Craving The Demon: A Standalone Enemies To Lovers Mafia Romance

by Rebel Hart

  “It’s not that bad, right? They were our enemies,” I hummed.

  My dad just shrugged and continued into his sunken office past the front foyer and I looked up the stairs. “Uh, mom? Should I bring Baylor?”

  Baylor sneered at me. “Hey! Don’t pull me into your—”

  “Yes!” she barked back.

  I smiled over at Baylor, who looked like he wanted to murder me. Still, I slapped a hand on his shoulder before heading up the stairs, Baylor trudging behind me.

  My mom, Gina, was the very picture of a vixen. She was tall and slender, with a severe jawline and piercing green eyes that she’d given to Baylor. She had short auburn hair that was shaved on one side and flowed down the other side in loose waves. The curves she’d been blessed with had led both Baylor and I to kick several men’s asses between Colorado and Nevada, and she almost never wore anything that couldn’t be considered formal, even when she was just around the house.

  The red dress she was wearing today seemed to punctuate her rage as we reached the top of the stairs and walked into the living room where she was pacing back and forth. She was the matriarch of our family, the boss. Everyone and everything around her bowed to her will, and she knew it.

  “What the hell are you two doing?” she started immediately. She walked over to one of the plain walls between the ceiling to floor windows and pressed a seemingly random spot, and an L.E.D. screen came to life. There was already a video ready to be played, showing Baylor and me fighting our way out of the bar with the Pucketts. “We’re supposed to be keeping the police out of our lives, not inviting them over for afternoon tea.”

  “He started up with me,” I defended quickly.

  Baylor stepped forward immediately. “It’s true. We were just minding our own business when Justice Puckett walked in and wanted to fight off the bat.”

  My mother pinched the bridge of her nose between her fingers. “You baby him, Baylor, and you’re the younger one.”

  “Really, mom. You know I don’t settle for his shit, but he didn’t start this, the Pucketts did.”

  She looked at Baylor for a few moments before turning her attention to me. “Stay away from them. Not just Justice, all of them.” Baylor and I exchanged a nervous glance that my mother was too keen to miss. “What? What happened?”

  “We don’t really have to worry about running into Justice Puckett anymore,” I said. “He and three of his friends are decomposing in the desert.”

  With a long, disdainful sigh blowing down her nose, my mom’s head fell back. “You killed them?”

  “They chased us!” I said. “They wouldn’t let up! We tried to ditch them in the desert, but they stayed on our asses. We had no choice!”

  “Please tell me you weren’t seen?” she asked. Once again, Baylor and I looked at each other, and my mom snapped. She stepped up to us with her red heels clicking against the hardwood floor and smacked a hand across the tops of both of our heads. “Honestly! It’s like you’re still teenagers! I’ve finally got this city eating out of the palm of my hand, and I won’t have you two ruining it! Did you clean up the bodies?”

  “We didn’t have time. We had to get the hell out of there before the woman who saw us figured out who we were.” Baylor fished into his pocket and pulled out the ID he’d stolen and handed it over to our mother. “We threatened her. She seemed harmless, but you know…?”

  Snatching the ID from Baylor, my mom stabbed it against his nose. “You deal with the police. I don’t need them snooping around here when I’m on the verge of closing the deal with MasCat, do you understand me?”

  “Yes ma’am,” Baylor said. He lingered there for a minute until her eyes widened, then he skittered away without another word.

  Then she turned to me.

  “What am I going to do with you? You cause problems everywhere we go.” I opened my mouth to argue, but she held her hand up. “Don’t! Don’t argue with me right now. Your brother has made incredible headway in the casinos and your father’s inroads with the government here is priceless. We’re going to grow our empire, and I need to know if you are going to be the thing that messes all of that up? I have no problem making you a security guard and sticking you in a corner.”

  Frustration boiled through my blood. That was how things had been lately. Baylor was younger than me, but for reasons I couldn’t entirely blame her for, my mother took him more seriously. “Maybe if I had something to do, I’d stop causing so many problems.”

