Bene (The Guzzi Legacy Book 5)

by Bethany-Kris

  Vanna blinked, tears slipping from the corners of her eyes as she swallowed hard. She spoke as though she knew exactly what was running through his mind when his gaze fell to her lips, and then darted back up to her eyes. “Just do it, Bene. Will it make you feel better to use me because that’s what I wanted to do to you? Don’t pussy out now—you put the knife in, I’m letting you twist it. That’s what you want? Then, just fucking do it.”

  He lurched forward—those pesky emotions again—to get his mouth on hers. Their lips crashed together as he slammed her back against the counter. Those fingernails of hers, always manicured to perfect points, scored against his throat as she took his kiss just as rough as he wanted to give it to her.

  All teeth, and tongue clashing.

  Ruining her lipstick, probably.

  Her taste in his mouth.

  God.

  Her back hit the sink counter hard, but she barely reacted to it at all. He only kept her pinned against the counter just long enough to drag her skirt up over her thighs and bunched around her waist. He lifted her to the granite counter, and her legs widened while her ankles hooked at his hips. Her hands did the rest of the work to undo his pants before dragging them down around his hips with his boxer-briefs to let his cock spring free to her waiting palms.

  Tight strokes of her hands made his already hard cock feel like pulsing steel. Her words a breathless plea when she mumbled against his kiss, “Fuck me … please, just fuck me one more time, Bene.”

  Not that he was in any position to deny her, but all he needed was to hear his name on her mouth to cement that decision. But unlike all the other times the two of them had fucked—all the moments he took to enjoy himself with her, to feast on her and take her so high again and again, he wouldn’t do that this time. Wouldn’t give her all of that again when it would only kill him that he couldn’t allow himself to keep loving this woman.

  But he could fuck her, sure.

  Like he hated her, and the very ground she dared to walk on.

  It would be a lie.

  A terrible, fragile lie.

  Still, he could do it.

  “Show me that pussy,” he demanded. “And I’ll fuck you the way you want.”

  Vanna dragged in a lungful of air as he drifted away from her lips, and without question, she let go of his cock to get her hands between her thighs. She showed no hesitation about pulling her nude panties to the side, the slit of her pussy a soft, wet pink already.

  “Your turn,” she urged.

  The thing Bene loved to do the most when he fucked this woman?

  Kiss her while he filled her full.

  All those sounds she made.

  How she tasted.

  It was electrifying.

  He didn’t do that this time. He kept his hands on her thighs, forcing them wide as she tipped her head back to the mirror and let him stuff her pussy full of his cock. She didn’t try to take more than what he gave her while he pounded into her, their words gone as they chased one last high.

  It was so familiar.

  Everything he wanted and needed from this woman.

  All the things that no longer felt like his.

  She shattered in his hold, her orgasm drowning him under a current of anger and lust all at the same time. Another three pumps of his hips, and he followed right after her, emptying himself deep as he held her tight to his cock.

  Vanna whispered an apology again.

  And a soft, I’d give anything to change this.

  Yeah, him, too.

  He was still as empty as ever when he left her spread open and leaking his semen on the counter when he exited the bathroom a minute later wishing so many things himself.

  Too many things.

  Impossible things.

  Bene was still trying to shove the image of Vanna’s heartbroken face out of his mind as he reclaimed his spot in the dining room. No one seemed to notice him coming back, and the meeting at the table continued as though nothing was out of the ordinary.

  They were only here to make a statement, anyway. They wouldn’t cause a problem as long as the Dettis didn’t react to their presence with violence. Seemed simple enough, didn’t it? That’s how Marcus intended it to be when he demanded they do this.

  Bene went along with the plan because …

  Well, Vanna.

  That, and because when he heard she was engaged to the Detti boss’s son, he—and probably the rest of his brothers and the men in la famiglia—assumed this whole thing had been one big plan on the Camorra’s part. Put a woman in front one of them, see how close she would get, and go from there to adjust their plans accordingly.

  Except in that bathroom, Bene learned that was likely not the case at all. This had been something Vanna did alone. After all, her desire to hurt them came from her own broken history. The Detti Camorra hadn’t fucked with the Guzzi family in decades; they didn’t have a reason to. So, that simply meant whatever the Dettis planned for the Guzzis came after Vanna was already involved. He found himself wondering why, and what might have changed for that to be the case.

  And goddammit.

  That just pissed him off more.

  That he wondered at all.

  The only thing he needed to worry about now was ruining that woman, and everything about her. Anyone fucking near her.

  But her sad face drifted through his mind.

  Those tears.

  It felt like a betrayal to his family that he felt anything at all for her now, even if it was something like sympathy. It meant he had a heart—that he cared. It said he was a decent guy, but fuck … he didn’t want to be a decent guy right now.

  She fucked him over.

  Lied to me.

  And she was engaged!

  Bene didn’t have so much pride that he couldn’t admit her engagement was the thing that bothered him the very most. It wasn’t what made him want to commit violence—no, that was reserved for the fact he watched his mother cry one too many times since his father had been arrested because Gian still hadn’t been able to come home.

