Hail Mary

by Lani Lynn Vale

  “I think he’s adorable,” I snapped.

  Drake’s eyebrows rose. “You’re mad.”

  I crossed my arms. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here because you kicked me out of my house.”

  I had.

  While at Dante’s, I’d sent a certified letter to Drake saying he had exactly a month to move out of the house because I was putting it up for sale.

  I hadn’t thought to check to see if he’d actually moved, though. Rafe and Dante had said they’d handle it, and I’d allowed it because I didn’t want to have anything to do with the mess that they’d created.

  “I’m selling it to help pay for my bills,” I said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t have any choice. You were the one to point out that I should fight the cancer, weren’t you?”

  Not altogether a lie. I did have medical bills rolling in, and the sale of my old house would mean that I wouldn’t have to live in debt for the next year as I worked to pay them off.

  Then again, had I not known that Drake was doing something illegal at my place, I wouldn’t have kicked him out. I would’ve suffered in silence due to him being my best friend’s widower.

  But he had been doing something bad, and though Dante had kept it on the down low, I knew that they’d found something substantial enough to warrant me kicking him out within a few days of finding out that he’d been doing something that I might not agree with.

  “I think that’s a bullshit answer,” he countered. “Marianne told me you had a lot of money, thanks to your grandfather dying. This house would sell for upwards of a mil. You didn’t have to sell the one I was living in.”

  “So, you wanted me to sell the one I was living in?” I countered right back.

  His eyes narrowed. “A single woman doesn’t need a house like this. One that takes a lot of upkeep. A single woman needs a one-bedroom apartment with security so she doesn’t fear for her life.”

  I shivered slightly as I took in his words.

  He was staring at me like I was a nuisance. Like he was pissed off that I’d decided to go forward with the treatment.

  Fucker.

  “I love this house. This was the place that I grew up. The only place in the world that holds good memories for me. I’m not selling the house I’m living in, regardless of whether you want me to or not. You’re not my husband. You’re not even my friend. You’re my dead best friend’s husband. I’m sorry you were displaced, but I gave you sufficient time to move out and find another place. I’m sorry if you didn’t utilize that time wisely. I gave you what was required by law and then some.”

  Drake narrowed his eyes. “You’re not my friend?”

  “Drake, I don’t even know you. The only time I ever saw you was with Marianne, and even then, it was sparingly. To be honest, I felt like you hated me. You saw I was around, and immediately left the room. I think the most time we spent with each other was right after Marianne’s death, but that was only because I was helping you with funeral arrangements.”

  The only contact we had was when I got the check from him each month for rent. We’d share a few words, maybe a short conversation, but that was it. There was nothing more to Drake and me.

  “Why were you with Dante?”

  I frowned.

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t like him.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that.

  “He and Marianne shared a fling. They had a baby together. A baby they conceived while we were still very much married. When she got sick, she came home, but that was only because she knew that I could afford the chemo treatments and he couldn’t.” He narrowed his eyes. “And now you’re with him. You were supposed to be my friend.”

  “I met Dante six weeks ago. He helped me when I needed it most. He was a friend when I didn’t think I needed one. He’s a good man, and I don’t know what happened with Marianne and him. I’ve tried valiantly not to think about it. Yes, they do share a kid.” He knew that, right? “But from what I understand, it was Marianne that deceived him, and not the other way around. Dante never knew that Marianne was married, or he wouldn’t have done a single thing with her. I guarantee that.”

  And I did.

  I knew with all my heart and soul that Dante wouldn’t have slept with Marianne had he known the full details of what had taken place. He would’ve stayed far, far away from her.

  Yet, he hadn’t.

  Which led me to believe that Marianne hadn’t shared a single detail about her relationship with Drake.

  Hell, I wasn’t even sure she shared anything about herself even after he knew Marianne was married.

  “Dante’s not a good guy.”

  My brows rose.

  “You don’t believe me?” he asked. “He’s not. I don’t think he should have custody of that kid.”

  That kid being Dante’s child, Mary, whom he shared with Marianne.

  “Why?” I asked.

  I was truly curious now.

  I’d seen Dante with Mary.

  I knew damn well that he was a good father.

  “He hurt people.”

  I wanted to laugh at that pathetic excuse.

  “Why?”

  “I heard things about what he did to the people that tried to hurt his family. He made his own sister kill herself.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “He most certainly did not.”

  “He most certainly did. Did you know that his sister was the one who was driving the car that day that his family died?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you know that she was on drugs?”

  I clenched my jaw.

  “He knew that she was a few days later. I was in town that day that he confronted her in the hospital. I was there with Marianne.”

  I didn’t show my feelings at all.

  I kept my eyes straight forward and refused to say anything.

  “He yelled at her and made her cry. It’s just convenient that she killed herself, right?”

  I didn’t know what to say to that.

