CHAPTER NINETEEN
Arturo
“Is this about Elmo?” Franco says, striding onto the balcony and standing over the chair. He grabs the back of it and clenches his fists like he’s getting ready to start an argument.
I make to stand up, ready to tell him to watch his damn manners when he’s in my home. Just because we’ve been through hell together these past few days, it doesn’t mean he didn’t desert me when I could’ve helped.
He made the worst possible choice.
And I had to save his ass.
Just like when we were kids.
Aida twitches, my queen telling me silently that I should let her handle this. Sitting there in her elegant coppery long dress, shining as bright and beautiful as her hair, and showing me that made-for-motherhood body to boot, she really does look like mafia royalty.
“Elmo’s still missing,” I say, keeping my tone calm. “I’ve sent Vinnie out to look for him.”
“I don’t like enemies out there in the dark, Arturo.”
“Elmo isn’t an enemy.”
“We don’t know that, do we? Peacekeepers could’ve turned him.”
“Your little friend was never a Peacekeeper,” I snarl. “My FBI contact told me he was a rogue agent. His uncle is in the goddamn Cartel. That was how he was able to get away with so much shit. You’ve been at war with the Cartel for years, and you never even knew.”
Franco flinches. For a second, I see the scared boy in his eyes. The years slide away. Beside him, Lyndsey’s eyes flash between me and Aida. Pearls glint proudly around her neck, and her ears sport two diamonds. But her eyes are the brightest thing about her as she stares, seeing something between us.
And how can she not?
After saving my woman’s life, I can’t hide it. I can’t even try.
Every sinew in me strains for her every second, every heartbeat, of every day.
I need her.
I need to claim her.
Always, forever, spanking that ass until it’s red and hot and rivers of come are creaming down between her chunky bite-me thighs—
I can’t let myself think about her – about that sexy body – right now.
We need to end this.
“Franco,” Lyndsey says softly. “Sit down, dear. This isn’t about Elmo.”
Franco blinks. “What?”
“It’s about something else,” she says, eyebrows raised at the pair of us. “Isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Aida sighs, shooting me a look of near panic.
I give her one back of reassurance. I tell her with my eyes, We’re in this together, the same way a lion does to his lioness.
My word is law and my princess immediately nods, biting her lip.
Fuck, I wish she wouldn’t do that right now.
Everybody sits down. Jackal perks his head up from his place beside me, regarding the guests with his ears pointed up in curiosity. It pains me when he doesn’t recognize Franco, even if it makes sense.
They never met. But it seems odd that these two, Franco and Jackal, they should know each other. They both meant the same thing to me once.
Security, loyalty, trust.
But then he left.
Even if that FBI scumbag made him do it, it still makes me want to roar.
But for Aida, I hold myself back.
“It’s about us,” Aida says, wringing her hands together.
Franco pauses whilst pouring a glass of whiskey. I made sure the table was well stocked before we arranged this meeting. The Peacekeepers are gone, the Cartel has been warned by my contact in the FBI, the only loose end is Elmo … so let’s have a goddamn drink, get merry with the man who stabbed me in the back.
But he’s my oldest friend.
He’s Aida’s father.
I have to make this work.
Whiskey drips from the end of the bottle, and Franco frowns.
“What do you mean, us?” he says. “Us as in the three of us, your mom, me … What, Aida? What do you mean?”
I sit forward, laying my forearms against my knees. My body feels cool and well-worked after the scene with the Peacekeepers. Flowing between them like a shadow of death, I felt complete calm falling over me because I know, bone-deep now, that I have what it takes to protect my family if the wolves ever come to our door.
“She means her and me, Franco,” I tell him. “Your daughter and I are together. And we’re going to stay together. Forever.”
Franco chuckles, shaking his head.
“Yeah, yeah, you always were funny, Arty.”
Arty.
Now there’s a name I haven’t heard in decades.
“Aida?” Franco goes on, growing serious when nobody joins in with the laughter.