  In his own heart, though?

  The engagement hurt like a bitch.

  While Bene had the chance, and he was sure the meeting would go off just fine without him standing in the corner, considering the number of men they brought along for their side of things, he slipped out of a side exit door. The alleyway beside the restaurant gave him a moment to breathe alone, and try to piece together the rest of the shit that still felt entirely unknown to him in this whole mess.

  And what a mess it was.

  All because of her.

  Bene fully intended to go back inside and rejoin the rest of his people to finish out this fucking shitshow once he had gathered his thoughts, but he didn’t get the chance before someone else exited the door, and joined him in the alley.

  He eyed the man.

  Sized him up.

  The guy did the same to him.

  They were pretty even in height—towering over six feet, but he had an inch on the other man. Not much, though. Mario, to his benefit, looked like he regularly played on a defense line for a football team, and while Bene had a boxer’s form from all his training with his twin, the man across from him still had a bit of size to his benefit.

  Not that it mattered.

  The bigger they were, the harder they fell when he broke their face.

  “Mario Detti, right?” Bene asked.

  Mario didn’t confirm.

  He didn’t really need to.

  “Let me make one thing very fucking clear to you, Bene Guzzi.”

  Bene tipped his chin up, considering his choices here. He didn’t like the man’s attitude, or the way he looked at him as though he were scum under his shoe. He hated the fact that Vanna wore a ring on her finger that came from this man. Part of him wanted to make sure Mario knew those things, but also had the greatest urge to rip the man’s pride and dignity from him as he did it.

  Broken hearts were the worst.

  “
And what is that?” Bene asked.

  “You stay the fuck away from my woman.”

  He took a second.

  Absorbed that warning.

  “If she’s yours,” Bene said, “then why was she fucking me?”

  “I—”

  “And why would you need to tell me that at all?”

  The man’s face reddened. “She might have fallen in love with you, but she’s in my bed now. Remember that, Guzzi.”

  … huh.

  That was a strange way to phrase something like that.

  Bene wondered … “But is she actually doing anything worth while in your bed?”

  Mario blanched.

  That answered Bene’s question even if the man did try to come back with, “But she isn’t in yours, is she?”

  Oh, so they were being really petty now, huh?

  “Is that because she wants to be in your bed, or because you forced her there?”

  “You heard what I fucking said. Stay away from her.”

  Right.

  He’d remember it, too.

  Not for the reasons Mario thought, however.

  “Corrado, is Ginevra—”

  “She took the baby over to see Ma.”

  “Good,” Marcus murmured, his voice drifting over the mostly quiet office space in his mid-city penthouse, “she loves Caroline. At least, the baby will make her smile.”

  “She’s not doing any better, then?”

  The question from Beni had Bene flinching, although the rest of his brothers couldn’t see it what with his back turned to the window. Here, he could let his mind run wild, and not have to worry about one of his siblings seeing the emotion on his face. It was hard enough listening to them try to make plans to take care of their ma while also attempting to figure out something for their father.

  A mafia boss in jail was a dangerous thing.

  For la famiglia.

  For their father.

  For them.

  A Don behind bars, even if it was on trumped up charges while the police tried to gather the information they needed to make a better case on the wire fraud and money laundering, put him in a vulnerable place. Open to attack, which meant they needed to make sure their father was protected in jail.

  As for their organization, with a boss away … men tended to become emboldened in the worst goddamn way. Like they thought this was their way to the top, as long as they could make it there before someone else did. They needed to keep an eye out for any of that shit happening while they handled everything else, too.

  And for them?

  Well, they just had to survive.

  “And we’re sure Papa’s protection is going to hold while he’s in that jail, or …?”

  Chris’s question hung in the air.

  Corrado passed his twin a look. “Les is making some calls—it all looks good, though.”

  “Yeah, okay.”

  “Bene,” Marcus said.

  He glanced over his shoulder. Behind the desk, his oldest brother looked far more like their father than he should have, except right then it also seemed like he had the weight of the world resting on his shoulders. Bene didn’t want to add to the pile of crap Marcus was dealing with, so for now, he just did whatever his brother told him.

  “Yeah?”

  “Make a trip to see Ma, yeah?”

  “Of course.”

  “Take Beni with you—how long are you going to stay, anyway?”

  Next to him, his twin shrugged. “As long as I need to. Tommas gave me the okay to be away from Chicago for however long this might take.”

  “Good to know. Back to these fucking Dettis.”

  Right.

  Bene went back to staring out the window. He had other shit on his mind. Going over every moment he ever shared with Vanna, their encounter at the restaurant, the shit she told him, and then after … with the Detti bastard.

  Something just wasn’t right.

  He felt it.

  In his bones.

  Something was wrong.

  Maybe it was still those tears that had been in her eyes when she stared at him, begging for him to listen and to let her apologize. Or maybe it had been Mario, and the way the man’s face drained of color when Bene asked if Vanna was actually fucking him when he tried to say she was in his bed now.

