“Don’t ever be afraid of me, Kelly.” His fingers swept over my cheek, and I closed my eyes. Luxuriating in the sensation his hand caused.
“You’re dangerous to me.”
He didn’t need exposition. I think he knew exactly what I was afraid of. Not of him physically, or the threat of bullets and blood that would come along with dating a Mafia Kingpin. But at how easily he seemed to be making his way past the borders of my walls and leading a charge on my heart.
“Have you ever considered you’re dangerous to me, as well?” His words were solemn and spoken in a hush against my mouth; a kiss that wasn’t a kiss.
“Is this real?” My voice was so small because my heart was squeezing my throat.
“It feels real.”
“It can’t be, Vince. I’m leaving after all of this is over. That was our deal. California and me becoming the next Emma Stone. Remember?” He had his sunglasses on, and all I could see was my reflection. I had no way of telling what he was thinking.
“I won’t get in the way of your dreams, little bunny.” His smile had a touch of sadness to it. “But I will enjoy every minute of the time we have left. If it feels more real than we anticipated. That’s okay, right?”
“Yeah,” I said.
Resting my head on his shoulder, we watched the people mill around us until trouble came.
Of all the people to stumble across in the park. Greg fucking Cooney and his punk ass friend were walking toward us. His friend was a little bit shorter and even more scraggly than Greg was. It was difficult to miss the big metal bats they were carrying on their shoulders.
“Oh, shit,” I muttered, the first one to see them.
Sal followed my line of sight and saw them too, and his body stiffened. He stepped from behind us and placed himself in front of the bench where we were seated as the two guys drew near.
They stopped a few feet in front of our bench. Vince stood but kept his hand on my back. “Can I help you two gentlemen?”
“Just going for a stroll,” Greg’s friend said. “On the way to the softball field.”
“Where’s your ball?” Sal asked, his arms folded.
“Hello, Kelly,” Greg said, ignoring Sal’s question. Greg tried to force a smile, but it was clearly unnatural. “We’ve been sent to bring you home.”
I stood. “Oh, really? Who sent you?”
“Your father.”
“Really? My father sent you to bring me home. I don’t believe that at all.”
“Look, it doesn’t matter who sent us, or what we’re doing. The fact is, she’s done with you people.” He paused to sneer at Vince. “Just let the bitch go.”
It wasn’t lost on me that Vince had barely reacted to his first two sentences. I think it was precisely when he said the word bitch that Vince’s eyes turned to fire. Vince took another step toward the boys. Sal was an arm’s length from both of them.
“You say whatever the fuck you want about me,” Vince growled. “I don’t give a shit. But how dare you talk about her like that.”
My mind flashed back to freshmen year of high school when I’d taken the long way home to avoid the fights, and even then, I’d still end up being that younger sister who got my older brother out of trouble. “Guys, just stop. There’s no need for this.”
“No, there ain’t no need,” Greg spat. “Just. Fucking. Come. With. Us!” He screamed, swept his bat up, and attempted to strike. His crony did the same. In one powerful swoop, Vince body slammed Greg into the dirt and put him in a headlock, his bat rolling on the ground. I gasped. Vince’s efficiency and taking him right down to the ground was scarily impressive.
Meanwhile, Sal had taken the bat out of the hand of the other one like he was taking candy from a baby.
“Looks like you two fucks just dug yourself a hole.”
“Vince,” I muttered putting a hand on Vince’s back. Greg’s face was red, and he looked as if he were on the brink of passing out. Vince reluctantly let go of him, giving him a shove into the dirt as he did. Greg gasped for air.
My heartbeat sped and my thoughts raced. Was this how it was going to be all summer while I was with Vince? Or would things calm once my family accepted the fact that I was dating him?
“I don’t know what the fuck you two think you’re doing, walking up to us with those fucking metal things like you’re trying to prove a point,” Vince growled. “But if you think you’re going to strong arm me, you’ve got another fucking think coming.”
