Casino King: A Dark Mafia Romance (Carfano Crime Family Book 1)

by Rebecca Gannon

  Alec hasn’t said a word. He just followed me silently, knowing I needed this.

  The wind whips all around us as the waves crash up onto the rocks, sea mist coating my face. Shivering, Alec’s arms come around me instantly, wrapping me in his warmth from behind like a blanket of security. I haven’t felt safe like I do with Alec in far too long, and because of that, I find myself telling him things I haven’t told anyone before.

  “My brother moved us here from northern Jersey after my parents died,” I start, and Alec begins to stroke my arms. “I found this place on my second day here when I was feeling too much and needed space. The apartment felt too small, so I got on my bike and just rode, needing someplace big. A place that felt bigger than everything I was feeling.

  “I come here when I feel like I do now. When every breath feels like too much of an effort and the memories find their way to the surface and I can’t push them back down.”

  I have the sudden urge to tell him everything. To give Alec what I’ve been carrying around with me for six years. He’s strong enough to carry it along with me, and I’m strong enough to let him.

  “My brother was all I had after my parents. But then he was taken from me too. He was murdered right in front of me.” Alec’s release of breath at my confession blows across my exposed neck, sending another chill through me.

  “James was only 19 when my parents died, but he wanted me to stay with him, which is why he moved us here. He said there was always money to be made in AC. He was lucky to find a construction job during the day and then he worked in the casinos at night. Two of them on rotation so he could get more hours.” My voice shakes, thinking about how hard he always worked. For me.

  “I didn’t get to see him that much with me still being in high school and the hours he worked, but he did anything and everything to make sure I could still dance. He knew it was all I had besides him in my life.” Tears slip down my cheeks and I blink slowly, the wind drying them almost instantly.

  “What happened to him?” Alec asks me, his arms tightening around me. “Who did it?” he asks a little harsher.

  “I don’t know,” I whisper. “It all happened so fast. All I saw was my brother crumbling to the ground. And blood. So much blood,” I choke out, my voice breaking at the end as images of that day flash in my mind.

  Spinning me around, Alec keeps one arm wrapped around my waist to steady me, and grips my chin with the other. I allow myself to get lost in his eyes as tears fall from mine. He gives me strength. He’s anchoring me to him so I don’t just let myself blow away in the breeze.

  “I’ll take care of it, Tessa,” he tells me with all the confidence in the world.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’ll take care of it,” he repeats.

  “How?”

  “My men will find him.”

  “It’s been six years,” I whisper.

  “That doesn’t matter. He’ll pay. No one gets away with hurting you or those you care about. Never again.” I can see the absolution in his eyes. The determination to exact vengeance for me and my brother.

  I don’t know how he’ll find out who did it, but I don’t have the energy to question him right now. Because somehow, I know that if Alec says he’ll find him, then he will.

  “I’ll always protect you.” Cupping the side of my neck in the possessive way I love, Alec kisses me softly, slowly deepening it until all that’s on my mind is him.

  My hands slide up and around his neck, my nails scratching at the base there. Rumbling his approval, he holds me even tighter, pressing me so close that I have no room to breathe. But I don’t need to. I just need him. He supplies me my oxygen.

  I don’t know when it exactly happened, but I need him. Since the moment I first felt him there in the shadows watching me, his complete and utter attention on me, I think I’ve needed him.

  “Take me home with you, Alec,” I whisper against his lips when we separate.

  With a groan, he kisses me, his thumb stroking the front of my neck as the pads of his fingers dig a little deeper in the back.

  I lead the way back across the rocks, careful to not slip and fall between them since my brain is a mess of too many emotions I’m trying to filter through.

  Where the inside of his car felt like a hidden sanctuary on the ride here, it now feels as if it’s too small. It’s suffocating. The air is thick with all that’s been said and unsaid between us. All the questions I didn’t want to ask him out on the jetty are now flooding me like a broken dam.

  What did he mean his men will find the man responsible? How? Who are his men?

