by Bella Jewel
“Julie.”
I flinch and look up to see Jacob standing above me, looking down with a grin on his face. “You were off in your own little world there.”
“Sorry, Jacob. I’m so tired I’m barely functioning.”
“When does your shift end?”
I glance at my watch. “A few hours.”
“Let me take you home; you shouldn’t be driving in your state.”
I jerk my head up and meet his eyes. He seems genuine, but I don’t believe that line for a second. “I don’t know . . .”
“I’m just driving you home, Julie.” He smiles. “I won’t bite.”
“What about my car?”
“I’ll bring it to you tomorrow, and you can just drop me back here.”
Seems like a lot of work, but considering I’ve had next to no sleep for the past few nights, I’m seriously considering it.
“What do you say?” he prompts.
“That would be great, thanks.”
“Perfect,” he says. “I better get back to it. I’ll meet you here after your shift.”
“Thanks, Jacob.”
“Anytime, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart.
Oh crap.
~*~*~*~
Jacob slows down at the front of my apartment building, and I lift my cheek off the window I was leaning on in exhaustion and turn to him as he stops. I open my mouth to speak but he stares past me with a tight expression on his face. I turn and glance at what he’s looking at, and my breath skids to a complete halt. Sitting on the front steps of my apartment building, hands on his knees, head tilted up and eyes focused on the car, is Rafael Lencioni.
I want to vomit.
“Who is that?” Jacob asks, his voice tight.
“Ah, um, I’m not sure.” God, I’m such a liar.
“I don’t like the look of him. Maybe I should escort you in.”
“No,” I say quickly—too quickly. “It’s fine. We have security at this apartment building.”
Jacob frowns, and his eyes finally move to mine. “Are you sure?”
“I’m fine, Jacob. Thank you so much for the ride. Call me later this afternoon when I wake up to help you with the car.”
He nods stiffly and leans over, kissing my cheek. “Okay, Julie. Good night, or should I say, good morning.”
I smile and open the door, sliding out. I feel sick to my stomach as my eyes fall on Rafael, who is now standing, all six foot of him. He’s wearing a slick suit, like he was the other night, and he looks terrifying as his eyes graze over my body. I wait until I hear Jacob’s car start to pull away before taking a step forward. My voice is stuck in my throat, and my chest is tight as I stop in front of Rafael.
“Julietta,” he says, his voice low.
God I love the way he says my name, and I shouldn’t. I really, really shouldn’t.
“Ah, Rafael,” I squeak.
Lame. So lame.
“You left your purse the other night,” he says, holding up the purse I didn’t even notice he had in his hands.
“Yes, I know,” I breathe, staring at his intense brown eyes.
“I was delivering it back to you.”
And now you owe me something.
I’m waiting for it to come. Waiting for him to tell me what a mistake it was to sleep with a member of the mafia. He does none of that, though. Instead, his brows furrow as studies me with a slight frown. “You’re exhausted.”
I blink and jerk back, confused. “Pardon?”
“You,” he says, stepping closer and reaching up, taking a strand of my hair and tucking it back behind my ear. I shiver and close my eyes. “You’re exhausted.”
This man is so intense it’s alarming, but I can’t make my feet move to push away from him.
“I’ve been on nightshift,” I finally mumble, glancing at my shoes.
He cups my jaw and gently brings my face up. “You shouldn’t work so hard.”
This is just getting weird for me. “Thanks for returning the purse,” I say, stepping back and taking it from his hands without permission. “I really need to get some rest.”
“You ran out on me,” he says, his jaw tight in frustration.
“You freaked me out,” I admit, looking up.
“I apologize for that.”
“You told me your friend owned the club,” I say, studying his perfect face. “Then I found out . . .”
“That I owned it,” he finishes for me. “I’m sorry about that, but you were terrified when we first entered the office. I didn’t want to alarm you.”
“Alarm me?” I say in an exasperated tone. “You mean because you’re a member of . . .”
He puts up a hand, effectively halting me. His eyes grow stern when he says, low, “Enough.”
He’s pissed at me. Of course he is. I was just about to scream to the world about his affiliation with the underworld. Though I’m sure they already know.
I drop my head. “Shit, sorry.”
He’s quiet for a second before he sighs and takes my chin again. “I don’t like people running from me, cara, but in this instance, I understand. Can we go up to your apartment to talk?”
“About what?” I practically shriek. “You delivered my purse, we had fun—I’m sure that’s where it ends.”
“Then you’d be wrong.”
Oh God, I was right. He’s going to request something of me. I’m going to have to give it to him or something awful will happen. My heart beats heavily in my chest, and my hands begin to tremble.
“Julietta,” he says, his voice calming. “I’m not going to make you do anything you don’t want to do. You do not need to fear me.”
“I’m having a hard time believing that,” I choke out.
“I swear it,” he says. “Now come. You need to get off your feet.”
He pulls me towards my building before I can protest. We enter through the front doors and I nod at my doorman, who glances at Rafael with a suspicious expression. I relax my shoulders, walking with more ease, not wanting to alarm him and have him call the police. That really wouldn’t go down well. Rafael would probably shoot them and make me help with the dead body.
