press my face to his neck and inhale deeply with all the willpower I possess. Suddenly, I notice that his hair is damp, like he’s showered recently. But not here. Somewhere else.
I don’t know why the thought of him showering elsewhere makes my stomach clench, but it does.
I shove at his chest, and he releases me. “Let me out of here. It’s been a week since you kidnapped me and brought me to your secret gangster dungeon.”
He passes a tattooed hand over the shadowed edge of his jaw. “You’re my wife. I can’t kidnap you.”
His hands are sexy. And he used them on me this morning. I’ve had a hard time thinking about anything else since, and I hate myself for it.
Where did he shower? And why? Was he using those fingers on someone else?
“You can’t disappear me just because we’re married either,” I point out.
“Actually, I can do anything I want to, and we both know it.”
He’s talking about what happened this morning. About how he finger-fucked me until I came all over him. My clit pulses. Something is very wrong with me. Hideously, alarmingly wrong with me. I can’t think about this now.
Maybe not ever.
“Can I have my phone back?” I ask, changing the subject.
“Not yet.”
“You don’t trust me with it.”
“After what happened at our wedding, I don’t trust anyone.”
“Fair enough. I’m in the same boat. And you know who I especially don’t trust? Gangsters who kidnap me, force me to marry them, and then keep me locked in some kind of insane mafioso basement vault.”
“I was under the impression I’m the only man you’ve married, topolina .”
I glare at him. “Don’t be a dickhead.”
“Don’t push me, wife. I’d be more than happy to give you another lesson. But then, I think you might enjoy that too much.”
My nipples are hard, and I hate him. How is it possible to simultaneously want to ride a man’s dick and murder him in his sleep?
I hug myself, trying to shield my body from his knowing gaze. “Please. I need something, some sort of distraction, or I’ll go insane.”
He works his jaw, staring at me, and then he nods. “I’ll be right back.”
He leaves, and I’d be lying if I said I don’t check out his ass as he exits the room. Priest Andriani has a fine backside. The kind you want to grab and hold on to while he’s railing you.
He returns with a reusable grocery bag that he extends to me like a peace offering. “Here.”
I take it from him, not knowing what to expect. And definitely not anticipating what I do find within.
“Lorine Niedecker,” I exclaim, extracting a copy of My Life by Water . “How did you know to get me this?”