  “My sister killed herself because she was raped for years by a boy who came over every weekend to spend time with my brother,” Dante said. “She was upset that she’d killed my family, but I, in no way, shape or form, yelled at her because of that. I was too lost in my own goddamn grief to ever say anything to her. It took me six months to finally talk to my family. I was yelling at the hospital because they wouldn’t let me see my children. I needed confirmation that they were actually gone.”

  I turned to find Dante standing in my front entryway, staring daggers at Drake.

  “What are you doing in her house?” Drake snarled. “Get out!”

  Dante didn’t bother to move.

  “This is unforgivable, she’s mine.”

  My brows rose at that, and at first, I thought he was talking about Mary. Until I felt Dante’s hand circle my hip.

  “She’s mine,” he countered. “Whether you like it or not.”

  I didn’t know what in the hell was going on, but I could tell whatever it was, Drake didn’t like it. Not at all.

  “Wrong move, D.”

  “Right move, Drake.”

  I blinked, looked up at Dante in question, and heard the angry growl come from the man in front of me.

  Dante dropped his eyes to mine and then turned to watch Drake—who was stalking angrily down the length of my walkway.

  He got into his truck, slammed the door closed, and then roared off before I could think of saying goodbye.

  Not that I would’ve said goodbye.

  But still.

  I waited until Drake was farther down the road before turning to Dante. “When did you get here?”

  I hadn’t heard him pull up, either.

  Dante’s lips twitched.

  “Mary wanted to see the kitty.”

  I grinned and turned in his arms to see Mary on the porch petting my new friend.

  I sh
rugged Dante’s arm away and crouched next to Mary, who had my new kitty by the torso and was burying her face into his neck.

  “You like my kitty, Mary?” I questioned my favorite girl.

  Mary looked up and smiled. “Yes!”

  Mary knew a few words, two of those she pronounced really well. ‘Yes’ and ‘no.’

  I giggled and ran my hand over Mary’s blonde ringlets.

  “What should we name him?”

  Mary closed her pretty blue eyes and then opened them again.

  “Cacker.”

  “Cracker?”

  Then she shook her head. “Wacker?”

  I bit my lip. “Ummm…”

  “Yes!”

  “Yes, what?”

  “Yum!”

  I started to laugh. “You want to name him Yum?”

  “Yum-Yum.” She nodded her head in confirmation.

  I snorted and turned to look up at Dante, who was staring down at his child and me with a bemused smile on his face. “Probably shouldn’t have asked her.”

  “I like Yum-Yum,” I said. “Yum-Yum it is, right, Mary?”

  That’s when I got a load of Mary’s shirt.

  My brows furrowed.

  “Ummm, what is she wearing?”

  Dante grinned and bent down as he pulled the shirt away from Mary’s chest so I could get the full view of the shirt.

  “Travis’s son, TJ, used to wear this shirt. But it got too small for him, and Mary just had to have it. I couldn’t convince her to put on something else, so we’re wearing it.”

  I started to laugh, my eyes skimming over the shirt one more time.

  If you think I’m cute now, just wait until my beard comes in.

  “Ahhh,” I laughed, wiping tears from my eyes.

  Dante’s smile was heart stopping.

  That night, things for us changed.

  Became charged.

  No longer was it just us being friends. That night, what we had turned into more, and neither of us realized it until it was too late.

  Chapter 19

  Maybe eating a donut wasn’t cheating on my diet. Maybe going on a diet was cheating on my donuts.

  -Rationale of a hungry person

  Cobie

  That night Mary fell asleep on the couch at Dante’s house with my cat tucked in close to her chest.

  We were now at Dante’s house due to a water pipe that had burst at the wrecker office about thirty minutes into his visit to see the new kitty.

  I’d just gone to the fridge and emerged with a beer for both Dante and me when he scooted over and patted the loveseat beside him so I wouldn’t disturb Mary.

  We were both on our second beers.

  I was downright feeling good, while Dante seemed content… Maybe, dare I say, even happy.

  He was all smiles today, despite a pipe bursting in his office and flooding not just his office, but Travis’ as well.

  After having an emergency water damage clean up company who specialized in this kind of disaster come out and take a look at it, it was determined that it would take over fifteen grand to fix it. Yet Dante only shook his head and laughed, completely bemused by the situation.

  Travis had narrowed his eyes at him at the time, but still, Dante’s mood hadn’t waned.

  It was exhilarating to see him smiling despite the shitty things happening around him—like listening to Drake run his mouth when he had no clue what he was talking about and his office being trashed.

  Once Dante was sufficiently sequestered to his half of the loveseat, I sat, our thighs only inches apart, and handed him his beer, and immediately felt Dante’s warmth.

  It had never felt so intimate when I sat this close to him before, and my heart was pounding about a million miles an hour.

  We stayed like that, for hours, as we watched rerun after rerun of How I Met Your Mother.

  We were on our third and fifth beer when I finally fell asleep.

  My eyes closed, and I dreamed.

  But my dreams weren’t sweet like I’d been expecting. They were sad and downright depressing.

  ***

  The dream I was having sucked. It sucked so bad that I couldn’t even begin to explain its suckiness. Dante was staring at me, laughing, because I’d told him my feelings for him.

