Bartender with Benefits

by Mickey Miller

  I looked up into his dark eyes, seeing the tortured shadows at the edges. “You should have told me. All of it.”

  “I didn’t want you to look at me any differently. You knew me before I became a monster.”

  I dropped my arms as some of my horrors disappeared. Vince and I were both colossally fucked up, and my own morality scale was twisted. Who was I to cast stones at Vince when I lived in my own glass house? Here I was, laundering dirty money for my family, aiding the drug racket in my own way.

  Vince pulled me closer. “Do you see me differently, Bunny?”

  That damn nickname tugged on my heart. “No, but I’m still mad you didn’t tell me. But what does it matter anyway, I’m leaving in a couple months.”

  Vince yanked me against him so hard I gasped. His hand palmed the back of my head. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  My heart bounced in my chest, squeezing the oxygen from my lungs. “What does that mean?”

  “It means I’m tired of pretending, I’m tired of us dancing around the truth. You know the skeletons in my closet, and they didn’t drive you away. Well, at least not for long. I fucking love you, Kelly. It’s time we both admit that this is way more than what we agreed to. I don’t want you to leave. I want you to stay.” Vince’s breath fanned over my face, his intensity almost tangible.

  I gazed up into his dark brown eyes, crazed with a gleam I hadn’t seen before.

  I’d known days ago that I’d fallen for Vince. And now?

  How could I deny him?

  I stroked the gruff shadowing his cheek. No matter how often he shaved, he always had a five o’clock shadow. “I love you, too.”

  Vince crushed me into his chest. “Let’s go home. I think I’ve had enough of New York.”

  The plane ride back to Chicago was quiet. Mostly because Sal kept glowering at Vince. Anyone with eyes could see something had changed between us. While before during our fake relationship Vince had been touchy feely, he was now glued to my hip. He’d opened himself up, secrets, warts, and all, and I accepted him.

  Vince tucked my bangs behind my ear and his teeth grazed the lobe. “Have you ever wanted to join the mile high club?”

  Chills shot through my body, and I sucked in a quick breath lest he think I was that easy. Well, for him, I was. “Have you ever?”

  “No, and this jet is just begging for a christening.”

  He stood up, tall, powerful, and panty-dropping hot. I should know the latter. My panties dropped for him frequently. He held his hand out to me, all chivalrous as if I couldn’t see the huge bulge beginning to swell right in front of my face.

  I darted a look toward the front of the plane where Sal sat in a buttery leather seat. If we were quiet, no one would suspect what we were up to.

  I held Vince’s eyes as I cupped his cock, my fingers spreading into a vee around his groin, and plumping up his cock.

  “Bunny,” Vince growled.

  I widened my eyes, trying an innocent look. “What?”

  His strong fingers stroked my chin and then hauled me up. When I was standing, he got a nice taut hold of my hair. “You’re being bad. Do you remember what happened the last time?”

  Heat flushed through my body, sending blood on a wayward adventure down south. I squirmed. “Yes.”

  He spun me around and gave me a swift spank to my ass. There was no hiding the loud CRACK his palm made on my ass.

  The heat in my cheeks was almost nuclear as he guided me down the narrow, carpeted aisle and into the back of the plane. The private jet was sumptuously decorated, but the bedroom Vince led me into had a woman’s touch. Crystal, maybe. The soft cream interior and white bedding gave me a bit of envy. There was even a damn couch and desk.

  “I think this is bigger than my bedroom at home,” I said.

  Vince wrapped his arms around me. “It belongs to the company, one of the perks.”

  He shut the door behind us and I turned in his arms. “Does this count as the mile high club? I thought that was being stuffed in a cramped bathroom and trying not to get caught by the flight attendants.”

  “There’s something I want to stuff, but it’s not us in a bathroom.” Vince took my mouth with a ferocious kiss. Heat sizzled through me, and I wrapped my arms around his shoulder, anchoring myself to him.

  God, I couldn’t get enough of him. His mouth played mine like a professional, parting my lips for the thick, slick sweep of his tongue.