Greg and his friend got on their feet. I almost felt sorry for him, he was so thin and pasty. “Kelly, this is it?” There was desperation in his voice. “After our fantastic date at the bar earlier this week, you’re already done with me?”
I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “You mean when you cornered me at Kelly’s during my bar shift? I hate to tell you, but that was not a date.”
The man, if I could call him that, looked totally helpless and utterly dejected. Vince stared them both down, but they didn’t move.
“You two want to get going right about now,” Sal said with a tone of utter certainty.
“So I’ll tell your dad you’re not coming home tonight,” the other friend huffed. They turned and walked away.
Vince turned to me, his arms on my shoulders. “You okay?”
“Yeah, of course, I’m fine. He didn’t touch me.”
“You’re not shaken up?”
“I am, actually. But it’s fine.”
“No, it’s not fine. Don’t lie to me, Bunny. Remember, I’ve built my empire on knowing when people are telling the truth and when they aren’t. And you are not fine.”
I leaned my head into his chest. He wrapped his arms around me.
“Let’s go someplace where we can actually relax,” he said.
“The limo?”
“My apartment, Bunny.”
Quattordici
Those motherfucking assholes.
What was this, seventh grade?
Who the fuck just rolls up to you in the middle of a park with metal fucking bats?
Yeah, like you’re going to do something, buddy.
“Kent, this is Kelly, my girl,” I said to the doorman as we passed him. “Let her up from now on.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. LaRosa. Of course. Right, this way miss.”
“MacNamara. Miss MacNamara.”
Kent’s eyes got a little wide when he heard Kelly’s last name. He was no stranger to the feud going on—no one was. But he would never question it. Hell, I’d hired him.
When the elevator reached the top floor, I whispered to Sal to stay outside my condo for now. He nodded.
I didn’t tell him to stay outside because I wanted to fuck Kelly five ways until Sunday—although I did. But something had been bothering her ever since that Greg guy showed up to the park, and I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. I needed to chat with her, alone. Just the two of us, and see what was going on in that pretty little head of hers.
I opened the door and let her inside, then closed the door behind us.
“No Sal?” she asked.
“We deserve some privacy, at least momentarily. Don’t you think?”
“I like private,” she reiterated in that buttery sweet voice of hers. I was going to have to add that voice to the list of things about Kelly that turned me way the fuck on.
This little bunny had my dirty mind spiraling out of control. My eyes followed her long legs as she walked into the living room, running a hand on everything like a curious kid. She wore tight white jeans that were so tight I swore I could see every taut curve of her ass. I stared shamelessly. Paired with a green striped tank top with some sparkles at the neckline, her outfit wasn’t anything special necessarily—just the ‘casually hot’ look she wore to the bar for her shift.
I added that outfit to my mental list as well, and I realized the list was rapidly getting quite long.
Fuck, getting long. Just like something else attached to me.
I walked over to my in-house bar and g
ot behind it. “Excuse me, miss. What’ll you have?”
She smiled. “Ooh. I get to be the customer for a change.”
“You look a little stressed. Might I suggest something strong? A Negroni, perhaps.”
She nodded her head with a wry grin. “Thanks, Mr. Bartender. Where’s your tip jar?”
I leaned forward, elbows on the bar, and pointed to my mouth. “It’s right here.”
Kelly’s mouth twitched, and she leaned in and gave me a kiss. I grabbed hold of her head and neck and pushed my mouth farther into her. We kissed slowly, passionately, deliberately.
“Okay,” she said, backing away slightly. “Wow.”
“I know.”
Focusing back on my task, I mixed Williams Chase Gin, Campari, and Italian Vermouth, garnished it with an orange peel and handed it to her.
We clinked glasses and she took a sip. “Holy shit, Vince, this is good. Where’d you learn to make this?”
“When I was eighteen and working under my father, I used to be the drink-getter for their private meetings. Well, one day the usual bartender didn’t show up—actually, he got snuffed out—and these guys sure as hell weren’t about to make their own drinks. I jumped behind the bar and learned quickly. The old-timers loved negronis. Still, this is my favorite of all the drinks I’ve made.”
