7. Matteo
Chapter 7
Matteo
“ Y ou’ve been staring at her all night,” a voice brought me back to reality.
Bridget was some woman I’d picked up Noir the night Mason and Nora had invited me out.
Or is it Bridy? I literally couldn’t remember her name, but she was on me like white on fucking rice. I had myself a fucking stage five clinger.
“Huh?”
She crossed her arms, pushing up her huge breast into my eyesight as if trying to distract me again. My hands went to her hips.
You’re easy, I thought again.
“You heard me,” she said. “Who is she?”
My eyes drifted back over to Rain, she had a beer in one hand staring into the fire. Every once in a while, someone would say something to her and she’d talk but mostly she’d just been quiet.
I watched as Carmine came over and sat down next to her, his blonde hair catching in the firelight. He’d thrown a fucking bonfire because he’d bought a puppy that was now sitting in his lap. Rain’s face had morphed.
She was smiling and it was because of my brother.
Jealousy ripped threw me and finally, I turned back to Big Titted Bridget.
“No one,” I smirked.
“She must be somebody 'cause you literally won’t stop fucking paying attention to her…like are you in love with her.”
I pulled Bridget’s chin up, forcing her glassy eyes to meet my intense stare. She seemed to be a little drunk and I’d only had two beers. “Stop worrying about her and worry about getting bent over in the bathroom,” I murmured before dropping a kiss on her lips.
That seemed to shut her up for five seconds as her eyes widened in surprise. My words had worked their magic. Before I we left the bon fire to go inside, I took one more look at Rain. The puppy was no in her lap, and she was cooing to it and stroking its fur.
We pushed past the some of the people Carmine had invited, to go inside of the house. Nora and Mason were coming out as I entwined hands with Bridget.
“Where are you going?” Mason asked.
I offered my brother a mischievous smile. “Be right back.”
“I’m sure it won’t take long,” Mason grinned widely, clapping me on the back.
He was right, I had Bridget down on her knees the second we were in the bathroom. I pulled my dick free and aggressively began to shove it down her throat.
The entire time, I imagined that it was Rain taking me deep inside of her throat. That she was sucking me off, nice and sloppy just the way I liked getting my dick sucked.
Bridget was too neat.
She was also drunk.
However, it did just enough of the trick. I was busting down her throat in three minutes just from the thought.
“No fair,” Bridget whined as she licked my salty cum from her mouth.
Stuffing my dick back inside of my pants, I agreed. “Sorry.”
“Well…what about me? You said you were gonna bend me over…like at least eat my pussy…”
The two of us stared at each other and finally, she let loose a scream. “Fuck you, dude. I’m out of here!”
The door to the bathroom clattered open and she flew out. Wincing, I closed the door behind her departing frame. This was about how most of my interactions with women over the last few years had gone.
A few one-night stands that never led to anything. There had been a woman that I’d dated for two weeks but it’d fizzled quickly once I’d taken an assignment out of town for a month.
Bracing myself against the sink, I stared into my reflection. I needed to get a haircut and shave immediately.
“You look like shit,” I shook my head.
That buzzing feeling was back, building at the base of my skull. A shadow darted around the sides of my vision, hints of red…
Turning the sink on, I splashed water on my face.
“What the fuck is going on,” I whispered to my reflection.
The buzzing at the base of my neck had been happening more and more frequently. My brother’s had described that feeling often. I knew there was no way that my dark passenger was beginning to stir. Not after all these years of having it lay dormant.
I was the normal one in the family.
As normal as you could be in a family with a father that was a fucking arms dealer and two brothers that were basically mercenaries.
Taking a deep breath, I headed out of the bathroom, still rubbing at my neck. Mason was standing by the corner waiting for me with a look on his face and two beers.
“What happened in there?”
I shrugged. “She sucked my dick and expected a marriage proposal.”
“Here. Come on, we need to talk. Carmine’s waiting in the gym.”
Taking the beer, I cracked the cap on the waiting brown bottle. It felt soothing going down and the buzzing feeling seemed to calm down which made me feel better.
Carmine’s house was fucking huge, and it made my apartment on a government salary look like a shoe box. Whoever said crime didn’t pay had fucking lied. It paid extremely well.
True to Mason’s word, Carmine was sitting at a little desk far away from the mats where he and Mason sparred and kicked the shit out of each other. The puppy was nowhere in sight.
“Where’s the dog?” I asked with just a hint of asshole in my voice.
Carmine had a scar over his left eyebrow. It was the only thing that marred his otherwise perfect features.
That eyebrow was now slowly raising itself in my direction.
Fucking pretty boy, I mentally rolled my eyes.
“What’s wrong with my dog? Why are you saying it like that?” Carmine leaned forward, his brow arched.
“Nothing is wrong with your dog,” I muttered feeling childish for even bringing it up.
“Nah,” he stood up, clearly insulted. “What’s your beef with my puppy.”
