by Bella J
Then she stepped back and I instantly mourn the loss of having her close. Her gaze searches the area around us like she’s expecting to find the answer in my goddamn kitchen.
“I don’t know, Lorik.” She shrugged. “Maybe it’s the thrill of it, because we know it’s against the rules. Like they say, nothing is as sweet as the forbidden fruit.”
“That’s not it.” I shake my head and step toward her. “I know all about forbidden fruit, Karina, and let me tell you this…there’s no goddamn fruit that tastes as sweet as you.”
“Lorik…” she starts, but I pressed my lips against hers, drowning out her words. It’s all I want to do whenever I’m around her—kiss her, touch her, fuck her…make love to her. I can’t stop it. I can’t stop myself from wanting to make her mine. Like a goddamn animal I want to claim and mark her, to keep bastards like Enzio from touching or taking what’s mine.
As she leans her body into mine, I feel her desperation to deepen our kiss—to take whatever is happening between us further.
I wrap my arms around her waist and place my hands on her ass, lifting her up and placing her on the kitchen counter. She opens her legs and allows me in while our lips remain plastered together. Sure, I have one raging hard-on whose sole purpose right now is to penetrate this woman, to make her scream. But right now it’s just so much more than that. Yes, I want her body in every way possible—but somewhere between when I first saw her in the interrogation room and now, I no longer just want her body. I want her mind, her soul…her fucking heartbeat. But is that even possible? Everything about us together was wrong. We’re from two completely different places in the world, two different elements…like fire and ice—which was probably why it felt so fucking good whenever we were together.
“Lorik?”
I dip my tongue into the hollow of her neck. “Hmm?”
“I really, really want to do this again.” I feel her nails dig into my shoulders and she glides her fingers across my skin, sending shivers down my spine. “But you think a girl can get a break just for a few minutes?”
I smile triumphantly. Yes, triumphantly. Hearing that she needs a break does wonders for my male ego.
“Gee, I don’t know,” I teased, before sucking a nipple into my mouth then let it go with a pop. “I have this real pressing”—I thrust hard between her legs—“need to be inside you…again.”
She clawed her nails down my back and I know that she’s seconds away from giving into the temptation.
I straighten and meet her gaze. “Take as much time as you need, princess. Just know that I plan on being inside you at least one more time before you leave this apartment tonight.”
She tilted her head to the side, dark curls falling over her naked shoulder. “Who says I’m leaving?” She winked and slipped off the counter, gliding her body down against my cock.
I groaned. “Fuck, you’re killing me, you know that?”
“Yet I’m the one needing a break?” She chuckled and walked down the hall. All I can do is keep my eyes glued to her naked ass, her hips swaying seductively from side to side.
“Minx,” I call after her.
She glanced over her shoulder. “That makes you one lucky son of a bitch then, detective.”
I tilt my beer in her direction. “Oh I fucking know it.” I take a large gulp while watching her until she disappears around the corner.
“Fuck me,” I muttered and rubbed the back of my neck. It’s just too damn insane, what’s happening between us. It’s more intense than I ever could have anticipated.
I grabbed a second beer from the fridge and make my way to the bedroom, deciding that she had a long enough break. My cock is aching and swearing at me right now.
When I round the corner and step into the bedroom, I freeze. My spine turned to ice and my gut dropped to the fucking ground, my hard on something of the past.
“Karina—”
When she turned to face me and I saw the hurt covering her beautiful face it felt like my heart was no longer in my chest, but lodged in my throat.
“What is this?” She pointed at the cabinet in front of her.
I glanced at the open cabinet, its contents mocking me. “I don’t—”
“I was looking for a goddamn shirt, and imagine my surprise when I find a cabinet filled with pictures of every member of my family…and me.” Her words were coated with distaste and pain.
I stepped forward, determined to explain. “I’m a detective, Karina—”
“And clearly your goal is to take down my family.”
“No…yes…I don’t know.” Goddammit.
“Which is it, Lorik?” She snapped. “Yes, or no?”
“I don’t fucking know. Everything is…it’s different than it was.”
“Why, because you fucked me? Because you fucked the infamous crime boss’s daughter?” She pushed her curls out of her face.
“No. That’s not it. Goddammit, Karina. Surely you know the kind of business your father runs. Tell me you’re not that naïve.”
She stepped back and bit her teeth into her bottom lip. “No, I’m not naïve when it comes to my family, Lorik. Apparently I’m just naïve when it comes to men.” Then she stormed past me, and I tried to reach for her, but she stepped out of my reach.
“Karina, please.”
“Fuck you, Lorik.” She grabbed her clothes off the floor and started to get dressed.
“Don’t go. Let’s talk about this,” I pleaded, desperate to get her to stay. Why?
“There’s nothing to talk about.” She pulled her dark curls out from under her shirt. “Like you said, you’re a detective, and I’m what you keep calling a Mafia princess.” And then her eyes widened, like she just had one motherfucker of a revelation. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
“What?”
“That’s why you seduced me. You’re using me to get to my dad, my brothers.”