  His fingers stroked through my hair and then down to my waist. He picked me up, and I wrapped my legs around his waist.

  “Say it again, Kelly,” he whispered as he lowered me onto the bed.

  I arched against him, rubbing the aching tips of my nipples into his chest. They were so sensitive through my dress. I hadn’t changed after we’d left Saint Satan. We just grabbed our bags, we’d been planning on spending the weekend in one of those swanky New York hotels, and headed to the plane.

  I cupped Vince’s cheeks and peppered his mouth with kisses. “I love you.”

  He closed his eyes as if those three little words were the best thing he’d ever heard. When he opened them again his eyes gleamed like fire sparking off seared logs. “Promise you’ll never leave me.”

  “Now you want promises,” I teased him. “You already moved me into your penthouse. I feel like a kept woman.”

  His large hands swept beneath the hem of my skirt, pushing it up, and revealing the skimpy black thong beneath. He plucked at the double straps holding the scrap on my hips. “You don’t ever have to work again if you don’t want. I know I was high-handed and demanded you stay. Are you giving up your dreams if you do?”

  “My dream was to start over,” I said against his lips. “I can be an actress anywhere, right?”

  He tugged on the edge of my panties. The back of his knuckles grazed my lips, setting me aflame with need. “We’ll make your family come around.”

  I held his gaze. We’d talked about the tension in the air, the threat of violence that had been simmering in the Windy City as the summer progressed. It had been nice to be in New York without it, but already I could feel it building again as we headed toward Chicago.

  We needed to do something to alleviate the pressure before it boiled over. But Vince looked at me with such hope, that I couldn’t burst that bubble. We would make Pops and Tommy and the others come around. Somehow.

  Steve, that damn drunk at the bar, haunted my thoughts in a burst of mocking laughter.

  You’ll need to make a choice, girlie.

  I pulled Vince against me and banished the thoughts. “Fuck me, Vince. I need you.”

  His grin dripped with lust. “Your wish is my command.”

  I was already primed by the time he tore my panties off. I laughed as he flung it aside. He’d promised to keep me flush with lingerie, and I would enjoy making him keep his word.

  I spread my thighs beneath his roaming hand, biting my lip as he stood up. He pulled a condom from his wallet with a flourish. “I never kept these so ready until you.” He didn’t even get undressed. Instead, he unhooked his belt and pants, letting them slide to his ankles. Though I would have loved to have seen him nude, him half-undone was just as sexy.

  I grinned. “What does that say about me?”

  He crawled above me. “It says we are insatiable.”

  I melted as he lowered his mouth to my throat, kissing the rapid flutter of my pulse. “I can live with that,” I whispered.

  I spread my legs and rocked up against him, feeling the head of his cock slide through my wetness. I hissed a breath, releasing the moan that simple touch caused.

  He tore the condom open with his teeth and then sheathed his dick fluidly. “One of these days soon, I’m going to fuck you bare, Bunny.”

  Shit. That was the hottest thing I’d ever heard. My toes curled, and my pussy quivered with pleasure. “Is that so?”

  “Yes. This is mine,” he tapped his dick against my cunt. “Only I’ve been inside you, and that’s going t
o stay that way.”

  “God, Vince.”

  “I know,” he murmured against my jaw. He barely gave me time to prepare before he pumped forward, slamming the whole length of his huge cock inside me. “Fuuuck, I love how tight you always are.”

  My fingers clung to his back as my body adjusted to his girth. That almost-pain, that rough friction was so good. It shuddered through me, making my womb clench with arousal. “You’re so damn big is why,” I panted.

  He pushed up from atop me, the only point of contact being his shaft buried inside me so damn deep. I squeezed my inner muscles and was rewarded with a groan. “Fuck, you’ve learned quick.”

  I rode my hips up, and then back down, fucking just a few inches of his cock. “I had a good teacher.”

  He glanced down, and I followed his gaze. His dick had me spread wide. The visual punch of it was so erotic that I dropped my head with a hungry moan.