“You’re a damn onion, you know that?”
I crinkled my brow. “An onion?”
“Yeah. Everything’s got this grand significance for you. It’s never, ‘oh I just Googled it one night when I was trying to sleep with this girl.’”
I laughed. “Maybe I am an onion. You know, the word ‘Chicago’ means smelly onion crop in an old Native American language.”
Her eyes went wide. “No shit?”
“No shit. Follow me. I want to show you something.”
Cocktails in hand, we headed up the stairs to the terrace on the very top floor. “Wow,” she remarked. “A hot tub, pool, sundeck? You must crush it with the ladies up here.”
I put my hand on the small of her back and smiled. “I’ve got some ideas for crushing my lady up here, yes.”
She seemed to wiggle her torso ever so slightly when I said those words.
I took her hand and led her to the east side of the terrace. “Besides, this is the panty dropper anyway.”
Her jaw dropped. We were on the top floor of the tallest condo in the South Loop, and the view was stunning. The sun reflected off Lake Michigan. From our vantage point, the boats in the water looked like little toys you might give to a kid to play with in the tub. It was a view that humbled me every time I saw it. I took a step back from the balcony rail so I could watch her.
“Vince, Jesus fucking Christ. This is so beautiful!” Her joyful smile was contagious, and before I knew it I was beaming like a silly man, and it felt fucking good. Being honest, I hadn’t smiled a lot the past few years.
Then her eyes turned downcast, as though she’d remembered she should be sad.
“Kel, something’s bothering you. What is it?” I rested my hand on her hip.
“It’s nothing,” she said, her eyes darting down and away.
“Bullshit.”
She took a deep breath and exhaled. “Fine. Two things, actually.”
“I’m listening.”
“First, this whole thing in the park—obviously, I didn’t even come close to getting hurt, but it’s really stressing me out. I know I agreed to this deal. I’m fine with it. But what if we can’t change things? What if we go the whole summer like this, nothing changes, and my family hates me? Then what happens? Do I just move to California with nothing but a hope and a dream? My family is traditional, sure, but they love me in their way.”
Her lips quivered. I gripped her body and brought it to me. “You can’t think like that, Kel. We will make this work.”
“How can you be so sure?”
I exhaled, then led Kel to the edge of the balcony rail. “Let’s see if I can explain. Kel, you see that LaRosa Beef sign down there on Seventeenth Street?” I pointed.
“Of course.”
“My cousin Victor, dead at fourteen. Drive by shooting. Stray bullet. The guy was trying to make a few extra bucks for his family, working before he even had a permit. Fucking tragedy. Now see that house a few blocks east? The blue one.”
She was trembling a little bit. “I see it.”
“My Aunt Victoria, also hit by a stray bullet. Dead at seventeen.”
Her eyes glossed over and a tear rolled down her cheek. “Why are you telling me this?”
I touched her chin and lifted it so she had to point her eyes at me. “I know you probably aren’t feeling the greatest about our rocky start here. But trust me, I have a plan and this is going to work. We’re going to get through to everyone. It hasn’t even been a full week.”
“Okay.”
I pulled her body closer to mine, feeling her heat. I held her tight, and my hands explored her hair, her back, her legs, her ass. I was hard. Fuck the list. Everything about Kelly was on the list. As feral as I was for her, I released her. I wanted to take this slow, and I could tell there was still something on Kelly’s mind.
“By the way,” I said, grabbing my negroni from the table where I’d placed it. “What was the second thing you wanted to say?”
“Second thing? Oh. Yeah. I thought I should probably tell you something about me.” She paused and took an especially long pull on her drink. “I’m a virgin.”
Sia Deug
I hid my gaze from Vince after dropping the V-card bomb. After the events of the afternoon, I couldn’t stomach the idea of horror or revulsion or any one of thousands of emotions that might show up on his face after my confession.