I quickly moved around the bed toward her. “No, that is—”
“Stay the fuck away from me.” She held up her hands, and my chest felt like it had been cracked wide open. I didn’t like the fact that she didn’t want me near her. I didn’t like it at all.
“Karina, I’m not using you.”
“Like fuck you’re not. My God, it’s always about my family and my surname, never about me.” She let out a nervous laugh, then looked up at the ceiling before her saddened gaze settled on me. In that moment, seeing the unshed tears gleaming in her eyes I wanted to wrap my arms around her and to do everything in my power to convince her that this thing between us was so much more.
But then she says the words that rip my goddamn soul out.
“First it was Enzio…and now you.”
Hearing her comparing me to that bastard hit me square in the fucking chest, mainly because she has every right to think that. She has every reason to doubt my intentions. For the last few years my sole mission in the police force was to take down the Valentis because I was so damn sure they were behind all the crime in this fucking city. But during the last forty-eight hours everything had changed—the conversation with Anderson, the altercation with the Mancusos, Enzio’s threat…her. So much has happened and now I’m just not so sure that everything is as black and white as I had always suspected.
“Karina.” I moved toward her, determined to make her understand. “I totally get why you might think that, but it can’t be farther from the truth. My intension was never to use you.”
Her eyes narrowed into slits. “So your bullshit excuse about a supposedly stolen credit card wasn’t a way for you to use me to get information on my dad?”
“It was different then.”
She snorts. “You say that like it’s just a long time ago. It was two days ago. The only difference is I hadn’t opened my legs for you yet.”
“Don’t.” I grabbed her elbow and pulled her hard against me. “Don’t you fucking dare make what happened between us sound so goddamn cheap.”
“I don’t have to,” she said so
ftly, then pointed toward the cabinet. “That already does.”
She jerked her arms free from my hold and gave a few steps back while a tear finally slips down her cheek.
I’m frozen on the goddamn spot. I can’t move. I can’t stop her. She has every right to be angry, so I let her go. All I could do was stand there and watch as she left while it felt like my heart had been cut open.
What a giant clusterfuck. But honestly, what did I expect? This thing between Karina and I wasn’t meant to happen in the first place, so why do I feel so fucking shitty right now knowing that I hurt her?
I glanced up at the open cabinet and stare at the pinned picture of every member of the Valenti family—including her. The picture of her father was right at the top, her mother, Antonio, and Dante below him. Then there was a ton of pictures of her—pictures I had no right taking. Pictures I took while I had her followed. Such an invasion of privacy, but as a detective I didn’t give a fuck or care. But now, as a man, I do give a fuck, I do care…about her.
Chapter 17
KARINA
It’s been four days, fifteen hours and twenty-two minutes since I stormed out of Lorik’s apartment. Yes, I’m that pathetic.
He hadn't texted or messaged, or tried to make any kind of contact with me—which is probably a good thing. Then why am I checking my phone every ten minutes?
Every morning when I woke up my phone was the first thing I reached for, only to be disappointed at the lack of messages received—or rather from whom. There’s no explanation why I feel the way I do. I was the one that stormed out of his apartment feeling hurt and betrayed. I’m the one that couldn’t stand to look at him for a second longer without feeling like my heart was being ripped in two. But what bothered me the most was the fact that I felt that way, and that I reacted the way I did. I knew he was a cop who investigated my family. It’s not like he hid that little tidbit of information from me. He summoned me to the goddamn station and let me wait for him in the interrogation room for fuck knows how long. So it wasn’t exactly a state fucking secret that he had his claws out for my family. It’s not like I went into our little—I’m not even sure what you’d call it…two night fling...weekend fuck buddies? It definitely was not a relationship since it didn’t even last seventy-two hours. But it’s not like I went into it completely blind and oblivious to the fact that Lorik was investigating my family. I knew this, yet I still ended up with him between my legs, and now it seems like I still got hurt. Judging by the heaviness constantly weighing on my chest ever since I left his apartment, and the way my gut feels like there’s this giant fucking hole inside it, I’d say I’m pretty fucking hurt.
Somehow seeing how deep Lorik’s obsession in bringing down my family went hit me like a damn wrecking ball. When I searched for one of his shirts I did not expect to find a fucking cabinet filled with pictures and information regarding every member of my family. All those pictures of me, taken without my consent, or knowledge, forced such a strong sense of betrayal inside my chest that I struggled to take a breath. But it wasn’t just the betrayal, it was the fact that I had once again managed to get myself in one fucked up situation where my actions had the potential to hurt my family. What the fuck is wrong with me?
I took a sip of my Negroni cocktail at—I glanced at the old Grandfather clock in the corner—two in the afternoon. Lucky for me my family owns this damn restaurant and no one who works here in Paradiso will question my motivation for drinking a cocktail this time of day.
“It’s a bit early for you, isn’t it?”
Except Dante.
I shrugged. “I don’t know. According to whose standards, mine or yours?”
He took a seat next to me at the bar and eyed my cocktail. “Negroni. Gin. That’s some hard liquor.”
I just ignored him and took another sip.
“Everything okay?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Oh I don’t know.” He held up his hand signaling to the bartender to give him one of his usual—Bourbon. “Maybe it’s because you’re not a big drinker, and you hardly ever come down to the restaurant.”