  Playtime was over. Vince yanked me closer by my hips and powered into me. I swore I felt him in my stomach, and I had no idea how there wasn’t a bulge there to signify where he bottomed out. I quivered beneath him, already on my edge.

  “Are you going to come for me, Kelly? Mmmm, shit, I can feel you milking my cock already.”

  My nails left grooves in his wrists, his shoulders, wherever I could reach in the desperate effort to pull him close. “Please, Vince. Pleeease.”

  “I love it when you beg.”

  He pounded into me, each stroke building on the previous one until the bedroom around us was a haze of pleasure and carnality. My climax loomed, roaring toward me like a damn freight train. And Vince was my conductor, guiding my passion until he showed me mercy. His fingers found my clit, teased that slippery tight place where we were joined, and he sent me flying.

  The whole plane heard my scream of release, and his guttural bellow as he joined me.

  Still, sex couldn’t banish the worry which rooted in my heart.

  I was going to have to choose.

  Vince.

  Or my family.

  Ventisei

  In my younger years, I’d considered any of my friends who chose to partner off with a woman borderline crazy.

  Didn’t these men see how much weaker they were?

  Didn’t their ambition for life fade away now that they’d “settled down?”

  Being with Kelly, I finally understood. Every second I was away from her was a second that I had moved closer to death without us talking. Touching. Fucking.

  She made me feel stronger every day, not weaker like I’d thought.

  These were my thoughts as I stood alone on our rooftop on a Thursday night, sipping a margarita as I watched the sun go down in July in Chicago. I smiled, never so satisfied as I’d watched over my dominion.

  For the past two months, I’d spent almost every single night with Kelly. Independence Day, known in Chicago as the Bloody Fourth of July, had a record low number of shootings this year. The word was getting out that Kelly and I were together, and people were taking note.

  I was still a dictator—I was just a benevolent one now. I wouldn’t stand for any more nonsensical or revenge violence. I took extra territory here and made some concessions there. The result was a well-oiled, generally non-violent business operation.

  I felt a hand run along my back and smiled, knowing whose it was.

  “Hey, Bunny.”

  “Hello, CEO.”

  There was a slight opening between myself and the wall, and Kelly slipped her body into it. Just back from her rehearsal, she had on jeans and a V-neck t-shirt. As usual, my cock swelled when she ground against my body.

  We made firm eye contact and her lips parted slightly. We kissed, slow and passionate for a minute or two.

  “Whatcha doing up here?” she asked, her face still inches from mine.

  “Thinking.”

  “About what?”

  “You. Me. My business. The usual.”

  “You worried?”

  “Not really. This summer just came and went so fast. It seems too good to be true. Do you feel that way too, or is it just me?”

  The breath went out of her. She turned and glanced at the city. My kingdom. Her kingdom now.

  “You’re a good man, Vince. I didn’t think it was possible that someone with your past could be, but you truly are.”

  “I’m the backbone of a business that sells fucking rocks to addicts, Kelly. Not sure that puts me in the ‘good’ department.”

  She squinted. “Vince, Coke is a thirty-billion-dollar a year market. If we don’t run the racket, someone else will step in and do it. A person is never all good or bad. Al Capone was evil, but he handed out food during the Great Depression. Saved a lot of people from starving.”

  My body flooded with warmth. Kelly wasn’t a bullshitter. I figured I’d have years of expensive therapy ahead of me after all the bad shit I’d done in life. Somehow, though, in Kelly’s presence, it was okay.

  She made me stronger.

  “You bring out the good in me,” I said as I stroked her cheek.

  Her smile built slowly. “I thought I was your little devil.”

  “Maybe. You’re also my angel, though.”

  “Seems like a contradiction.”

  “It’s not,” I retorted. “You’re a little devil bunny when we’re fucking, and an angel the rest of the time. Hell, at the same time.”

  She lifted her chin and trembled. “You’re making me need you again.”

  I licked my lips as I ran a hand down her back and on down to her thigh. “Then I might have to fuck you like a naughty girl on the roof. That would be a shame, wouldn’t it?”

