Staying in Vegas: (Vegas Morellis, #1)

by Sam Mariano

“I used to believe a fat man in a red suit dropped down a chimney and delivered me neatly wrapped presents every December; I’m wrong sometimes.”

  Moving away from them and over to the stove, I check the timer, then bend to crack open the oven door and take a peek. The chicken is sizzling nicely, so I close the door to keep in the heat, and grab the spoon on the counter, stirring the broccoli cooking on the stovetop. Luckily the chicken came in a three pack, so even though there are only two of us, I went ahead and made all three pieces. At first I figured Sin could take leftovers for lunch tomorrow, then I realized he doesn’t work a typical nine to five and consequently there’s probably no formal lunch break.

  I wonder if there’s some sort of mobster 401k program in place? Probably not. I should help him set something up for himself while I’m here.

  My eyes widen as a sudden realization hits me. Rafe doesn’t know Sin kept me here against my will. He thinks I’m here because I want to be, and that I’m seeing Sin.

  Smiling with unabashed glee, I walk back over to the men and hold my hand out to Sin. “May I see my phone please?”

  Sin stares at me, unmoving. “Your phone?”

  I nod. “I need to call Carly real quick while I’m waiting for the food to finish cooking. I missed her call earlier and she’s probably starting to wonder if I got kidnapped or something.”

  Sin does not return the gleeful amusement in my eyes. His dark brown eyes are dead at best, maybe a little annoyed. “It’s pretty close to dinnertime. Why don’t you call her later?”

  “I think I’d like to call her now.”

  “I think your battery’s dead,” he says.

  “Okay.” Turning to Rafe, I ask, “Will you let me borrow your phone for two minutes?”

  “No,” Sin says, before Rafe can respond. Shooting me a narrowed look, he fishes my phone out of his pocket and holds it out to me.

  “Thank you,” I say, reaching for it.

  Sin doesn’t let go of the phone. I meet his gaze and he moves closer, giving me a look that wordlessly reminds me not to do anything stupid. He’s so silly. Does he really think I want to drag my sister into this shit show?

  Finally, he releases the phone.

  As I wake it up and open my recent calls, Rafe asks, “Why does he have your phone?”

  Sin opens his mouth, but before he can say anything, I offer, “No pockets.” Then I indicate the thin, pocketless pajamas I’m wearing.

  “Does he usually have your phone?” he demands, his cogs clearly turning.

  “No,” I say, touching my sister’s name and placing the phone to my ear, shooting Rafe a faint smile. “I’ve been getting your texts, don’t worry.”

  Now Sin appears to feel a little better. I stifle the urge to wink at him since Rafe is looking right at me, but come on, Sin; give me a little credit.

  “Where the hell are you?”

  I shrink a little at the harsh demand on the other line from my loving sister. “Hey! I’m so sorry I’ve missed a few of your calls.”

  “A few?” Carly demands. “A few? I thought you were dead!”

  “How could I be dead? I’ve been texting you.”

  “You texted me a dolphin emoji. What the hell is that?”

  I bite back my amusement, remembering when Sin sent her that text. “Hey, dolphins are adorable.”

  Now Sin cracks a smile, too.

  Now I can’t resist winking at him.

  “Anyway,” I say into the phone. “I only have a minute to talk, but I just wanted to touch base with you so you didn’t worry. Let you know I’m totally fine, safe and sound, not murdered and dumped into a ditch or any large body of water.”

  “I have been worrying my head off,” Carly tells me. “Where are you?”

  “I told you, I’m in Chicago for a few days.”

  “Yes, you did tell me that, but when you stopped answering your phone, I called your roommate, and guess what?”

  Grimacing, I go through my list of friends, wondering which ones she has phone numbers for. “I’m not staying there. I’m… staying in… the…” I flounder, not accustomed to lying to my sister. I had a lie all picked out and rehearsed, but I didn’t prepare for bumps in the story. “With Winn—efer.”

  Carly’s tone is dead. “Winnefer?”

  I grimace harder. “Yes, Winnefer. She’s a… she’s Scottish.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind, the point is, I am fine and in Chicago, and I just wanted to let you know. I am going to be staying for a few more days than I originally planned though, so I didn’t want you to freak out if I’m not home when I said I would be.”

