Chapter 7 Giovanni #2
“We will find her, fiore. I’ve made a promise to you and to myself, and I will not stop until she is safely reunited with you. I will never stop, do you understand?”
I stand in front of her, holding her gaze, her eyes puffy with the tears still to come.
“I’m sorry, Gio. I’m so sorry. I should never have—”
“Hey, you have nothing to be sorry for.”
I fold my arms around her, as her breaths become shuddering sobs. I stroke her hair, rub her back, breathe in the smell of her, wishing that I could make this all go away.
We are still standing like this, Meggie in my arms, when the cabin door opens, and Enzo bursts in.
“Houston, we have a problem.”
He offers me his phone. The screen is unlocked; he’s in the middle of a video call with a man whose image raises my hackles and clenches my jaw.
Mario.
It takes a couple of beats for me to orient Mario in his surroundings, during which time my initial instinct is to make Enzo complicit in placing the monster in the setting of my casino.
My. Fucking. Casino.
It’s like seeing a pig in the jungle claiming the leader position from the mighty lion, and the rage that, until now, has been burning inside my chest for The Fish, turns white-hot. It is ready to be unleashed, and heaven help anyone who dares to stand in my way.
“Giovanni!” Mario’s features move closer to the screen, so close I can see the red lines crisscrossing the whites of his eyes and the enlarged pores on his nose.
He taps the screen. Grinning. “It is you! I was starting to think that you’d abandoned your family business completely when you didn’t answer your phone. ”
My phone! I left it in the bedroom when I climbed out of the window.
I glance at Enzo watching me intently from a few paces away, his ready, casual smile replaced by thin lips and narrowed eyes. He wanted a part of the family business, but he is already out of his depth with this.
I turn my attention back to the screen. “What do you want, Mario?”
Might as well set the terms from the outset. Not that it will make any difference to Mario—he is going to get what he deserves, and that doesn’t include any part of my business.
“I thought I made it clear during our last conversation.”
The smile fades. The predatorial glint is back in his eyes. When he speaks, his voice slithers from the screen and wraps itself around my neck like an icy noose.
“I want this. I want everything that you’ve built here, everything that belongs to you, and once I have it, I will tear you apart and distribute the pieces where only the vultures will find them. Snip, snip, snip.” He makes a scissor action on the screen with his fingers.
I keep my voice low. “Get. The Fuck. Out. Of. My. Casino.”
“Gio.” He stands back from the camera, the busy casino floor hazy in the background. “That’s no way to treat a customer, is it?”
He glances left, and another man steps into view. Dark hair, heavy features. I recognize him from the last video chat. The one where my sister Bianca had been beaten up by a bratva brute in black.
“Nice setup.” The guy shrugs. “Room for improvement though.”
I feel the tic pulsing in my jaw. Mario must be aware of what’s playing out in Vermont and is hitting me while I’m otherwise engaged. But he will learn the hard way that he has picked on the wrong person.
“Game on.” I end the call.
“Gio?” Meggie is watching me with the same look in her eye that she had when we found her in the climbers’ hut. “Who was that? What’s going on?”
“That … is my brother-in-law.” My tone is clipped, and I try to smooth it out, for Meggie’s sake. “It’s nothing for you to worry about.”
Her eyes flicker to Enzo and back again. “I heard him. He said—”
“Hey, it doesn’t matter what he said.” I go to her, Enzo’s phone like a grenade in my hand, and pull her into my arms.
Right now, this feels like the only way I can keep her safe. She has already proved that she can escape the guarded cabin if she believes that it will save Amber, and I will not risk losing her again.
Fuck Mario! He will learn, too late, the meaning of respect. Fortunately for him, I won’t be the one to deliver the lesson, not while The Fish is still out there taunting us with Amber’s abduction.
“I’ll handle it, fiore.” Her hair tickles my chin as I speak.
Meggie tilts her head back and peers into my eyes. Searching for the truth. “Do you need to go back to New York?”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“What are we going to do about Mario?” Enzo jolts back to life. “We can’t let him get away with this.”
I smile. His use of the word ‘we’ isn’t lost on me. A year ago, I’d have baulked at the idea of involving him in family matters, But now… He has done more in the last few days to prove his allegiance to the family than he has ever done before.
“He won’t get away with this.” I hand his phone over. “You’re going to New York.”