  Just like when Enzo said I’m boss’s girl…

  He makes it sound like…

  I play with the ring on my middle finger as a tingling sensation creeps down my spine. My eyes dart to Alec’s hand on the gearshift and I see the faint lines of scars on his knuckles and fingers.

  He’s more than he says he is.

  I’ve felt his danger and power from the beginning, but I didn’t want to think too much into why. Why the owner of a hotel and casino would instill fear in everyone around him. Why he talks of an army of men so casually. Why I have a bodyguard. Why the security at The Aces seems to be military grade. If I stopped to wonder, then I might have run in the opposite direction instead of straight into his arms.

  I try and discretely take shallow breaths to rid my lungs of the constricted, oppressed feeling they’re in, but he notices. He notices everything about me. His attention is always zeroed in on my every move.

  “Relax,” he soothes, his voice dropping to that octave that makes my stomach simultaneously twist and melt.

  “I am,” I tell him, but my voice is far from sounding relaxed.

  “Don’t lie to me, Tessa. Never lie to me,” he says with an edge.

  Biting my lower lip, I turn to face the window so he can’t see my reaction to him.

  I’m not scared of him for myself. I know deep down he would never hurt me. Not physically at least. But hearing him threaten the life of a man who’s haunted my nightmares for six years, and who’s had me checking every shadow wherever I go, makes me realize just how deadly Alec is.

  He said he took care of the man who attacked me…

  That scary guy dragged him down to the basement. The basement…

  What’s in the basement?

  Swallowing hard, I smooth my hands out on my pants as we pull into the parking garage of The Aces.

  Grabbing my dance bag from the trunk, Alec places his hand on my lower back as he guides me towards the elevator. I avoid the eyes of the man standing guard next to it, his presence suddenly holding more meaning than I let myself see before.

  Walking me straight to his room when we get inside his penthouse, Alec places my bag in the closet. “Take a hot bath. Relax. Take as much time as you need.” Tilting my chin up so I’ll look at him, he says, “I’ll be in my office making a few calls if you need me.”

  “Okay,” I whisper, and he nods, leaving me alone to collect myself. I don’t know how he knows I need to be alone, but I’m grateful.

  I soak in a hot bath filled with lavender salts to relax, and when the water turns cool, I reluctantly drain the tub and shower off.

  Putting on the extra leggings and t-shirt I had in my dance bag, I head into the kitchen to make myself a cup of tea. But when I reach for a cup up in the cabinet, I hear Alec’s raised voice floating down from the hall on the other side of the dining room where I know his office is.

  I’ve yet to venture over to that side of his house, and my curiosity gets the better of me when he keeps yelling. Tentatively, I make my way towards him. I know I shouldn’t be eavesdropping, but I feel like this is my chance to discover if what I think is true.

  I need to know.

  Rounding the corner, I inch my way down the hall, his muffled voice through the closed door at the end of the hall becoming clearer the closer I get.

  “Leave her out of this,” he growls. “Her safety is
my priority along with the family’s. Don’t ever fucking question that again, brother.”

  My heartbeat is in my throat as I stop right outside his office door. Is he talking about me?

  “My men are gathering intel on the Triads every day, collections from the other casinos have been picked up, I have a man working on Katarina’s party, and The Broker’s party next weekend is mapped out with contingency plans in place. I have everything under control. And next time you want to question my loyalty, don’t,” he emphasizes. “You know I’d never jeopardize us. Any of us. Including myself.”

  The Triads? Collections? Loyalty?

  My breathing quickens as it hits me that my suspicions were right. I’ve lived in Jersey my entire life. I know what that all means.

  He slams the phone down with a snarl and I hear the sound of glass shattering like he threw his drink against the wall. His fast approaching footsteps give me little warning, and before I have the chance to move, his office door flings open. Alec’s eyes widen and then narrow when he sees me standing there. They’re so dark and angry that I can’t even see any good within them at the moment.

  “What’re you doing?” he asks, his voice hard and full of suspicion. “Were you listening to my phone call?”