  “Laurel, what is going on?” she asks, seriously.

  Winnefer was a terrible name. Why couldn’t I commit to something more normal than that before it tumbled out of my mouth? Sighing, I tell her, “Okay, promise you won’t freak out.”

  The amusement on Sin’s features as he watched me attempt lying melts and he stares at me like he doesn’t trust me again. This man is just a basket full of trust issues, I swear.

  “I won’t freak out,” Carly assures me, her tone purposely calm. “Whatever is going on, you can talk to me.”

  A pang of guilt hits me, because I do have something serious going on, I’m not talking to her about it, and I definitely should be. This is not the time for that, though, so I shove it down and get back to what I was just about to tell her. It’s not even a lie, exactly—just a compromised truth.

  “I kind of met a guy,” I tell her.

  “A guy. In Chicago?”

  “Mm hmm, and that’s why I want to spend a few more days here. We’re having a nice time and I’m not going to be ready to leave in two days. We’re actually at dinner right now, so I only have a minute to talk. There was a line at the bathroom but it’s almost my turn. I figured, hey, two birds, one stone. Anyway, yeah, so… that’s what’s going on. Just enjoying my little love nest for a few more days before I come home.”

  The line is quiet for a moment and my stomach turns over. Lying to Carly has always felt like what I assume lying to your mom feels like—an agonizing, gnawing ache right in my gut. When she speaks, relief floods me because she sounds convinced. “Well, I need details. What’s this guy’s name? How did you meet? This one isn’t a Morelli, right?” she half-jokes.

  Brightening, I say, “No, this one is not a Morelli.”

  I give Sin a thumbs up, but he just rolls his eyes at me.

  Whatever, it’s a point in his favor. Sorta. I guess Carly probably wouldn’t think so, since he does still work for them. He also advocates killing Vince to keep things tidy. Aw man, Carly wouldn’t approve of Sin, would she?

  No point thinking about that. I’ll leave here in a few days and return to my staid life—the one where I never engage in sexual activity with murderers. Where I’ll get past the unintended burden of having a gangster’s baby and go on to marry a nice, normal biophysicist, and our biggest point of contention will be arguing about whose research is more important.

  Why does that sound so boring now? Why do Sin’s busted knuckles feel like something I’ll miss? Before Sin, I only had Rafe to compare men to—and they already fell short. Now I’m going to look at the smooth, unmarked hands of every date I have and be like, “You clearly haven’t beaten anyone to a bloody pulp lately; check, please!”

  Carly interrupts my thoughts of future disappointments, asking, “Wait, you’re at dinner?”

  “Yes,” I answer, frowning slightly.

  “Kinda early for dinner. What’s this guy do?”

  I pull the phone away from my ear and check the time. It’s 5:18 here, but that means it’s only 3:18 in Chicago. I forgot about the time zone difference. Placing the phone to my ear, I say, “Late lunch, early dinner. Linner, if you will.”

  She presses on. “Does he go to school with you? What’s his name?”

  Before I blurt out another ridiculous name, I figure I should probably wrap up this phone call. “Okay, Mom, a stall just op
ened up so I have to go. When I get home I’ll give you all the deets. We’ll drag Vince out for milkshakes and make him listen. You know how much he loves our girl talk.”

  Cackling wickedly, she says, “Yes, it’s a date. Text me your flight info and I’ll pick you up. I hate that you left a note and snuck away. I would’ve given you a ride to the airport.”

  “It was impulsive,” I tell her. “Anyway, I’ll see you in a few days. I love you.”

  “Love you too, babe.”

  “Tell Vince I said I miss him too, then tell him I said to stop rolling his eyes.”

  “Hurry up and get your butt back here. Summer is supposed to be mine, not some mystery guy’s.”

  “I’ll be back soon, I promise. Bye, Carly.”

  When I hang up the phone, I’m hit with a wave of homesickness. They’re the only family I have, and I do miss them. During the school year I’ve grown used to living on my own in the city ever since Carly moved to Connecticut for God knows what reason. But I always go home for breaks and spend them with her and Vince—or, in the case of Easter, with Vince’s family in Chicago, where I met Rafe.