Enzo licks his lips and casts his eyes across the blank screen. Just when I think he’s going to question my decision, a smile tugs his lips into a lopsided smile. “Nothing like being thrown in at the deep end, huh?”
I place my hand on his shoulder. “You’re family. I wouldn’t trust anyone else.”
He smiles. “I’m assuming that you have a plan in place?”
“Always.”
I don’t tell him that dealing with Mario and his bratva pals requires a new plan, one that I haven’t yet finalized.
Sending him into the lion’s den with a lack of confidence in my strategy will be like signing his death warrant.
I need him to go in with the bravado of the kid who picked a fight with a lad almost twice his age because he believed in justice.
“Gio?” Meggie intervenes. “Is it… Is it dangerous?”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to lie to her, to tell her that it’s nothing, that my brother-in-law is bluffing. Like this is a game we regularly play. But I want no more secrets between us.
So, when Enzo goes back to his cabin to prepare for his trip to New York, I switch on the coffee machine, fill two mugs, and sit beside her on the couch.
“My brother-in-law is a brute,” I begin.
I tell her about the arranged marriage between Bianca and Mario, my father’s warning not to interfere, and my reaction when I saw Bianca’s bruises in LA, in what feels like a lifetime ago.
“He is retaliating in the only way he knows how.”
She furrows her brow. “By stealing your business?”
That would only be the beginning.
“By resorting to violence. My sister is being held captive by—” How do I explain to her the meaning of the bratva without elaborating on my own background? “—a Russian mob.”
Meggie gasps, one hand clamped over her mouth. “Mob?” She doesn’t spell out her fears; she doesn’t need to.
“Fiore, my family hail from Sicily. My father, my grandfather, and generations before him—”
“It’s okay, Gio.” She shakes her head and places a finger on my lips. “You don’t have to tell me. I already figured it out. The security team. The contacts. How you knew so much about Amber’s father.”
I didn’t realize until now how heavily this has been weighing on my shoulders and hearing that Meggie already knew and didn’t run away at the first opportunity is like a green light flashing above my head.
No more secrets.
She knows who I am, and she still loves me.
“What about your sister, Gio? Do you know where she is?”
I’ve hardly had a chance to think about Bianca with the events of the past few days.
She has been there, at the back of my mind, her bloody battered face staring out at me like a ghost hovering behind a misty window.
The bratva used her to send me a warning, but they won’t kill her.
She is worth more to them alive than she is dead.
“I will find her.” My hands instinctively ball into fists.
“Oh my God, Gio, I am so sorry.” Meggie sets her cup down on the floor next to the couch and strokes my face. “This is all because of us, isn’t it? Me and Amber.”
“None of this is your fault, Meggie. What happened to my sister…” I suck in a deep breath. “It has been a long time coming.”
She chews her bottom lip, mulling it over. “If you need to go, Gio, I understand. I’ll stay here and find Amber.”
I take her chin between my thumb and forefinger and kiss her lips. “I’m not going anywhere without you and Amber.”
“But…”
“But nothing, fiore. You and Amber are my world. Do you understand what that means?”
Her green eyes lock onto mine. “I think so,” she whispers.
I smile. “Perhaps I haven’t demonstrated it clearly enough.” I lick her lips, parting them with my tongue.
She sucks on the end of it, a glint of mischief in her eyes. “Perhaps you should try a little harder.”
“Like this?” I kiss her, my tongue exploring her mouth while my cock fills my boxers. “Or maybe like this.”
Gripping her hair with one hand, I tug her head backwards, exposing her neck.
I nibble her earlobe, her hairline, her jaw, my tongue leaving damp trails down to her collarbone.
Meggie shifts her position on the couch, sliding her ass down towards me so that her upper body is horizontal across the cushions.
I move with her. Her gentle groans against my mouth are all it takes for my cock to start throbbing.
With all that’s going on, it shouldn’t be this easy to fuck Meggie, but it is.
It’s as though our bodies strain towards one another, for release, for sustenance, for love, and I’m powerless to resist.
I tug Meggie’s sweater over her head, exposing her naked breasts. Trailing my fingers over them like whispers, I watch mesmerized, as her nipples grow erect and plump.
“God, fiore.” I lower my head, squash her breasts together, and suck her nipples while she watches me, her head propped up on a cushion. “You’re the sweetest fucking thing I’ve ever tasted.”