  “No,” I say quickly, taking a step back. “I heard you yelling…”

  “So, you stayed to listen? How much did you hear?” He takes another step closer.

  I debate whether or not I should play dumb, but I need to know. I need to know who he is. “You don’t just own The Aces, do you?”

  “I told you my family has a lot of businesses. The Aces I claim as my own.”

  “Your family…” I start, trailing off, not wanting to say what I think out loud.

  “My family, what?” he asks, tilting his head to the side, gauging my every reaction.

  “Nothing,” I say quickly, shaking my head.

  “Tessa,” he says firmly, caging me against the wall with his hands on either side of my head.

  “Alec, please,” I whisper, so softly I can barely hear it.

  “Are you afraid to say it? Are you afraid of me?”

  “No,” I breathe out with a little shake of my head.

  “Are you sure? Your eyes are saying the opposite, bella.” The roll of his tongue on the sweet endearment makes my heart skip and makes me wish he was using that skillful tongue to bring me to heaven instead of asking me the hard questions.

  “I’m not afraid of you,” I say a little stronger, my voice surprisingly never wavering. I’ve never been afraid to be with him. I’ve only ever been afraid of how I feel about him. Of what he makes me feel about myself.

  “No?”

  “No. But the reason you’re so concerned for my safety…that has to do with your family.”

  “Yes.”

  “Because your family is involved in things that aren’t legal.” I say it as a statement, already knowing it’s the truth.

  “You could say that.”

  I swallow the lump in my throat. “Your family…you… you’re in the…” I don’t know why I can’t say the word.

  Mafia.

  I can think it, but it won’t form on my tongue, knowing that it’s never actually talked about if you’re in it.

  He flashes me a wicked grin that isn’t a smile, but rather a baring of teeth like a wolf to its prey. “I’m not just in it. I am it. My family is it,” he emphasizes, running a finger down my jaw and across my bottom lip. “Does that change anything for you?” he asks, almost a threat – daring me to say it does so he can prove to me just how easily it would be for him show me why it shouldn’t. How he could make me stay even if I didn’t want to.

  I’d like to think that him being a part of the mafia would make me run in the opposite direction, but I can’t. Doing that would tear me apart. I’d never be able to be the Tessa I am on stage ever again. I know that, and I can’t lose that.

  “No,” I say finally, a little breathless. “It should…but–”

  “But what?” he prompts, his eyes flaring with heat.

  “I just want you. Anything else…it doesn’t matter.”

  Just as I get the last word out, he slams his mouth down on mine, silencing me with the heat of his lips – searing me, possessing me, claiming me.

  This kiss is deep, messy, and fueled by pure passion and need.

  “Sei la cosa migliore che non avrei mai pensato di poter avere,” he rasps against my lips, then goes back to kissing me breathless – across my jaw, down my neck, back to my lips. None of it’s enough, though.

  Tearing his lips away, I whine in protest until he drops to his knees to slide my leggings down my legs, kissing, licking and biting as he goes. Moaning, I sink back against the wall, needing it to hold me up.

  Stepping out of them, Alec slides his large hands up the front of my legs and grips the red lace thong I have on and rips it from my body like it was nothing, the material giving way to his need to have me bared to him.

  I look down at him, and seeing him on his knees in front of me, his dark eyes full of sinful promises burning up at me like an offering, is something that will always be imprinted in my mind.

  Reaching down, I run my fingers through his hair and his eyes darken even more. I grip the dark silken ends and push him forward to where I need him to kiss me.

  Taking my direction, Alec buries his face between my thighs and I fist his hair, crying out when he sucks my clit between his lips straight away, not gentle in the least. But that’s how I want it with him. I don’t want him gentle. I want him to give me the beast he has simmering just below the surface of his barely contained control.

  Just as quickly as he took me in his mouth, Alec easily escapes the harsh grip of my fingers and stands. Towering over me, he captures my lips in a bruising kiss, his tongue demanding entrance so I can taste my arousal on his.