  He drifts over in my direction, hands shoved into his pockets and regards me. “Chicago, huh?”

  “Couldn’t tell her I was coming to Vegas, now, could I? My sister has a fully functioning brain, so she would have stopped me.”

  He cracks a smile. “You have a fully functioning brain, too.”

  “If I did, I would be at home,” I inform him, handing my phone back to Sin. “I would have a belly full of Oreo milkshake and cheese fries instead of an embryo, and the only Morelli in my life would be the harmless one.”

  Rafe looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “Vince? The harmless one? Oh, kitten, you don’t know anything about him, do you?”

  Maybe I don’t, and maybe I don’t want to. Now I just feel sad. I want to go home. Oh, God, why do I want to cry? I’m not going to cry. That would be horrible. I don’t even really know why, but I feel like I’m drowning in a pool of sadness and I can hardly breathe.

  Before I make a fool of myself, I turn and abandon them in the kitchen, running upstairs to the bathroom and shutting myself inside.

  Now I let the tears fall, even though I have no idea why I’m crying. Yes, I’m homesick, but why do I feel so heartbroken about it? And why out of literally nowhere? I guess it was the first time I’ve heard Carly’s voice in a few days, but this seems like an overreaction.

  23

  Rafe

  Laurel is openly disappointed when she opens the bathroom door and I’m the man standing on the other side of it. Her eyes are red-rimmed and her nose is flushed. A tissue is balled up in her hand and now the light in her eyes dies because I’m not Sin.

  Ouch.

  I guess I deserved that.

  Leaning against the doorframe as if unaffected, I ask, “Mind if I come in?”

  Too polite to tell me no, Laurel shakes her head and takes a step back.

  It’s a small bathroom—maybe normal by some standards, but compared to even the smallest bathroom in my house, this is a pantry. Hell, my pantry is larger than this bathroom.

  I shut the door behind me and take a step forward. Laurel is close already because it’s so crammed in here, but I’m not one to pussyfoot around. Rather than wait for an invitation that won’t come from a woman I’ve let slip away from me, I reach out and wrap an arm around her shoulders, pulling her into the sanctuary of my chest. I hear her sigh, then feel her relief as she settles into my embrace. Her relief feeds mine. Perhaps she hasn’t recovered her trust in me, perhaps mine isn’t the face she wanted to see when she opened the door, but now she moves into my arms like I’m someone she likes. Like she did those days in Chicago when she followed her instincts instead of common sense and decided she could trust me.

  It’s my fault Laurel trusted me. I gave her every encouragement to do so, and it seemed harmless at the time. It was only a fling, after all. I could reside in her memory as a good experience, she would be the same for me, and safely tucked away from one another for the rest of all time, it could be true. I could have simply been the handsome stranger she spent a wonderful weekend with.

  If only the goddamn condom hadn’t failed us.

  Now she gets the reality of me. Usually women I’m only casually involved with get the fun experience, the charming Rafe, not the one my girlfriends have to deal with. There’s a reason I don’t have girlfriends all that often; I’m much more appealing as a hook-up, and I know that about myself.

  Laurel didn’t. Laurel believed in the fantasy I showed her, and now even though she has seen it blown all to shit, she is letting me hold her. That gives me hope. Perhaps Sin doesn’t have his hooks sunk all the way into her yet. Hell, if showing her the truth worked to dull my shine, I could easily do the same thing to her vision of him. I have no idea what Laurel actually knows about Sin, but I know it can’t be the whole truth or she wouldn’t look at him the way she does.

  Now’s not the time for that, though. For whatever reason, she’s sniffling into my dress shirt. I didn’t understand why she got so upset all of a sudden, but when she rushed off looking like she was about to burst into tears, I looked at Sin for an explanation.

  “Hormones,” he said, simply.

  Now I rub Laurel’s back, knowing this is probably my fault, too. If she really hasn’t had sex with anyone else, then I have to be the one responsible for impregnating her. I still don’t know how, and I’m never going to trust another condom again as long as I live, but it’s starting to seem like this is real.