Mason looked between the two of us, shaking his head. “Are you alright?”
I sipped my beer, “I’m fine.”
“I think he has an issue with Ziggy,” Carmine muttered.
Mason ignore the two of us and tugged something from out behind him. He tossed it down on the desk and then didn’t say anything. It was a small leather-bound book, that looked distressed and grimy.
A smell hit my nose. It was as if Mason had found this object buried deep in the earth.
“What is that,” Carmine covered his nose and stepped back.
I leaned into the scent, kind of enjoying it. My eyes roamed over the book but I waited to touch it.
“Nora and I found this on our little trip to Corsica…”
My head whipped up at the mention of our ancestral home. “You went there?”
Mason’s hand had gone to his hip, his eyes staring at the booklet intensely. “Yes, and it was creepy. We broke into a crypt.”
“Jesus, the two of you are a regular Batman and Robin, huh?” Carmine's face showed small bits of astonishment.
“That was dangerous and stupid,” I looked at him.
“Augustus is laying low,” Mason shrugged.
“Still…”
Mason held up his hand. “Let me finish. This thing right here…. it's like old ass scientific research and findings on…”
“Corsicans,” Carmine whispered finally picking up the old manuscript that looked like it could fall apart from even the slightest touch.
Our attention couldn’t be pulled away from the diary, Carmine gently flipping through it as if it were a fragile newborn. His eyes were crinkled with every flip.
“None of this is in English…” Carmine handed it to me and I took my turn, sitting my beer on the desk.
The paper felt weird under my fingertips and I wondered what it actually might have been made of.
“Nora thinks it might be Latin,” Mason sighed. “She’s been running some linguistic programs on some of the text trying to get a match.”
Finally done with my inspection and knowing I wouldn’t be able to add much to the conversation about it, I handed it back to Mason.
“You think Dad was looking for this?” I asked.
“No idea. But remember when I was in Italy looking for Gisella?” My brother tucked the item back where it’d been on his person.
“Yeah?”
He took a breath. “We ran all these names that we’d found in her calendar. At first I thought maybe she had a roster of men she was sleeping with. When we finally took a better look, all the men were involved in different aspects of business, foreign governments, banking.”
“Deep pockets,” Carmine volunteered.
I picked my beer back up and finished it off. It felt so cold hitting my stomach, and my taste buds seemed to enjoy the citrusy aftertaste that it left. For a few moments I thought before speaking.
“Dad promised those men something,” I finally spoke, nodding while still thinking. “He’s a fucking arms dealer, he deals in weapons. The fact that your psycho ex-marine buddy popped up and started killing…these pieces are starting to look like a puzzle.”
“You think Augustus was funding synthetic Corsicans?” Mason’s eyes widened just a bit.
“He wouldn’t bankrupt himself….and Nora said there was a feed that night. Watching you and Tobias fight…”
Mason nodded in agreement, considering the weight of my words.
“We all just need to be aware,” Carmine leaned against the desk but stood up and straightened himself. “I have eyes on Asher and Cody. They can take care of themselves but as long as Dad thinks they’re not a threat they should be fine.”
“It’s the two of you he’d want to kill,” I shrugged.
Mason and Carmine’s Corsicans were active and deadly.
Mine not so much.
“None of us are safe, brother,” Mason sighed.
“Look….I’d love to sit around in here circle-jerking it with you half the night. But have you seen Nora’s sister? Holy fuck, what a fucking smoke show,….she’s watching the dog by the way…”
Something roared inside of me and I don’t know what happened but suddenly Carmine was spitting blood, knocked back from the force of me hitting him.
“What the hell man!” He screamed.
“I…I…Carmine, I’m sorry.”
No, you’re not, something wicked whispered inside my brain.
Taking a breath, I shook it off only to continue getting stares at from my brothers.
“That was uncalled for,” Carmine nursed his lip.
“Sorry,” I said again.
He shoved past Mason and me and we watched him go. About to follow him, Mason stepped in front of me. His face was furled into an inquisitive look.
“What was that really about?” He asked, still staring as if I was going to give up some sort of secret.
The truth was, I had no idea why I’d hit Carmine.
Rubbing at my neck, where the buzzing was sometimes, I took a breath. “I don’t know. Stress probably.”
He stared at me for a moment longer and then let the subject drop. We left out of the gym and headed back to the party. Running eyes over every single person still at the bonfire, I noted the Rain was missing.
Sitting down by the fire, the heat warming my body I relaxed. Sure, I’d gotten my dick sucked but that was it. Watching Nora sit in Mason’s lap with the puppy, relaxed and in love, it was that I realized might truly be alone for the rest of my life.
Later on, I heard Nora tell Mason that Rain had decided to go home and get some rest. It wasn’t until my phone started ringing at five a.m. that I determined Rain had lied to her sister.
She hadn’t gone home to get some sleep.
She had gone to party with Yakuza associates and it had almost cost her dearly.