Okay, now I’m just being dramatic.
Calm down, Julie.
When we’re in the elevator, Rafael turns to me. In the light, he looks a little less intimidating but equally as sexy. I study the chiseled lines of his face, so perfect, but a complete contradiction to the hair curling around the base of his neck, messy and a little rogue.
“Which floor are you?” he asks.
With a shaky hand, I press my button and we ascend, slowly.
I glance at the man in front of me and wonder how the hell I’m going to get out of this one.
CHAPTER 6
JULIETTA
“You have a lovely apartment,” Rafael says, walking around my apartment when we enter.
He’s lying. It’s awful, but it’s all I can afford. I don’t do well with money, still paying off old student loans, and that combined with general living doesn’t leave me any room to move. My car is so run down it’s alarming, and there is no way I can scrape together the extra money to fix it, so it’s just getting worse and worse. I have started taking the bus or the train, because it lets the poor car have a break.
“Look,” I say, stepping beside my faded wooden kitchen counter and putting my things down. “I’m sure you’re a nice man, but whatever you want to discuss, I assure you I don’t want it. I didn’t know what you were; if I did, I wouldn’t have done what I did.”
“We both know that’s a lie,” he says, not looking at me but instead standing and staring out the window.
“No,” I say. “It’s not.”
He finally turns and stalks towards me, his big body moving with way too much grace. “I don’t like liars.”
I flinch, but he has a point. “Okay, I would have fucked you because you’re hot and you fuck like a damned animal, but that’s where it ends, okay?”
His lips twitch. Asshole. “I have a proposition for you.”
“Not interested,” I mutter, turning and sliding around into my kitchen so he can’t get any closer. Good. Now there’s a counter between us.
His brows go up at my maneuver. “You haven’t heard what I’m offering.”
“I don’t need to. I don’t need anymore complications in my life. I’ve got enough to deal with. I’m sure your proposition is very nice, but people like me and people like you shouldn’t mix.”
“Are you afraid you’ll get hurt?”
I turn and glance at him again. He’s got his arms crossed, studying me. “Do you mean that in the violent kind of way, or the heartbreak kind of way?”
His lips twitch again. “The violent way, cara.”
“Then yes, I am afraid of that. I don’t pretend to understand your world, but I know who you are, and I can take a good guess about the shit that goes down. That scares me.”
“You would come to no harm.”
My eyes widen. “I . . . look . . .”
“Just hear me out,” he says, stepping up to the counter and placing his hands on it, leaning in. My heart jumps into my throat. “If you don’t like what I have to offer, then I’ll walk out and you won’t hear from me again.”
“You can promise me that?” I whisper.
“I swear it. You won’t be bothered by my world, Julietta. You did nothing to me except blow my mind. You’re completely safe.”
I blew his mind? I tremble. “Okay then, what is it you have to offer?”
~*~*~*~
I stand, staring at him, mouth agape.
He did not say what I thought he just said. No way in the world. My knees begin to tremble, and I’m forced to sit on my sofa to stop myself falling over. The information he gave me swirls around in my brain, and I can’t seem to stop it long enough to process it. I must have been hearing things, because there is no way he just offered what he offered.
“Are you nuts?” I finally choke out, glancing up at him.
He narrows his eyes, like my words offend him. “No. What I offered you is very common in my world.”
I blink.
Common?
He has to be shitting me.
“It’s common to cheat?”
He bristles and his jaw goes tight. “It’s sex.”
I snort. “No offence, buddy, but that counts as cheating.”
He growls and drops down onto the sofa over from me, putting his hands on his knees and leaning forward. “Unless you understand my life, you can’t possibly understand how normal what I’m asking you is. I fully understand it’s cheating, but my wife is also fully aware of it.”
“You’re asking me to be your mistress?” I shriek. “To fuck you while your wife is at home, sleeping in your bed!”
He stares at me.
I drop my head in my hands.
“My wife is aware, as I said,” he says, his voice way too calm for my liking. It’s as if he’s telling me about the weather.
“And she doesn’t care?” I yell, standing and pacing the room.
“Sit down, Julietta,” he orders.
I don’t.
“Sit down!” he hisses, and even though it’s not yelled, I flinch as though it was.
I spin around. “Do not tell me what to do in my own house!”
His eyes widen, and I snap my mouth closed, realizing who I just yelled at. It takes us both a moment to compose ourselves, but finally he speaks, calmer this time. “I am married to Maria for the sole purpose of producing sons. It was an arranged marriage that she accepted her role in. I am a leader—it is expected of me to have one mistress, sometimes more. Call it a status symbol if you will. My marriage is unlike the ones you have grown up around. It was known from the very beginning that I would seek my passion in other women.”
My mouth opens, then closes, and then finally I calm myself enough to speak. “But that poor woman has to lie around, waiting to get knocked up, living a depressing life, while you’re out enjoying yourself?”