  Her lips parted. “Oh, God. I want a drink first.”

  I let go of Kelly, went behind the bar and made her cocktail just the way she liked it.

  “Light ice with salt,” I said as I handed it to her.

  “Thanks.” I stared at her as she gripped it and licked the salt. I loved watching everything the woman did.

  “Vince, there’s something I wanted to tell you about.”

  I shifted my weight. “What’s going on?”

  “There is a festival coming up next weekend: the Irish American Heritage Festival. It’s on the north side of the city. My family goes every year. It’s a fun time. You know, Guinness, lots of music, corned beef and cabbage, ring toss. I want you to come.”

  “Of course I’ll come,” I said without hesitation.

  She swallowed. “It’s not that simple. My dad will be there. My brothers will be there. Greg fucking Cooney will be there. Everyone goes. I’ll probably get up on stage at some point. And, trust me, you’re going to stick out like a sore thumb, even more than you usually do.”

  I stepped forward and placed my hand on her hip. “Bunny, I’ll go. It sounds like fun. It’s done.”

  She cocked her head to the side. Her voice was strained when she replied. “You ever get one of those weird feelings in your bones? Because I have that right now.”

  “I get that weird feeling in my bones a lot when I’m around you. I’m pretty sure it’s called ‘maximum arousal.’”

  She grinned, biting her lip. “Vince LaRosa, I don’t think most girls could handle you.”

  “Which is why I’m with you.” I held my drink out to the side as I gripped her head and kissed her, licking her salty lips and pressing my tongue inside her mouth, tasting the margarita. She pulled back.

  “You’re disarming,” she raised an eyebrow. “But I have to say this. I have a really bad feeling. It’s been so calm this summer. Like, suspiciously calm. No major shootouts. For the first year in ten years, deaths have declined instead of risen.”

  “That’s because of us, Kel. Because of you. We’re leading by example, and it’s trickling down. Trickle down alliance.” I smiled at the term I had just made up.

  She shrugged. “That’s one way to look at it.” Her eyes darted down and side to side. Something wasn’t right with Kel, and it was up to me to fix it.

&n
bsp; “Come here.” I took her by the hand and walked her to the south side of the patio. The buildings looked tiny, like part of a toy train set. “What do you see?”

  “I see houses. People doing what they want to do.” She shrugged. “I don’t know. What do you see?”

  “I see people who react logically to incentives. We put the right ones in front of them, the bullshit stops. And that’s what I—what we—have been doing this summer. We’ve stopped tolerating the bullshit ‘no-reason’ retaliatory violence. It’s worked. And it will keep working as long as you and I are in it together.”

  “That’s a big weight on my shoulders.”

  I grabbed hold of her neck and massaged it. “Our shoulders, Kel.”

  Her smile turned devilish and she ran a hand down my shirt. “Let’s just forget about this for now. Forget I even said anything.”

  I was about to spin her and pin her against either the patio fence or a nearby wall when my phone buzzed in my pocket. “Ignore it,” I said.

  When it buzzed for a second time, she reached into my pocket, took it out, and looked at it. “It’s Sal,” she said, flashing her baby blues at me. “Text says code gray.”

  “Fuck,” I said through gritted teeth. “Give it to me.”

  “This better be good,” I huffed.

  “Sorry Boss. But we have some intel that I really think you need to take a look at.”

  “Now?”

  “Yes, Boss.”

  “Fuck,” I muttered. He told me where he was and I hung up the phone.

  “Kel, I have to go,” I said, pressing my forehead against hers.

  “Okay,” she responded, disappointment in her voice. “I guess I’ll just be the princess in the tower tonight.”

  “Damnit, don’t say it like that.”

  She inhaled, let out a deep breath, and pecked me on the cheek. “See you later.”

  “I love you.” I squeezed her hip and let go.

  “Love you too.”

  I swallowed the last of my drink and set it on the bar, leaving Kelly to contemplate her own thoughts as she sipped her drink. I glanced over my shoulder before I took the first step. What thoughts filled her mind as the queen looked over her new kingdom?