Love and Lead

by June, CoraLee

  I fucked her till she came—twice. I fucked her like she was only mine to use up and bleed dry. I wrapped my fingers around her neck, squeezing a little and smiling when I heard her tight moans of appreciation. Tall buildings were a blur outside. The tracks below our feet created a steady beat timed perfectly to our rushed breaths and my harsh, punishing thrusts.

  I was thinking of nothing then. Just how good she felt, and how this was the closest thing to peace I’d felt since I realized I was a fucking monster.

  Then I came. Hard. Spurts of cum filling her up. She let me hold her by the neck and took me with a smile, milking my newfound insanity like it was somehow worthy of her.

  “Fuck, Callum,” she said with a sigh before spinning around. “That…”

  “I’m sorry—” I choked out, even though I didn’t feel remotely sorry. It just felt like the right thing to say as I saw bruises forming along her collarbone. How hard had I gone?

  “I’ll forgive you if you do it again. Harder,” she whispered over my lips before kissing me.

  Beautiful, beautiful Sunshine. Kissing me like she somehow saw the monster inside and thought it was something she could tame with her body. And maybe she could. Or perhaps she liked my monster just as it was, wild and hungry, devouring her when the cage didn’t feel strong enough.

  “Let’s go sit down before we’re kicked off this train,” I whispered before looking out the window once more.

  “Callum?” Sunshine said looking up at me with a hint of worry on her face. Did I do something wrong? “I love you, you know that, right? Nothing you could do will stop that.”

  She looked a little bit like her mom just then, all desperate and devoted, looking up at me.

  “Yeah, Baby. I love you too.”

  But it didn’t feel right. ’Cause if I really loved her, I would let her go. But I guess that’s another reason I fit in with the Bullets.

  I’m a selfish fucker.

  She pulled up her pants without cleaning up, and we left, smiling at the scowling attendant that knew what we did and didn’t have the proof to do shit about it. “Back to your seats, please,” he said in a chiding tone.

  But this time, I didn’t let the others cuddle her after I used her up. I kicked Blaise out of his seat and held her, stroking her hair while staring at the blood orange sun in the sky, looking like fire and forever.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Sunshine

  New York felt suffocating now. Not in that overcrowded way that most anxiety-prone people felt in big cities, but in that ominous sort of way that made your heart sink. Some places just had that sort of energy, the vibe that made you have to catch your breath.

  My soul was still floating from the hot train fuck with Callum. I’d started counting the bruises forming along my neck and collarbone, pressing on the discolored skin and exhaling as Joe’s knife sat heavy in my pocket.

  One. Callum wasn’t the same, but I liked how he felt.

  Two. He was fighting demons greater than guilt.

  Three. I didn’t even fucking care.

  Four. I wanted these bruises forever.

  I wanted the worst of all of them. I guess in some ways, it made me feel a little better about myself. “We’re staying here,” Gav said as the taxi we were in came to a stop outside a fancy hotel that towered over us. A couple of doormen outside opened the cab door, and we got out. “Only a couple nights, right? We have a little extra cash to burn, and I don’t plan on needing to be frugal much longer. Besides, it has good security and is in a busy place. Santobello would have to be a dumbass to attack a five-star hotel.”

  He attacked Blaise’s penthouse in Harlem, I thought to myself. I didn’t know he gave a fuck about being public. He owned men in power and had enough money to pay for others to take the fall. It’s how he’d gotten to be where he was. But even so, it was nice seeing Gavriel take charge and make decisions again, so I kept my mouth shut, hiding my doubts behind the thin line of my lips.

  The first thing I did when we got in our room was take a shower. After being in and out of disgusting motels for the last week, standing under the hot water in a bathroom that was clean and elegant was relaxing and renewing. The guys eyed me when I immediately went there, Blaise even standing to see if he could join me, but I shook my head.

  I loved being around them, but I needed a moment to collect myself. I was nervous about meeting Gavriel’s father. Nervous about tracking down this woman that was only rumored to have evidence to take down Santobello. And despite all the anxiousness, I was happy too.