Not even Lyndsey, I note. She’s watching the whole exchange carefully, eyes narrowed, paying special attention to her daughter. It’s like she’s picking her apart in real time with her eyes.
“I wouldn’t have put it that bluntly,” Aida says. “But he’s telling the truth. This last week—”
“This last week,” Franco blusters, almost tipping over his whiskey glass as he waves his hand, “you’ve been his prisoner. What the fuck are we even talking about here?”
“We’re together, Dad,” Aida says. “I’m sorry if you can’t support us, but something magical happened between us. I know how that sounds. You think I’m just being silly. But I’m not. I really, really want this. We both do. Don’t we?”
She turns to me, cheeks blushing fiercely, her eyes wide as though in fear. It’s like my horny princess thinks that I’ll leave her hanging now, as though I don’t want her as badly, as achingly as she wants me.
I’d die for her every day.
For the rest of our lives.
Because she’s mine.
And I love her.
“We need each other,” I say fiercely, staring back into her gorgeous eyes. She’s so damn pretty, it hurts. “I’ve never believed in fate or anything like that, but then I met you, Aida. And I really didn’t know who you were at first. I didn’t know how funny, how talented, how caring, how smart you were. But I already knew you were mine. I already knew we belonged together.”
Tears glint in her eyes. She reaches across and grabs for my hand, her touch trembling. I take her hand in mine, using it for love now and not violence, but ready to use it for battle any moment somebody tries to take our love.
Everybody turns to Lyndsey when she makes a sniffling noise.
“Oh, how wonderful,” she says.
Franco glances at her. “Wonderful? How’d you get there?”
“Look at them, listen to Arturo. You can hear how much they want each other. You’ve always said that Arturo is a good man. You’ve always said that if you had it your way, you never would’ve left him.”
That hits me hard right in the gut.
Fine, Franco left, but somebody was threatening Aida.
What would I do for Aida?
Anything.
“You really said that?” I mutter, smirking a little.
Franco half-smiles, and then turns to the estate and shrugs.
“I mean, shit. Maybe. Sometimes.”
“Look at you two,” Lyndsey says, laughing. “Trying to fool the world into thinking you hate each other. The fact is, you’re both going through a whole lot of emotion right now and you’ve never learned how to express it.”
“Emotion?” Franco chuckles. “Last time I checked, I was a man, my love.”
“Yeah, no emotion here,” I laugh grimly.
Franco’s eyes meet mine, and then it’s like we’re kids again, me, him, and Elmo pulling some stupid prank on the older kids, laughing our assess off whenever it went wrong or right. Franco explodes into laughter, and I join him.
Aida starts to giggle, too, a sweet musical sound. I think hers comes mostly from relief.
“This is weird, though,” Franco murmurs. “I don’t understand how it happened. The only reason I’m not going crazy here is because you
’re saying you want to be together forever. So you want to start a family together?”
“Yes,” I growl, “I do. More than anything.”
“That means grandchildren,” Lyndsey grins, jabbing Franco in the belly with her elbow, excitement bubbling out of her.
“I know what it means,” Franco growls, and then knocks his whiskey back in a gunshot slam. “So, marriage? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Dad, let’s not jump to conclusions,” Aida says quickly.
“No,” I tell her, giving her a be-silent look.
She huffs, causing her breasts to jiggle and bounce alluring.
She knows to keep that pretty mouth shut when I want her to by now … and she knows when to open it to do whatever the fuck I want. I hope my horny little minx isn’t so naïve as to think the nonstop fucking and pleasuring of her body is going to stop once I make a lady out of her.
“Franco, I’d like to ask your permission to propose to your daughter,” I tell him. “I want your blessing. I’m not saying when I will propose. I’m not saying it will be soon. But I know damn well that I’m going to want to – need to – and I’m not ashamed to ask you, man to man, for your daughter’s hand in marriage.”