His jaw tightens. “Firstly, she has everything any woman could ever want.”
“Except love,” I cut him off.
His eyes flash. “To you, this life sounds awful. To Maria, it’s all she’s ever known, and she fully accepts her position in it.”
“I just don’t understand,” I whisper. “She deserves love, and compassion . . .”
“Perhaps, but it’s how it works and it’s something she chose to enter into. Now, that aside, will you consider my offer?”
“To be your sex toy?”
He sighs, and it looks a lot like he’s trying to keep himself calm. “No, cara, to be my mistress.”
Same difference.
“Yes,” I say again. “Your sex toy.”
He runs his hand through his hair with impatience. “There’s much more to it than that.”
I snort.
He glares at me.
“Look, I’m sure there are plenty of women who are happy to wait around for you to come and fuck them when you feel like it, but I’m not one of them.”
“And the money? The luxuries I offer? What about those things?”
“In other words, you’re paying me for sex?” I snap, crossing my arms. “I’m your whore?”
This pisses him off. His eyes flash, and in an icy tone he says, “Whores do not get respect, compassion, or support. I offer all those things. I do not expect you just to lie here and wait for me to fuck you. I wish for you to have a life. I wish to give you nice things. I will take care of you, Julietta. You are in no way a whore.”
I grind my teeth together because he makes a damned good point. Whores do not get the kind of treatment he’s offering. And I’m lying to myself if I say the money he offered and the things he presented wouldn’t change my world forever.
I’m struggling. I can barely afford to eat. His offering would change my life, but being his mistress, being paid to give him sex . . . feels just wrong.
“You’re offering me material things to be locked down.”
His eyes flash with warmth and understanding. “You won’t be locked down. You can work, go out with your friends, do anything you want. There are only two rules, Julietta.”
“And those are?” I say, looking up at him.
“Don’t fall in love with me and don’t ever, under any circumstances, mention who I am or what I do.”
“That’s it?” I say, skeptical.
“And obviously I ask that you do not communicate with my wife for her respect.”
I frown. “The wife lying at home, depressed because no one loves her?”
Rafael stands and starts pacing the room, muttering, “Insane, intense, crazy, difficult woman!”
I process the offer as he paces, mumbling about me. He’s offering to take over the rent on my apartment if I don’t wish to move to one closer to him, and he’s also offering to take on any medical expenses as well as providing me with a car. He is basically setting me up for a life with him, only he can’t guarantee how much we will actually be together. Then there was this. . .
Long term.
He doesn’t just want a fling—he wants someone willing to warm his bed for a long time, years, decades even. He swore that he would not hold me back if I wished to leave, that I was under no contract, but for as long as he wants me, I will be in his life, and he has made it clear that’s a good long time if everything between us goes well.
“What if I fell in love?” I suddenly blurt when the thought enters my mind. “Not with you, but with someone else?”
He stops pacing and turns, staring at me. “Then I will allow you to leave.”
I give him a skeptical look. “With no strings attached?”
“Yes, Julietta, with no strings attached. I’m not asking you to give the rest of your life to me when I can’t give you the things you want. If you decide it’s too much, for whatever reason, be it love or the need for children, for example, then you may leave without any problems.”
“Can I date?”
He flinches. “If you must. As I said, I won’t hold you back.”
“Will you take the car and the nice things back if I end it with us?”
His eyes hold mine. “If you cannot pay the rent on the apartment you’re in, then I will take it back but everything else is a gift, so no.”
“That seems too easy.”
His brown eyes keep holding mine. “I’m not asking for marriage, I’m asking for a companion, someone I can come to, spend time with, and fuck. If that lasts a long time, and we’re both happy, then so be it. If it doesn’t, I fully accept that, too.”
“You say companion and spending time together. How do you mean?”
“Meaning I can come to you and spend days there if I need a time out, or if I need someone to talk to. It’s not just sex.”
God. This is too much. He is literally asking me to be his girlfriend but without any commitment. “But we’ll never be seen in public together?”
“No.”
“And you’ll never involve me in your world?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Forgive me, but it seems too easy,” I breathe.
His eyes hold mine. “That’s because it is.”
I shake my head and stand again, walking into my kitchen. I need a stiff drink. Or nine.
“Why me?” I ask, glancing at him as I unscrew the lid from a vodka bottle.
He glances at the bottle, smirks, and then looks to me. “Because you’re the first person I’ve met in a long time that intrigues me. You’re beautiful, you’re sassy, and fucking you was incredible.”
“I can be a royal pain in the ass,” I point out, pouring the vodka.
“I’m aware.”
“I can be moody, and temperamental, and I don’t like being told what to do.”
He grins.
I shake my head.
That’s clearly why he picked me. The sick bastard likes all those things.
I’m in deep shit.
CHAPTER 7
JULIETTA
“How long do I have to decide?” I ask one hour later, after asking a million questions.
I don’t even know why I’m asking this because I’d be insane to become the mistress of a mafia leader. Or any mafia member for that matter. It’s dangerous, and risky, and—