I placed my empty glass on the counter. “Or maybe I’m just not a big drinker according to you, and maybe I finally realized that my life just isn’t family orientated enough so I decided to surround my whole goddamn life with everything Valenti—including my breakfast, lunch, and fucking dinner.”
“Whoa,”—Dante held up his arms—“where did that come from?”
Paolo, the bartender, placed a new cocktail in front of me like he could read my fucking mind.
“Thanks.” My heart was pounding so damn fast, my anger levels bordering on explosive, hence why I downed more than half of my new cocktail.
“Karina, what’s going on?”
“Nothing. Everything is just goddamn peachy.” I hate my life.
Dante turned in his seat to face me. “Does this have anything to do with that cop?”
Immediately my gaze snapped up to his, and I narrowed my eyes. “What cop?”
He started laughing, but it’s not an amused laugh. It’s more like an “I-call-bullshit” laugh. “You know exactly what cop I’m referring to. Detective Stone, the guy who face planted Enzio against the wall.” He cocked a brow. “And also the guy you spent last Saturday night with.”
Right at that moment I took a sip of my cocktail and then almost choked to fucking death. I grabbed the red and white checkered napkin and cleaned my face. “Oh my God.”
Dante weaved his fingers together in front of him, staring at me like I’m a child who just got caught in the act.
“There’s no use in denying it. Unless you forgot, you took my fucking car and I just happen to have GPS in that baby.”
Oh, fuck me.
“Which brings me to the topic of why Antonio decided to fuck up the immaculate paint job by punching dents into my car.”
See, this was why I should have left Monday. I tried to. I was packed and everything, until my dad came into my bedroom and begged me to stay just another week, saying that they missed having me around. He was still busy giving me the speech he had probably prepared for a week when I started unpacking my suitcase again. I might not see eye to eye with my father, but I love him.
I huffed out in frustration and pulled my hair out of my face. “Dante, what do you want me to say?”
“I don’t want you to say anything. I just want you to stop moping around like you’ve been doing the last few days. Is it because of him?”
“Who?”
“The cop.”
Silence.
“Dante—”
“Did he hurt you?” He straightened like he was already readying himself to go on the war path.
“Oh my God!” I threw my hands in the air. “Why is everyone so worried about me getting hurt?”
“Because we care about you and don’t want to see you get hurt.”
I let out a maniacal laugh. “You and Antonio should start realizing that I’m an adult, and I’m a woman. So I’m bound to get hurt sometime. Everyone gets hurt.”
Dante just stared at me like he’s trying to figure me out, trying to assess my mood.
I scowled at him. “Don’t do that.”
“What?”
I waved my hand in front of his face. “That whole trying to see right through me thing.”
He snorted. “That’s not what I’m doing.”
“Yeah right.”
What felt like hours—but it was probably seconds—passed without either one of us saying a word. But I can feel Dante’s gaze on me the entire time. It’s burning a fucking hole in the side of my head.
“You told Antonio, didn’t you? About Enzio?”
I hang my head down in defeat, starting to feel the effects of the alcohol I’ve consumed for the last hour. “Yes, Dante. I told him.”
He turned back toward the bar. “Well, that explains the foul fucking mood he’s been in the last week. Last Saturday when you drove off with my car
,”—he glared at me—“he got into his car and left.”
“Where did he go?”
Dante pulled up his shoulders. “Beats me. He came back four hours later smelling like cheap whiskey and even cheaper women.”
As if I need to feel any more guilty. Antonio’s bad mood was because of me, because of my damn problems.
I glanced around the restaurant. “Where is he now?”
“He went straight through to the back office. Didn’t even make his usual rounds greeting everyone.” Dante took a sip of his drink. “So how did he take it?”
“He wants to kill Enzio,” I say it like it’s no big deal. It’s a big fucking deal.
“I don’t blame him. I’ve wanted to kill that son of a bitch for the last four years.”
I glanced around the restaurant. The lunchtime rush hasn’t passed yet, plus it’s Friday, so chances are it’s only going to get even more busy. Paradiso isn’t one of those grand Italian restaurants where you’re too afraid to breathe, let alone eat. Decorated in typical Italian style with red, green and white being the main color scheme, it had a real homey atmosphere—especially with the smell of oregano and basil always hanging in the air. The reason I didn’t come here much was because of all the eyes and ears of the customers in this place. Customers were always extra polite to me, treating me like fucking royalty, and I hated it. I hate it because I know it’s fake. Their friendliness had nothing to do with my pretty face and the friendly atmosphere of the restaurant, but everything to do with who my father was.
Was it too much to ask to just be me, and to just be treated normally?
Dante glanced at me. “Talk to me, Karina.”
“There’s nothing to say that hasn’t been said in the past. I’m sick of having to live my life around the whole Valenti legacy in this town.” I leaned back in my chair and just stared blankly out in front of me. Dante and I have had this discussion so many times in the past because he felt exactly the same. He just handled it better than me. Plus he doesn’t have a vagina which in this case totally works in his favor.