  My need to be alone had nothing to do with my men and everything to do with my fear of losing them. Our plan had too many holes in it. It wasn't a solid foundation. Maybe we should get as far away as we could. Start over? We didn’t need the money. And Santobello’s reach, although influential, wasn’t worldwide, was it?

  I shut off the water and wrapped a soft towel around me, heading back into the main room where the guys were sitting and talking to one another. Callum was on the phone, sounding official to whoever was on the other side of the line. “Yes. I’ll need a room reserved for ten a.m. tomorrow morning. Moretti is rumored to have information on a case I’m working.” A pause, he paced the floor, his fingers shaking. “That’s classified.”

  More pacing. Silence.

  “Look. You can either get me a room or explain to your superior why I had to go above your head for a court order and waste precious time on a time-sensitive case. Make it happen,” he growled before cutting off the phone and turning to look at us. All I could think of was how eerily similar he sounded to Gavriel just then, ordering people around to get what he wanted.

  Was I fucked up for finding demanding men hot?

  Ryker was sitting on the bed and patted the mattress beside him. “You okay, Sunshine?” he asked, and suddenly I realized why Gavriel was so annoyed when I asked him that same question again and again. It made me feel like a kid.

  “Yep,” I said, popping my lips on the p to punctuate an added syllable.

  “They’re going to have cameras in the interrogation room. They’ll probably be recording, so we’ll need to be careful how we ask,” Callum said while pacing the floors more, looking at me and pausing when he saw the light bruises his fingers left on my skin from before. I noticed his hands reach up like he was grasping for me, but he dropped his hands before pacing again.

  “So, what’s the story then?” Gavriel asked.

  “It’s probably best that we stick as close to the truth as possible. I’ll tell him that we are searching for Lilly Russo and need as much information as he can provide. I’ll even pretend to offer him a couple of years off his sentence in exchange for information.” Callum touched his beard and pulled his fingers back as if realizing he needed to shave again.

  He then marched towards the bathroom and opened the door, slipping inside and turning on the faucet. For a moment, we all sat there listening until he called out over the sounds of the running faucet. “Sunshine can be my assistant.”

  A few more minutes passed, and the water was shut off. Callum emerged from the bathroom clean shaven and looking like the officer I knew from my past.

  “Officer Mercer,” I joked while smiling timidly at him. He then ran his palm along his jaw, checking for any missed stubble. I felt my cheeks grow hot while I checked him out, and he pulled his bottom lip between his teeth when he caught me staring.

  “Is there anything we should be made aware of about your father?” Callum asked Gavriel before crossing his arms across his chest. He was back in serious mode.

  Gavriel went silent, as if trying to think about how to word what he was thinking. “He won’t trust you at first. You’ll need to find a way to say who you are without alerting the prison guards,” he said. I moved to sit next to him on the bed, clutching my white towel to my body while staring at him.

  I wished I knew what he was thinking. “There’s this poem he used to recite to me,” Gavriel said. Though the sentence didn’t see
m foreboding, I noticed how his eyes went dark with an emotion I couldn’t place. “It’s by Edmund V. Strolis. It’s about Italian families, and there’s a line in it about the circle of trust. Tell him about it. He’ll know I sent you. It’s a code he told me as a child should I ever run into trouble. He also used it as a way to help me know who I could trust. If anyone didn’t know the code, they couldn’t talk to me.”

  I nodded, understanding, but still hurting for Gavriel. What kind of world did he grow up in where that sort of thing was even necessary? “Leave it to you to have a ridiculous code word that’s hard to remember,” Blaise said with a grunt. He was bruised and cut up but looked better in the light of day. If he had a concussion, he was over it now. I’d been keeping an eye on him to see if he threw up or passed out, but he never did. Blaise was right; he could definitely take a hit.

  “I hate the idea of you going,” Blaise pouted. “I don’t like having you out of my sight.” I’d always thought it was Gavriel that was overprotective and needy. But seeing the lengths to which Blaise was willing to go at the fight changed my perceptions of his protective nature. I’d always known he was devoted and dependable, but this brought things to an entirely new level. My heart swelled with affection for the goofy bounty hunter. He wasn’t just the comedic relief in my life.