Winding my arms around my waist, I stared down at the city. This was the whole of Vince’s domain, from the enormous factory which fed a thousand cogs in the meat industry to the enormous gambling boat surfing across Lake Michigan that I knew he owned, he kept his pulse on all things Chicago. Hell, there were even rumors he owned a controlling stake in the Chicago Jaguars. The LaRosas were like what Heinz was to Pittsburgh; a food industry titan stretching out across the United States, and diversifying their interests in multiple ways. Though LaRosa sausage wasn’t quite as titanic as the ketchup giant, I didn’t doubt they would get there in a couple generations.
Maybe then Vince and his family could cut away from the Mafia ties. Though if the Italians were anything like the Irish, that sort of conflict was bred in the womb. What would Chicago—and all the other hot-spots of mobster activity like New York and Jersey—be without the two sides constantly warring?
“You’re a virgin?” Vince’s voice was a low baritone rumbling against my ear, bringing me back to the conversation at hand. The surprise was palpable in his tone.
I wound my arms tighter around my midsection and nodded. I didn’t trust my voice. I’d been evading this question since he’d begun prodding me for information on my past, those little hints and nudges about what I liked sexually when we’d been out to lunch. Yes, I had some experience, but until Vince, I’d never had the big ‘O’.
And now that I have? Well, I wanted to learn more. I had confidence that Vince could control my body as if it was his very own personal playground.
His finger curled around my ponytail, fanning the strands over my shoulder. “That explains a lot.”
I dared to glance up at him through my lashes. “Explains what?”
His mouth tilted at the corner. “You have this aura of innocence about you. It makes me think of things, about how hard I’d have to fuck you, and how much I’d need to dirty you up to get rid of it. But then I think, I kind of like it.”
My throat grew dry as I gazed up into his bittersweet brown eyes. They smoldered like embers, threatening to catch me afire.
No, I wasn’t right. I was already burning. Just spending a few minutes in his arms made me wet. His kisses were dangerous to me, and could easily divest me of my panties.
I still c
ouldn’t believe I’d let him go down on me in the limo. It was so wrong. So bad. I should say a hundred hail Mary’s and go to confession. But I liked it, too.
I looked down and bit my lip.
His hand fanned against my nape and pulled me into his chest. I sank into him, engulfed by the spicy scent that I recognized as Vince’s natural fragrance.
“Do you want to stay a virgin? I know some of you Irish gals want to wait till marriage, that whole tradition. Hell, I’ve encountered my fair share of Italian girls who wanted the same thing.”
I found it fascinating the similarities between his side and mine. If the Italians and Irish both hadn’t been treated like the scum of the Earth back during the great immigration, would this war still be ongoing? Both sides had wanted to climb out of the gutter and muck, be viewed as important instead of worthless. The Italians had succeeded a bit more than the Irish had. They were viewed as wealthy and elite, while we were often characterized as blue collar and brutal.
I ran my fingers over his toned chest, and up along the width of his broad shoulders. God, shyness all but crippled me as I soaked in the sensation of him pressed against me. Could I admit what I wanted from him?
My nose traced the sinewy contour of his bronzed throat. “I don’t want to wait.”
Suggestion trilled through my voice. Vince was smart, I knew he’d catch on to what I was all but purring at him.
He stiffened beneath my palms. His hand stroked down my spine, curving down to cup my ass and pull me closer. “If you don’t want to wait, what do you want, Bunny?”
I just loved his nickname for me. It made me feel feminine and fuzzy inside, at odds to the tomboy I’d been my whole life; just one of the guys with dirt on my nose and a wad of chewing gum stuffed in my cheek like tobacco.
I summoned my bravery and wiggled closer. He was already deliciously hard, the stiff length of his prick ground against my hip through his slacks. “I want you to make a woman out of me.”
His mouth moved against my hair, his lips folded into a smile as he offered a soft laugh. “What a quaint way of putting it. I’m not going to make a woman out of you.”
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