  “You really think I could fall for someone like you?”

  Everyone else was laughing, too.

  “Cobie.”

  I woke with a start and stared straight into Dante’s concerned eyes.

  “You okay?”

  I blinked, then nodded my head as I raised one hand up and pushed the hair out of my face. “Yeah,” I croaked. “I’m fine. What’s going on?”

  “We fell asleep on the couch,” he said. “Your cat is annoying.”

  My brows rose, but with it being so dark, I couldn’t figure out why, exactly, he thought my cat was annoying.

  “He’s been digging his claws into my beard for over an hour. Can you make him go away? I can’t seem to lift my hands.”

  I laughed and reached up and over, half of my body draping over Dante’s, as I picked the cat up and pulled him to my chest to cuddle.

  I didn’t, however, move off of Dante.

  I kept my body exactly where it was, and tried to forget the dream that he’d woken me from.

  “Not really a dream, though. More of a nightmare.”

  “What?” I asked, startled.

  “Your dream. You said, ‘It was just a dream,’ when you woke up. But I wouldn’t call something that made you cry out like that in your sleep a dream. I’d classify it as a nightmare. You sounded like you were in pain.”

  I was.

  “Oh,” I murmured, eyes once again closing. “I can’t even seem to remember it now.”

  I snuggled in closer to Dante, who didn’t push me away, and was asleep again moments later.

  Not once did I notice that we weren’t on the couch anymore. Nor did I notice that I’d somehow lost my pants, and Dante’s chest was smooth underneath my fingers.

  Because if I had, maybe I wouldn’t have stayed.

  If I had, maybe what happened next wouldn’t have happened.

  Chapter 20

  If your woman isn’t the most annoying person on the planet, she’s not the woman for you.

  -Cobie to Dante

  Cobie

  This dream was way better, was my first conscious thought.

  I pushed back against the hard column of Dante’s cock that I could feel along my backside and groaned.

  “Dante,” I breathed.

  His big hand went to my hip and he pulled me back as he ground himself against me, not saying a word.

  I didn’t need words, though. Not when it came to the man that had stolen my heart.

  Dante wasn’t much of a talker. It didn’t surprise me that that extended to sex.

  He growled, though, and that was just as good, if not better.

  “Please.” I pushed back against him.

  His hand smoothed up under my shirt to lay flat on the expanse of my belly, and then he went lower to where my panties laid against my skin, right underneath my bellybutton.

  His fingers teased the waistband. First, they went along the entire length, circling around one hip before they came back to the middle where the tiny pink bow lay. Then, the tip of one finger dipped below the waistline to run along the length of my pubic hair.

  Over and over, just barely teasing.

  It was enough to set my body on fire.

  “Dante,” I whimpered.

  I felt his bearded chin along my shoulder, and then his lips were on my skin. My neck.

  My jaw.

  He peppered my body with kisses as he tasted me, and I started to shiver.

  My legs were rubbing together as I tried to alleviate the ache he was causing, and I licked my lips before I finally took the plunge and shoved my panties down my legs.

  Onc
e they were kicked off, I spread them wide and threw one leg over his hips.

  The room around me was dark so I couldn’t see anything. I could only feel.

  But feeling was enough.

  I felt more than enough, actually.

  His hand hovered just at the apex of my thighs, his fingers digging into my skin as I practically willed him to move forward. Just another inch and his fingers would be where it ached the most.

  I shifted my hips to hopefully help, but still, he didn’t move.

  His lips had frozen at my neck, and I bit my lip as I reached for his hand.

  The moment my hand touched his, he shivered.

  “Like this,” I whispered to him as I guided his hand down.

  The moment I felt that blunt finger of his touch my clit, I knew that I was going to come.

  Which, apparently, was all the encouragement that Dante needed.

  He took control then.

  His lips caught my skin, and he sucked lightly.

  His hand delved deeper until his finger rested at the entrance to my sex.

  And, before I could tell him a single thing, he let that finger slip inside of me.

  I was so wet from his ministrations, as well as the simple fact that the man behind me was Dante, that it was almost embarrassing.

  He felt so good.

  God, everything about him was perfect.

  “Dante,” I breathed.

  Still he remained silent, but it didn’t matter.

  He was perfect.

  His fingers were perfect.

  His mouth was perfect.

  Everything about him was perfect.

  I reached behind me and started to feel.

  He had pants on, but not his jeans. Sleep pants.

  His sleep pants were doing barely anything to contain his raging erection, and when I pushed his pants and boxers down, his cock sprung free and slapped against my lower back with a meaty thud.

  I shivered as my hand circled around him, and Dante growled.

  “Fuck.”

  His strangled curse word was enough to encourage me to continue. I pumped him with my fist, relishing in the fact that he filled it to overflowing.

  I’d been with two men in my life, and both of them had been a disappointment.

  Dante wasn’t even inside of me yet, and he’d already given me more than the other two men ever had.