  She lifted an eyebrow. “Do you think that’s it?”

  “I do!” I crossed my arms. “I spent years mastering my craft, but I don’t get to use it anymore. Give me something to do and let me prove that I can be useful. I…” I looked down at the floor. “I want to earn your forgiveness.”

  “Fine,” she said, turning around and sitting down on one of the couches. “I actually do have something I need your help with.”

  I stood up a little straighter. “Really?”

  “Yes. I was planning on telling you over dinner tonight. I didn’t want to have to lecture you first.” She picked up a folder from the glass coffee table in front of her and held it out towards me. “This one is going to require finesse.”

  I walked over and grabbed the folder before sitting down on the couch opposite the one she was on. When I noticed the label on the folder, my heart dropped into my stomach. “You want my help with MasCat?”

  She locked eyes with me. “I’ve got every member of the board ready to pull the trigger, including the CEO, except for one woman.” She nodded at the folder and I opened it, revealing a picture of an incredibly beautiful, red-haired, lavender-eyed woman. She looked a little young to be on the board of directors for a tech company, but stranger things had happened. “I need all of the information you can get me on that woman.”

  “What’s her name?” I asked, flipping over the picture, looking for any information, but there was none.

  “That’s just the thing,” my mother responded. “I don’t know it.”

  2

  Mari

  The sound of ocean waves lapping against the shore always calmed me down. Children playing in the distance, the call of seagulls flapping overhead, the wind whipping through, creating just enough breeze to keep the skin cool, but not so much that it ruined the day. It was utopia for me. If I had my way, I would always be on some beach on my back, cast across a towel, letting the sun turn my cream skin a nice bronze color. It always brought out the golden flecks in my green eyes, at least that’s what my dad always said.

  With my eyes closed, I took deep, even breaths in and then out, trying to push away any stress that would be lingering on the edge of my brain. I so rarely got any time to myself to just lay and relax, and the sun in the sky seemed like it came out just to make my day a little brighter.

  Who was I to waste its kindness?

  Without me even having to call in an order, a handsome, very well-cut waiter came walking up to me with a tray of colorful drinks. There were tall flutes with slushie drinks in them and short, wide coconut cups with umbrellas sticking out of the top.

  I slid my sunglasses up to my forehead. “Are these all for me?”

  “Miss Westun,” he said.

  “Yes?” I furrowed my brow. “You’re standing right in front of me. You don’t really have to call my name anymore.”

  He knocked on the edge of the tray a few times. “Miss Westun?”

  I sat up in my lounge chair. “Yes? What? Are these drinks for me?”

  Once again, he knocked against the edge of the tray, this time about six or seven raps. “Miss Westun?”

  I was starting to get annoyed. “What the hell are you—”

  “Miss Westun?” My eyes slowly peeled open, taking a moment to adjust to the darkness in the room. “Miss Westun?”

  A groan left my lips. The sounds of the beach were still wafting quietly from my white noise machine and I curled my mouth downward at it. I wasn’t on a beach soaking in the sun.


  “What?” I called out.

  “Your parents have requested your presence for dinner.” It was likely Judah, one of my family’s many butlers, but this one in particular was really old, so he was the only one my father and brothers allowed near me. “At six o’clock sharp.”

  “Thank you!” I called out, and then I heard his footsteps retreating down the hallway.

  I brought my hands up to my face and tried to rub away the sleep. My computer was still open and the document I had been working on was still open with the cursor blinking as if to remind me of how little work I’d done. Slowly, but surely, it all came back to me. I’d been tasked with putting together a retirement proposal for one of my many boards. Here I was, supposedly the heiress to one of Las Vegas’ most notorious organized crime families, and yet somehow the most exciting thing I did with my day was pop on a white noise machine and dream of a day on the beach.

  Something wasn’t adding up.