Aida is staring at me with her mouth open wide, shock dancing across her expression. Lyndsey blinks with tears in her eyes.
Even Franco looks a little choked up.
“Well, shit,” he sighs. “You have it, Arty. You’ve got my blessing.”
“Thank you, Frankie,” I say. “That means a damn lot.”
Aida’s hand gets tighter and tighter around mine like she can barely hold on, like she thinks she’s going to float up and away and out of this moment, landing in some deranged land where I didn’t claim her and she isn’t mine.
But I did. And she is.
Nothing is ever going to change that.
“Oh, how exciting,” Lyndsey says, fluttering her hands together in hummingbird claps. She sits up and smiles broadly. “A little tip for the proposal, Arturo—”
“Mom.”
“Please, I’m all ears,” I smirk, enjoying seeing my queen squirm a little.
“Aida has always dreamed of going to the Grand Canyon. Ever since she was a girl, she’s said—”
“Mom, seriously,” Aida says, her cheeks flaring. “This is next-level embarrassing.”
“I know what she dreamed,” I growl softly.
“What?” Aida says. “How?”
“You dreamed of standing at the edge and singing into the canyon. You dreamed of hearing your voice come back to you from a hundred different places.”
Aida tilts her head at me. Lyndsey gasps dramatically. Even Franco’s eyebrows perk up, as he leans forward and asks, “Arty, how the hell did you know that?”
“I know her,” I say. “She loves singing. More than anything.”
“Almost anything,” she murmurs, shooting me a meaningful look with those excited bright eyes.
Does that mean she loves me as fiercely as I love her?
“So just to make this clear,” Franco says, sitting back with a grin I haven’t seen in years. “You got rid of the assholes who’ve been tormenting me for most of my adult life. You handled his Cartel friends. You saved my daughter’s life. And now you’re a fucking mind reader, too? What’s next, flying?”
We all crack up at that, the four of us, and then even Jackal stands up and starts padding back and forth, howling and whining through a grin.
Whatever happened next I know we can face the future together.
With Aida and the family, we’re going to build together, nothing can wreck us.
Nothing can wreck what we have.
Our love is the strongest thing in the world.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Aida
I wake the next day sensing that my Arturo isn’t beside me.
All night, I woke up to claw across the silk sheets and grab onto him, feeling the heat of his body, burning beneath the muscles. Or hug closer to him if he already had me in his arms, laying my cheek against his chest so that I could hear the rumbling of his heartbeat.
To confirm that he was there, that yesterday with Mom and Dad – and when he turned into a beast to save me – wasn’t all a little girl’s fantasy.
No, it’s real, it happened.
He’s mine.
And I’m his.
The sun is glowing through the silk curtains, already hanging above the horizon, the room flooded with the curtain-filtered sunlight. I sit up and look around at the floating red motes, letting out a yawn.
After everything happened – not to mention the wild way Arturo unleashed on me last night – I’m still tired despite it probably being almost lunchtime.
I dress in some sweatpants and a hoodie, my best bet if I want comfortable clothes around the estate. Arturo wouldn’t want anybody seeing me in a bathrobe.
That’s just for him.
And it feels so good to be his personal plaything, my womb blazing hotter and firmer each moment, silently telling me that she’s doing her work. She’s taken Arturo’s seed and now she’s going to paint us a future with it.
I make my way through the house, heading down to the main balcony. Arturo likes to eat out there. Otherwise, he’ll probably be in the gym or in the city for work.
I hear him as I approach the balcony, his voice raised, and another man’s voice beneath it.
I freeze when I reach the door.
The other voice belongs to the man who kidnapped me, the man in the leather jacket who tapped the silencer of his gun against the glass.
“Aida,” Arturo growls from the other side of the door. “It’s okay. Come here, please. Nobody is ever going to hurt you.”
I walk onto the balcony, finding Arturo stood with his back to the railing, his hands behind his back, clean shaven and ready to do business in his dark blue suit. His silver hair is swept, and his near black eyes glint as he stares at me, and then nods at the man sitting between us.