  Moaning, I tear at his belt, and manage to unzip his pants so I can slide my hand inside to grip him. He groans into me, his cock jumping in my palm as I squeeze and stroke him, loving the feel of him. Long, thick, smooth, and heavy. A king’s dick that reigns over me, making me feel like a queen every time he enters me.

  Pushing his pants down just far enough to free himself, Alec lifts me up and I wrap my legs around his hips. My head hits the wall with a gasp and a moan when he enters me in one swift motion.

  “So fucking good,” he rasps into my neck, licking his way to my ear. “Sei così fottutamente perfetto.”

  Taking me quick and hard, every thrust sends sparks through my body, my nerve endings alight as fire rages through me.

  Alec sets me on fire.

  He strokes the demons I carry with me like a pet, and I arch into him, wanting his affection, and loving that he likes my demons because I think they resemble his own.

  Grabbing his face, I make him look at me, his eyes flaring each time he fills me so fully. I kiss him hard, biting his lower lip and then smoothing it out. His answered groan brings me higher, so I do it again, and the vibrations of his groan running through me is enough to push me over the edge.

  My orgasm hits me like a bomb. So powerful, the scream coming from me is unlike anything I’ve ever heard. I shove my face into the crook of his neck, biting down hard, needing to give him some of what I’m feeling because I can’t hold it all to myself. It’s overflowing, and I need to release it all. I need him to feel it all with me.

  Alec’s deep groan as he fills me with his release falls on deaf ears with all the blood rushing through my head. But I feel it against my skin, and it sends another wave through me.

  Feeling him come inside of me, marking me as his in the most primal and raw of ways, makes me feel like even more of a queen. I make him lose control. I make him fuck with absolute abandon. I make him come like he’s putting out a fire.

  Panting, we breathe each other in until our hearts calm down. Our chests are pressed so tightly together it’s as if our hearts were one.

  Unlinking my legs, Alec lets me s
lide down the wall until my feet touch the floor, and then he lifts my chin so I’m looking at him.

  Rubbing his thumb back and forth across my bottom lip, he doesn’t say anything for a long moment. Lost in his own thoughts, his eyes are swirling pools of darkness like a lake at midnight. I don’t know everything that lies beneath the surface, but I’m still willing to jump in. And even if I drown, it would be a death that comes after knowing the greatest euphoria.

  “What’re you thinking?”

  “Nothing,” I say with a shake of my head.

  “Tell me,” he urges.

  Swallowing, I lick my lip where his thumb is still stroking, and while his eyes narrow and darken, I try and find the right words. “I was thinking how I should have known from the beginning. But it wouldn’t have made a difference.”

  “I can’t share a lot with you, but I promise it’ll never have to be something you have to be concerned about. It’ll never touch you. No one will ever touch you,” he says fiercely. “My family is all I have, but you…” He pauses, his eyes searching mine. “You matter. Don’t ever think otherwise.”

  Blinking away the urge to cry, I give him a small nod.

  No one since my brother has ever made me feel like I mattered.

  Although Alec didn’t even have to say the words. I already knew. I already felt it.

  Chapter 17

  Alec

  I haven’t seen much of Tessa this week besides falling into bed with her every night and waking her up with my mouth on her sweet pussy or slipping right inside of her so her beautiful eyes fly open to see mine above her.

  She’s always wet and ready for me as if she was dreaming of me, waiting for me, and knowing I’d be around soon to take care of her. She always gasps in surprise, and then moans out long and low for me – the two sweetest sounds in the world. Which I won’t deny is fucking amazing, but I also want to just be with her, something I’ve never needed or wanted from a woman before. They always serve their purpose for a good fuck and then they’re gone, their names and faces quickly fading from my memory.

  But with Tessa, I want to come home and have dinner with her. I want to take her out and show her my city from my eyes, taking her places she never even knew existed. I want to hear her voice as she tells me about her day. I want to see her smile, giving me a little light in my chest to keep some of the darkness at bay.