  “Mari!” A handful of loud pounds against my door made me jump and knocked me right out of the little bit of zen I had managed to establish. “Can I come in?”

  I sneered at the closed door. “Do I have a choice?”

  Rather than answering, the door opened, and the older of my two younger brothers, TJ, walked into the room. Unlike my blond hair, he’d inherited my mother’s chocolate hair, which he always kept cut short and had swept to the side. His green eyes were a reflection of my own, however, and they were currently wide with excitement.

  “Did you see the news?” he asked, bounding into my room.

  “No. What news?”

  He skipped past my bed and into the seating area of my bedroom, where he quickly lifted the remote off the coffee table and turned on the television to the news.

  “Though detectives currently believe the altercation may be a disagreement amongst the victims,” a news reporter said, mid-story, “new evidence has come to light on social media of a bar fight that happened not long before the deceased were discovered.”

  “What is this?” I asked.

  “Shh, just watch.”

  The scene of the news reporter in the station switched to a video that had been posted to social media, and I scowled at the first face I saw.

  Bryce Misterro.

  He and his brother Baylor were tumbling around with a small group of people, all while the bar’s staff were screaming at them to get out and threatening to call the police.

  “Why do I care about this?” I asked. Bryce Misterro, though I’d never met the man, was still one of my least favorite people on the planet. How nice it must be to run around doing whatever you want without considering the consequences.

  “See…” TJ walked over to the television and pointed at one of the blurry bodies, “that guy?”

  “Yeah?”

  “That’s Justice Puckett.” He laughed. “I thought you of all people would recognize him. Is it because he’s dressed?” I leapt out of bed, just barely managing to spare my laptop before it tumbled to the ground, and rushed over to TJ. I socked the shit out of his arm, making him whimper out, “Ow!” and snatched the remote from him.

  “They got into a fight?” I asked, rewinding the playback so I could study it a bit closer.

  “Yeah,” TJ grumbled as he rubbed his arm, “and then—”

  “You two. Come on.” Both TJ and I looked towards the doorway of my bedroom, and my youngest brother, Marcos, was standing there. “Mom and Dad are waiting.”

  “Then what?” I asked.

  “Coming!” TJ yelled and started for the doorway.

  “Wait. Then what?” I called out but was totally ignored.

  Irritated, I had no choice but to follow my brothers out of the room and make my way down to the dining hall. It was a massive, overly pretentious room in our family’s manor where my parents loved to host dinner parties and make us eat meals as a family. My father always sat at the head of the table like some sort of supreme overlord, with my mom to his immediate right, me next to her, and then my brother TJ to his left, and Marcos next to him. The table was always decorated with full flatware and silverware and each place setting was adorned with one glass of wine and one of water as if we were at a five-star restaurant.

  Which, of course, we weren’t.

  My brothers took their seats, and I quickly fluttered into the room and took my own, leaning across the table towards them. “Okay. Then what happened after the fight?”

  My father cleared his throat from the head of the table, and I took a deep breath to calm my rage before leaning back in my seat. Silence fell over the room as the wait staff brought in plates under cloches and set them in front of each of us. At the exact same time, each of them set their hands on top of the cloches and removed them in unison, all then skittering away, apart from the chef. He remained lingering in the back corner behind my father, sweat pouring down his face and his hands trying to shake in spite of the way he was wringing them in front of himself.

  “What have we tonight?” my dad asked.

  With a notable quiver to his voice, the chef spoke. “Tonight we have a seared steak with a bacon jelly sauce, and sliced baked potatoes topped with cheese, sour cream, and green onions. You’ve also got roasted broccolini. It’s all been paired with a spicy zinfandel.”

  Me, my mom, and my brothers all sat in silence as my dad tried each piece of his food. He took about thirty second per item to really taste them, and then he took a gulp of his wine and mulled it over for about sixty seconds. The chef shifted back and forth nervously as we all waited on pins and needles. Finally, though, my father nodded and smiled.