  Everyone went quiet, and I knew that if I gave my men enough time and silence, they’d think their way into overprotective nonsense and change their minds about me going. “Do you all think it’s weird that I’m bringing my other boyfriend with me to meet my father-in-law?” I asked, hoping it lightened the mood.

  Gavriel was the first to laugh. “Yeah. It’s a little weird, but don’t worry,” he began before grabbing my hand. “He’ll be more pissed that you’re with an agent than with your boyfriend.”

  * * *

  I’d always had this perception of what prison was like. I’d envisioned large warehouse-looking buildings in nowhere towns with barbed-wire fences surrounding the property. I pictured burly men outside, fighting and spitting in the dirt while they lifted barbells and played football in empty fields.

  But the Manhattan Federal Corrections Facility was nothing like that. The prison was stuffed between two other buildings, towering over the street but blending into the cityscape. It had security measures, yes, but it looked oddly placed. Like anyone could walk in and out on a whim.

  The guys stayed back at the hotel while Callum and I visited the prison. The guards that worked there patted us down and inspected Callum’s shiny badge with scrutiny. “What’s your business with Lorenzo Moretti?” a bald man with beady eyes asked while staring at us both. He was wearing an expensive suit, and my gut told me that he was bad news.

  “That’s classified,” Callum replied, the words smoothly rolling off his lips like we weren’t breaking the law and lying about our purposes for being here.

  “Everything that happens in this jail is my business. A last-minute interrogation, is my business. Lorenzo Moretti, is my business. Bastard has been giving me hell, and I want to make sure you aren’t going to do something stupid—like offer him a shorter sentence or cushy job while here. The man is evil. Pure evil.”

  I dropped my mouth open in shock then quickly closed it to match Callum’s unaffected demeanor. Damn, I’m not good at this at all. “I know that Moretti is crucial to an ongoing investigation. And if you think he’s bad, then the person I’m bringing in would give you nightmares. They have connections in every prison system worth talking about. One word to my superiors that you’re cockblocking this investigation, and I’ll ruin you,” Callum said through gritted teeth.

  “Fine,” the man replied before guiding us down the fluorescent-lit, grey hall. “I’ll be listening. Thirty minutes.” The warden opened the door to a room with interrogation mirrors covering an entire wall, guiding us inside before slamming it shut.

  I stole a glance at Callum, trying to feel confident but shaking from the pressure. This was a bad idea.

  The room had a table chained to the floor, and Lorenzo Moretti was sitting at it. He had dark salt and pepper hair, tan skin, and a clean-shaven face. But the most memorable feature about him was the smirk on his face. It was the same cynical amusement that I’d seen Gavriel Moretti wear. He had frown lines on his face but otherwise looked like an older version of the man I loved.

  “Lorenzo Moretti,” Callum greeted him before holding out a chair for me to sit in.

  “They said I was meeting with an agent today. Didn’t realize I’d get to see an angel, too.” He leaned back in his seat, showing off more of the tight, orange jumpsuit on his body. He was fit, and his dark eyes appraised me with warmth. I thought of the code Gavriel told me to give him, worried that too much time had passed and he wouldn’t remember the poem, or that it would alert the warden who was watching.

  “I’m no angel, Mr. Moretti,” I said before glancing at Callum. We never discussed who would take the lead for this conversation, but our time was limited. Gavriel’s father wouldn’t say anything unless he trusted us. “Do you know of the poet Edmund V. Strolis?” I asked, keeping my voice casual. “He has a poem about Italian families that I think you’d enjoy. There’s a line about the circle of loyalty.”

  Mr. Moretti’s eyes grew wide. “My husband told me about that poem. And your circle of loyalty is why we’re here. There’s a woman named Lilly Russo. She’s got information about—”

  Moretti held his hand up, slicing my sentence off at the neck with a fierce expression and a nod towards the mirror. Three heartbeats later, an alarm went off and the door locked. The blare of the siren was making my teeth rattle. Lorenzo then spoke. “We have ten minutes until that asshole gets back and the feed starts. Talk. You have my attention.”