She smiles. “How sweet?”
I kiss her again, smothering her mouth with mine, and she grips my hair, holding me tightly like she can’t get enough of me. Tiny groans escape her lips. I slide my hand down, inside her pants, my fingers finding her sex as she gasps.
“You’re wet,” I murmur against her lips. “I would fuck you but…”
“But?” She nuzzles my nose, still gripping my hair.
“But I don’t want to hurt your foot.”
The games are so easy. We both know that I’m going to fuck her with my tongue before I fuck her with my cock, and we both know that her foot isn’t going to stop either of us.
“I have an idea.” She slants her eyes and gives me a mischievous smile. “As you’re demonstrating how much I mean to you, perhaps you could prop my foot over the back of the couch.” She sucks her bottom lip. “It’s just a suggestion.”
“How can I refuse, fiore?”
I unzip her pants, slide them over her hips, and drop them onto the floor. She isn’t wearing panties, and the thought of her being in my company without underwear sends the blood flowing straight to my already engorged cock.
Raising her sore foot carefully, I prop it over the back of the couch. The sight of Meggie’s parted sex is more than I can bear.
I grip her thighs and dip my head between her legs, licking and sucking her juices, the sweetness of her fueling my desire. I stick my tongue inside her, licking her out, my cock itching to be set free as Meggie’s groans fill the cabin.
With one hand, I reach for her breasts, tweaking her nipples while I suck on her clit.
Her breathing grows shallow, her thighs trembling against my shoulders.
I could stop. I could drag it out, make her wait for her orgasm, but tonight is about satiating our desires, quenching our thirst for each other.
Tonight isn’t for waiting.
Meggie’s pussy clenches around my tongue as her orgasm explodes. I keep sucking, swallowing her juices, getting my tongue deep inside her.
Then I stand and strip off my sweater and pants, my cock springing free.
Meggie watches me languorously. One arm behind her head as though she is posing for a naked portrait.
“I’m not done with you yet, fiore.”
She smiles. “You mean there’s more to come?”
“There’s always more to come where you’re concerned.”
I go to straddle her, but she sits up and reaches for my cock, wrapping her cool fingers around me and pulling me towards her. “My turn.”
I lean over her so that she can lay back against the cushions, supporting my upper body against the back of the couch. “Suck me, Meggie.”
Her lips close around the head, her tongue exploring me, gently to begin with but sucking harder, her grip tightening around my girth. I wrap my own fingers around Meggie’s making her rub me harder. I’ll come quickly tonight. There’s an urgency to our bodies that we haven’t experienced before.
When I feel the pre-cum oozing from me and into Meggie’s mouth, I pull out.
“I’m coming inside you.”
I kneel between her legs and rub the end of my cock around her pussy. It’s a sight that I will never tire of, her naked body, her wide green eyes that shine all for me.
Guiding my length inside her, I support myself on one elbow and suck her nipples while I pound into her. “Are you ready for me, fiore?”
“Always.” She arches her spine and wraps her good leg around my back, holding me in, her thrusts meeting mine until I explode inside her.
When my balls are empty, I roll onto my side, burying my face against her neck. Meggie strokes my arm, cradling me against her the way she would cradle a baby.
“Now do you understand?” I murmur, studying her profile.
She twists her head around to look at me and smiles. “I think so. But I might need a repeat performance in the morning.”
We don’t move into the bedroom for what little remains of the night.
When Meggie is asleep, I grab a blanket from the hamper in the living room and cover her naked body, then I pull on some clothes, retrieve my phone from the nightstand next to the bed, and take it outside.
There’s one missed call from Mario. He isn’t a patient man.
When I didn’t pick up, he gave up and targeted the next sibling.
The temperature still drops at night, and the cool air seems to make everything sharper.
There’s a light on inside the cabin Enzo is sharing with Demi.
I wonder if he is sharing his fears with her, or if, like me and Meggie, they’ve found solace in each other’s arms. He’s different around her.
More grounded. She could be good for him.
In another reality where cops and mafia can overlook each other’s powers and weaknesses.
It’s morning in Sicily when my call connects to Don Calderone’s private number. He answers on the first ring. “Giovanni, my friend.”
“Emiliano. I wanted you to be the first to know. I’m going to start a war.”