  “Delightful.” He looked back at the chef. “You may go.”

  The chef let out a sigh of relief as he nodded. “Thank you, sir. Of course, sir.”

  He rushed out of the dining room and I just chuckled and shook my head. “Not gonna kill this one, daddy?”

  Antonio Westun was a prickly man with impossible to please tastes. He’d been through about twelve chefs in the last six months, killing each one who didn’t meet his needs. His justification for it was that anyone who had been in our home had seen too much. If they got fired, they could become jaded and rat us out to the police or one of our enemies, so killing them was much easier. Unfortunately for them, the position offered a six-figure salary, so most chefs came in elated to give the job a shot… until they arrived and heard from other staff what had happened to their predecessors.

  “No. I am actually quite pleased with this meal. If he continues to produce meals like this, then we shouldn’t have any problem,” my father confirmed. “Dig in, everyone. I don’t want it going to waste.”

  After receiving the official go-ahead, my brothers, mother, and I all tucked into our meal. As most of our meals went, we ate in total silence, not ever having been people who were particularly good at relating to one another. I, however, was still chomping at the bit to hear the rest of the story about Justice and Bryce, and was actively trying to gauge how long we had to sit in the quiet before I could bring it up.

  Rather than trying to get TJ to continue the story from where he’d left off, I thought it was better to present it like I was sharing. “The Misterros and the Pucketts had a bit of a run in, I hear,” I said quietly.

  My father nodded. “Quite the run in. I’ve sent out a few feelers for more information, and it sounds like the Pucketts are reeling.”

  I lifted an eyebrow. “Reeling? From a fight?”

  The questioning in my voice made my father look up from his plate and directly at me. “Are you joking?”

  I shifted a gaze to TJ briefly and then back to my father. “Was it more than just a fight?”

  Marcos frowned across the table at me. “Bryce and Baylor Misterro killed Justice and three of his men.”

  The information made my chest compress and relax several times in an instant. “Wait… Justice is dead?”

  “They found him and the three he had with him mangled in the desert,” Marcos continued explaining. “
Of course, no one actually saw Bryce and Baylor do it, but they didn’t drive themselves out there and start shooting one another.”

  “That’s the police’s theory,” TJ said. “Detective What’s-Her-Face has already released a public statement denouncing this kind of behavior. That this is the only good that can come from organized crime. Eventually someone will want more power and it will create conflicts that lead to death.” He snorted as he forked some of his potatoes and ushered them to his mouth. “Anything for her to get the best scoop, huh?”

  Food was flying all over the place from how messily TJ was eating, and I glanced at my father, waiting for the reprimand I would definitely get if it were me, but he was swirling his wine around in his glass and gazing off into space as if he didn’t even see it.

  “You’re just pissed off that she won’t give you the time of day,” Marcos said. “Did the last time mark the third time she turned you down, or the fourth?”

  “It’s not like I actually want the bitch,” TJ hissed. “But that in-road would be nice.”

  “I’m working on in-roads at the police department. You don’t worry about that.” My mother glared briefly at TJ before looking down at her plate again as she said, “If you tip her off, she’s going to start looking into the seeds I’ve planted, and it’ll ruin everything. Stick to what you know.”

  TJ’s jaw dropped, because Marcos was right, he did have a crush on the detective. “But—”

  “Your mother is right,” my dad cut in. “You had an opportunity to work your way in, but you failed. You have plenty of product to move. Worry about that.” Though he did so with a huff, TJ returned to his meal and didn’t argue any further. He didn’t dare to. Not with my father. “Speaking of which, Marcos, how is your supply?”

  My family operated on the explicit and exclusive sales of unique drugs and guns that people couldn’t get anywhere else. In a city where people come to experience the rare and unusual, my father built an empire on unknown drugs and high-artillery weapons, like the kind someone would only use in the military otherwise. When I was born, my father decided that I was better suited to espionage rather than moving any of his products.