  “Tell me what’s wrong,” I murmur.

  “Everything,” she says, rather dramatically.

  “Let’s narrow it down. What are the top three things that are wrong right now? I have an entire criminal empire at my disposal, you have that giant Price brain in your pretty head; surely together we can fix three things, can’t we?”

  Another sniffle. Then she mutters, “I’m pregnant. You’re the father. You sure you want a third thing? I can keep going into double digits if you want me to.”

  I smile faintly, even though she’s emotional and annoyed at me. She can’t see my face while she’s tucked into my chest, so I’m safe. “Do you not want to be pregnant?” I ask her.

  She doesn’t answer me. I don’t know whether she’s afraid to admit how she feels, or afraid of my response, so I go on.

  “If you don’t, I understand. You’re only 19 and this isn’t your home. But if you do, that’s fine, too. It’s perfectly understandable if you want to make the best of a bad situation. I know you didn’t get pregnant on purpose. There’s no way you could have. I’m the one who provided the condoms, not you.”

  After a moment, her tone still low, she asks, “Why did you have to be so mean? This is the Rafe I thought I was coming to see.”

  I run a slow hand up and down her back in a gentle, reassuring motion. “No one can be at their best all the time, kitten. Surely you know that.”

  Now she bends her head up to look at me. “I didn’t expect you at your best all the time, I just expected ‘not cruel.’ I don’t think that’s an excessively high expectation to have.”

  I brush her hair back behind her ear, running a hand along her jawline. “No, you’re right; it wasn’t a lot to expect. I’m the one who reacted like a scared 19-year-old and you were the one who behaved like an adult.”

  Laurel nods. “Next thing you know, I’ll start running your mafia. I’ll probably be better at that, too.”

  She startles a little laugh out of me. “Maybe. You want to be queen for a day? I’ll let you call all the shots.”

  “Psh, for a day,” she murmurs good-naturedly. “I’m gonna run this city.”

  “Mm hmm. As long as you never have to lie,” I state, recalling her horrendous attempt at lying to her sister on the phone.

  “I need time to prepare before lying. I can’t pull it off on the fly like that.”

  “Yes, if I didn’t pick that up by
the time you name-dropped your friend Wennifer, it hit home then.”

  “I think it was Winnefer,” she tells me.

  “Oh, my mistake. I fucked up the name of your made-up friend. Will she ever forgive me?”

  Laurel’s eyebrows rise. “I don’t know, she holds her grudges pretty hard, that Winnefer.”

  I shake my head in mock disappointment. “Typical Scot. You gotta stick with the Italians.”

  “Oh yeah, because you’re a calm, forgiving bunch,” she says dryly.

  “Hey, I’m calm,” I tell her, with exaggerated bluster.

  Laurel chuckles at me and I can’t help grinning back at her. This is the first moment since everything went to shit that I’ve felt a little bit of Easter coming back, and now I’m remembering why I liked her. Now I’m remembering those nights after I fucked her tight little cunt until we were both exhausted, when she would curl up in my arms and talk to me about nothing until one of us fell asleep.

  I regret being such an asshole the other night, but I can’t undo it, I can only try to fix it. Maybe her problems are too big to fix tonight, but a couple of my problems can be remedied right away.

  “Come home with me tonight,” I say.

  The amusement drains right out of her face, solemnity returning. “Come home with you?”

  I nod, bringing one of her hands to my lips and kissing her knuckles. “You should be staying with me, not Sin.”

  I expected some level of discomfort to flit across her face when I said his name—perhaps a shade of shame or guilt. Laurel is inexperienced to begin with, so sex is a bigger deal to her than it is to me. I don’t like that he’s been with her, not if she’s someone I want to keep, but in this instance, I can acknowledge that it’s entirely my fault. I kicked her out of my house—out of my city, in fact—and drove her right into his arms.

  Those are not the feelings that flit across her face, though. There’s conflict. Reluctance. I just offered her the same deal she happily accepted the other night in a nice moment between us, and instead of readily agreeing, she takes a step away from me.

  “I don’t know,” she says.