  It was hard to think with the loud sirens, and I was momentarily stunned. So this was where Gavriel got it? Always ten steps ahead of everyone, controlling the universe with nothing but a nod.

  “Santobello’s taken over. All imports, accounts, allies. He’s got it all. He attacked Gavriel,” Callum explained calmly while I reoriented myself.

  “I heard. My son was stupid, but looking at her, I’m assuming he wasn’t thinking with his head, hmm?”

  I blushed, feeling chastised and cherished all at once.

  The sirens continued to pierce through the air, making me grit my teeth. Yelling down the hall erupted, and I went rigid with tension. “So you want Lilly? You know how many people have been looking for her over the years? She’s the best damn ghost there is. You don’t go to her; she comes to you.”

  “Well, could you get a message to her? Tell her that we want to strike a deal and bring down Santobello?”

  Mr. Moretti looked at the clock on the wall and exhaled. “There's a chance she probably already knows you’re here asking about her. The bitch has eyes everywhere,” he said with a frown before turning his attention to Callum.

  “Never thought my son would work with the feds though.” He then spat on the concrete floor. “Ruining our family name. Please tell me you’re going to have little Morettis soon. I need to redeem myself with a grandson that can run a fucking empire.”

  I blushed again and noticed Callum’s mouth part slightly, like the idea of me one day having children hadn’t occurred to him. I don’t want to have kids. What if they inherited my father’s psycho tendencies...what if I did?

  No. Absolutely not. But I wouldn’t be telling Gavriel’s father that any time soon. “How do you know her?” I asked.

  “We used to mess around. Nothing major. She mostly wanted blackmail on Santobello at the time. I’ve always liked a good pussy to dip into. It was mutually beneficial.”

  “You and Santobello used to work together, right? Gavriel briefly explained what happened. He got greedy, but it feels like there's more. Why does he want to ruin the Moretti empire so badly?”

  Mr. Moretti exhaled, and it was a slow and weighty thing, full of regret and grief.

  “Santobello and I grew up together, back w
hen the original families were in power, and there wasn’t a person in the city that didn’t have to answer to us. There are three families that control the Italian territories. The Santobellos. The Morettis. And the Russos. We owned the world. Time changed things though. Crime had to get creative, and we went our separate ways, but we always worked for the benefit of the original families. We always worked together when it fucking counted. You read that poem, baby. Loyalty is like a hurricane. Destructive, determined, and beautiful in a way.”

  I gasped, eyeing the clock. We only had a few more minutes. “I’m not the best father, but my loyalty is always to my son. I was married to a woman that Santobello wanted for a while. It was an arranged sort of thing. No love there, but she was pretty and useful. Birthed me a healthy boy before she started doing crack.” I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling guilty for learning all of this without Gavriel here. It made me feel dirty. “She embarrassed me. Brought men home. One of them hurt my son, and I couldn’t stand that. So she died. Someone gave her some bad drugs, and my Gavriel found her lying face down in her own vomit.”

  I clutched my chest, breathing in the musty smells of the prison while staring at the emotionless man in front of me. “I was arrested about six months later, and Santobello blamed me for her death.”

  “Did you?” I asked. “Did you kill Gavriel’s mom?” I couldn’t wrap my head around that.

  “Don’t ask questions to shit you don’t want the answers to,” he replied.

  “So where does Lilly play into this?” Callum asked, bringing the conversation back to why we were here. His lips were in a thin line of disapproval though. “Do you think Lilly could help us? Are you sure you don’t have any evidence to lock him away?”

  “Not any that wouldn’t lock my son and me away for longer,” he replied.

  Fuck.

  “And there’s nothing about Lilly you can tell us? Nothing at all?” Callum asked, his voice pleading just as the sirens stopped. I looked down at the metal table, hating that I’d learned so much but still didn’t know anything.