  “You okay?”

  Bene met his twin’s gaze. Behind them, the conversation between their other three brothers continued like they couldn’t hear the two of them. Given how low Beni asked the question, the rest probably didn’t hear their conversation.

  He nodded. “Yeah, sure.”

  “I know when you’re lying.”

  “You could leave it alone, too.”

  Beni lifted one shoulder. “I mean, I could … but that’s not really what I do, and definitely not where you’re concerned.”

  Not a lie.

  The bigger problem for Bene was that the things running through his mind wouldn’t spell out anything good to his brothers, or the rest of their family. The fact he felt anything at all for Vanna, or that a part of him wanted to keep digging until he figured out what was wrong here, would only cause a major issue with his brothers.

  She fucked them over.

  Messed with their life.

  Hurt their parents.

  That should have spelled the end.

  Completely done.

  And yet …

  “I don’t know if everything with this, and her, is as simple as it seems,” Bene murmured, “but if I said that to Marcus, or—”

  “Yeah, that won’t go over well. He’d kill her first, and not even bother to ask questions later.”

  Exactly.

  “It won’t get out of my head, though.”

  “Or is it her?”

  Bene let out a hard breath. “Both, maybe.”

  “Do you think she—”

  “Wanted to hurt us, yes. Got in over her head. But it’s something else, too … something more, Beni, and I don’t know how to let it go.”

  “Maybe,” his brother drawled lowly, “you don’t let it go.”

  The two of them stared at one another until Bene put his attention on his reflection in the window. “Then, Marcus would kill me.”

  “Only if he finds out you’re looking into shit, though.”

  Good point.

  “The red lace set certainly has an extra—”

  “White. It needs to be the white one.”

  The seamstress who had been called to Mario’s home to do a fitting for Vanna’s wedding dress and brought along a half a dozen sets of lingerie for her to pick through to wear under the gown, met her gaze in the mirror. It was as though she was waiting to hear Vanna’s opinion on the items she wanted to wear for her wedding day, but it wouldn’t work like that.

  “Why not pick something a little different for under the dress? Like a … surprise,” the seamstress suggested. “That’s what most women do.”

  “Vanna isn’t most women, and she will be my wife, and since I will be the only man who gets to see what she’s wearing under her dress, shouldn’t I get the choice of what I want to remove from her body the night of our wedding?”

  “Mario,” Vanna muttered.

  Not that her warning would do any good.

  It was clear the woman helping Vanna try on the items wasn’t comfortable. And to be fair, this wasn’t the first set of comments—lewd, or otherwise—that Mario made while she was having her fitting. Undoubtedly the most unprofessional fitting the seamstress ever had to do, and Vanna felt bad for her because of it, too.

  “What?” he demanded.

  “The dress is white, Mario.”

  “I know, I’ve seen it.”

  Of course.

  Because she couldn’t even pick her wedding dress alone. Mario had to be there to do that, as well. Lest she pick out something that might make him look bad in front of the parish, and priest because apparently she didn’t know how to act.

  All of it … entirely ridiculou
s.

  Vanna knew better than to cause an issue over it, though.

  “Although …” Mario said, tipping his head sideways, his reflection in the large mirror showing off the action from where he stood in the bedroom doorway. Even her fittings weren’t private, and since he kept such a strong hold of control over her now, it had to be done in his home because he didn’t trust her to do it outside of his view. “That red set does very nice things for your ass, Van.”

  The girl—Courtney, was her name—cleared her throat. Otherwise, she said nothing even as Vanna stared hard at Mario in the mirror, clearly unimpressed with his behavior, and not trying to hide it at all. Not that it mattered.

  She hadn’t been hiding anything, lately.

  She was unhappy.

  He would be, too.

  Vanna made him a promise, after all.

  “Pick the white,” Mario demanded.

  “Fine.”

  He chuckled, taking a few steps into the room to come and stand alongside the bed. Fingering the sexy lace items on the bed, Vanna felt her stomach start to twist and turn at the sight. The heavy realization that she would be wearing those things for him coming to rest on her chest like a weight that just refused to be moved.

  God.

  She could barely breathe.

  In a month—just thirty days from today—she would be married to Mario, and his to do with what he wanted. Including ripping all this lace from her body to use it as he wanted, and she wouldn’t get a say.

  For a while, she had done well to ignore it, but now as the wedding drew closer with every passing day, she could no longer pretend like this wasn’t happening. As if this wasn’t her reality, and her new life wasn’t waiting right around the corner.

  Mario picked up another item from the bed, holding it high and grinning salaciously at her from the end of the bed when he said, “White for the wedding night, but we’ll be taking the rest of these sets to enjoy, as well.”

  He hid nothing.

  Not his intentions.

  His disgustingness.

  Or anything else.

  Courtney gave Vanna a smile—awkward as it was—and picked up one of the garment bags from the bed. “I will let you try on the last one alone, so I can go grab the dress from the back of my car, and we’ll get on with the fitting. Okay?”