At first, I think I’ve made a mistake. This man is completely bald, as though he’s shaved recently. His cheeks are sunken. He looks broken. But then I look closer, and I see I’m right, it’s him. He has the same eyes.
“I’m so sorry,” Elmo says. “Aida, Miss Capullo. I am so, sorry.”
“Tell her what you told me,” Arturo grunts.
Elmo licks his lips, wringing his hands. Jackal brushes up against me and I absentmindedly let my hand move through his fur. The big dog gives a rumble of protection. I tickle his scruff, letting him know it’s okay, and he settles down.
“I was forced to kidnap you by the Peacekeepers. They threatened my niece in California. They even kidnapped them once. I’m sorry. I was a fucking junkie, an idiot. I’ve been a junkie for too damn long now. When they took me – when they broke me out of that cell – do you know what I did after I finally fought them off and won my freedom? I locked myself away. I waited for the shivers to pass. I waited for my self-respect to come back. I knew if I went out into the world, I’d find drugs and use again.”
“And then he returned here,” Arturo says, “to accept his punishment.”
“Punishment?” I mutter.
Arturo nods gruffly, his eyes hard.
“Whatever you want done with him, that will be his fate,” he snarls. “He scared you. He betrayed me—threats or no threats. But kidnapping you is by far his worst crime. So it’s only fitting that you choose his punishment.”
“But if he never kidnapped me,” I say, “we wouldn’t be together.”
Arturo grinds his teeth, then sighs. “No, Aida. I don’t accept that logic. It doesn’t excuse what he did.”
“He did frighten me,” I say, glancing at him.
He looks so sunken, so lost.
“Do you believe him, Arturo?” I say, turning back to my man. “Do you believe it was the drugs? Do you think he can change?”
Arturo is silent for a long time, his eyes off in the past.
Finally
, he nods.
“I think so,” he says. “But it’s your choice.”
“He’s going to do voluntary work for a drug rehab institution for five years,” I say. “If he stays clean that entire time, he can rejoin the Family. Let something good come from what he did.”
Arturo nods matter of factly. “You heard her, Elmo.”
Elmo slides from the chair to his knees, his head bowed, his hands clasped in front of him as though in shackles. I glance at Arturo, wondering if this is normal in the mob. But he looks as confused as me, his eyebrows knit.
“Thank you,” Elmo says, voice cracking. “Thank you so much. I don’t deserve it … but thank you.”
“Alright, alright,” Arturo growls, stepping forward and lifting his friend by the forearm, handling him like a child, the man is so weak looking. “It’s over. It’s done. I’ll arrange the voluntary work. And if I hear you’ve stepped foot into Family business in that time, I’ll exile you, Elmo.”
“Never, never,” Elmo says. “It’s a blessing, Arturo. I get to help the less fortunate. I can do some good. Will, you put me up at one of our charities?”
Arturo nods.
“Wait, what?” I say.
“Arturo runs most of the drug rehab charities in the city,” Elmo says. “Didn’t he mention that?”
“No,” I say, shooting him a sassy look. “I kind of think he likes it when I see him as an asshole.”
Arturo smirks. “I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about, my sweet Aida.”
“You didn’t tell me you knew how to fly,” I yell over the thundering chop-chop of the helicopter’s blades.
I sit up front, in the cockpit next to my man, as the world falls away beneath us and the stunningly blue sky gets closer and closer. It’s clear, cloudless, and as we whir and buzz our way from the city and deeper inland, I feel like we’re a giant insect cutting across the world.
Arturo glances over at me, his hand steady on the control as we surge across the sky.
“You never asked,” he says with a near smile, which for him is the same as an ear to ear grin. His voice is intimate and close in the over-ear headphones.
“I didn’t realize I had to,” I laugh. “Knowing how to fly is something most men would brag about, you know.”
His To Claim: An Instalove Possessive Age Gap Romance Page 12