by Sam Crescent
“I had a quick word with her boss and after that, I went to her apartment. I wasn’t going to be long. You can leave now.”
“You’re not going to invite me to stay for dinner?”
“No.” He poured himself a large glass of water and stared at Daniel. “You can leave.”
“Wow, man, you’re a real fucking charmer.”
Daniel didn’t linger though.
They were colleagues as well as friends, so Daniel knew when it was best to stay or go. If they weren’t working together, they did hangout but Daniel was always chasing one pussy or another, and he wasn’t interested in that.
Finishing off his water, he picked up the bag of books, along with the laptop that she’d need as well. He’d already gotten it disconnected from the internet, and he made his way upstairs to where Arika lay.
One look at her pale face and the fear that flashed in her eyes and he knew exactly what the fuck was going on.
“He told you some stuff,” he said.
She held the blanket with a death grip as if that would save her.
“He told me a few things.”
“About me?”
“Yes.”
“I won’t hurt you.”
“But if your bosses give the order, you won’t have a choice, will you?”
“I’ll have a choice. I’m not owned by them, Arika.”
“They’re the mafia.”
“And I told you, the less you know the better.”
He saw tears in her eyes, and he hated it.
“He wouldn’t shut up. I didn’t even ask at first.”
“At first?”
“He got off on it. On me being afraid. I hated that. I didn’t want to be afraid of him or what he was doing, but I was. So, when he went to leave, I wouldn’t let him think that he had a way of scaring me. I asked him to tell me more.”
Vincenzo took a seat, watching her. “He told you what I’ve done.”
She nodded her head, the action jerky and scared.
“I’ve done a lot of bad things, Arika. In this line of work, you have to.”
“Torturing men and women?”
“I needed answers,” he said.
“But, what if they were innocent?”
“If they were innocent and there was proof they would be highly compensated.”
“That kind of torture couldn’t have been easy to live with after,” she said.
“Yes, but more money and power are always a deal-breaker, Arika. The world is full of bad people.”
“And you’re one of those people.”
“If I was to tell you that some of the men and women that I’ve killed had hurt children, the next generation of the mafia, what would you think?”
She went to speak, and he saw her pause. “In what way?”
“Forcing them to have sex with men or women they don’t like. Hitting them, abusing them, exploiting them. I’m not saying the mafia is perfect, but the family I work fo0r, they don’t believe in the exploitation of children, or in their torture.”
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” she said.
“Some of the people I’ve hurt and even killed deserved it, Arika. I’m not going to make excuses for what I’ve done. This is who I am.”
“It scares me.”
“Do I scare you?”
She nodded her head.
“I’ve not done anything to harm you. I’m going to keep on protecting you because you are an innocent in all of this. You were merely at the wrong place at the wrong time. I won’t hurt you. I will do everything to keep you safe.”
He watched as she pushed a strand of hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear. Holding up the bag he brought her, he smiled. “So I went through your apartment and found everything related to your course.” He held up the laptop. “There is no internet service here.”
“What about a deadline?”
“You’ll print it out, or give me one of those USB drives, and I’ll take it to your professor.” He paused as she watched her. She was biting her lip. “I want to make one thing clear, Arika. If for whatever reason the cops come calling or questions start getting asked about you, I’ll have no choice but to end your life, do you understand?”
He watched her swallow, the nerves clear on her face.
“I—”
He cut her off before she could say anything else. “I will do everything in my power to protect you. That means keeping you alive. I can only do that if you allow me to. Cops change things. It puts a hit on your head, and I will do it. Not only that, I will make it slow.”
“I don’t want to die.”
“Then let’s not send secret messages to your professor about where you are or what you’ve done. You want to stay alive and breathing so you can finish those plans.” He saw the surprise in her eyes. “I saw the board you had, the plans you’d written on it. What you hope to achieve for the future. I found it a rather inspiring plan. You wish to help others.”
Again, she nodded without saying a word.
“It’s good what you’re doing.”
She looked at him. He saw the doubt in her eyes.
“I’m not really going to get far as a waitress though. There’s so much I want to do with my life.”
“We’ll work together to help you achieve that.” He took her hand, and at the first touch, she flinched. He didn’t let her go though.
She stared at their hands, and after a second or two she gripped his firmly. It wasn’t much but it was a start, and for now it meant he could trust her.
“Is this even allowed?”
“What?” he asked.
“You and me, talking together. Isn’t the mafia supposed to be, like, an exclusive kind of thing?”
He smiled. Her question was so sweet.
“It’s not an exclusive club, Arika. There are always people close to it that have nothing to do with it.”
“Like?”
“Mistresses can be one.”
“How? They must be pretty close to it.”
“Some of the men take wives that are part of other families. They’re often not good matches, and usually result in a great deal of unhappiness. So the men do what they must, and when they find the right woman, they take her as a mistress. Rarely does the life touch hers. She’s there to provide entertainment. Some time away from their life.”
He saw her thinking.
“But it does touch them.”
He stared at her.
“You said rarely. That’s not never. So, a mistress position must still be pretty dangerous.”
“It is.”
“I don’t know how anyone could do that. Be part of a life. Especially with a married man.”
“For the most part, the guy isn’t really married. He must have heirs, obviously, but he wears a ring, that’s it.”
“I can’t even believe you’re telling me all this.”
He didn’t respond to that.
“What about the women?” she asked.
“The mistresses?”
“No, the wives. The women. Don’t they get to have a little fun on the side?”
“No.”
He saw her jerk back.
“Like that, just no?”
“It’s not allowed in our life.”
“Wow, talk about double standards.”
“The wives don’t need anything else. They’re being taken care of. They’ve got sons. There’s no need for anything else for them.”
Her mouth dropped open in a perfect O of shock. He found that utterly cute. “You don’t think she has a right to be with someone that … I don’t know, gets her hot and excited?”
Arika’s cheeks were on fire.
“They don’t need that.”
“You’re unbelievable. Women want that kind of stuff as well. Granted, not all women, but then not all men do either.”
“They want sex?”
“Yes!”
“They get sex.”
“Not with g
uys they actually want. They probably just have to lie there. I don’t need to know anymore.” She held the hand up that he wasn’t holding and shook her head. “I can’t bring myself right now to even think about this.”
He chuckled.
“You’re doing it to make me crazy.”
“The women are not allowed to take lovers. If they do, it’s in secret, and it’s highly dangerous.”
“Is that what you’d do? Marry who you’re told and then expect her to live a lonely, miserable existence being your wife and only getting anything intimate when you deem it necessary to have sons?”
“I’m not part of the mafia like that. I’ll not be providing anyone with sons that are needed. Whoever I take as my wife will be mine and, believe me, Arika, when she’s in my bed, there won’t be any need to take a lover. I’ll make sure she’s well-kept and gets everything her heart desires.”
****
“You’re a pretty good cook,” Arika said, twirling her fork in the spaghetti.
“Living on your own, you learn these things. I’ve never been one for takeout food.”
“Why were you at the diner then?” she asked, slurping up the spaghetti with the rich sauce he’d coated the pasta in.
She’d been in his home now for two days. During that time, the pain had started to lessen a little, which she loved. She’d also completed her assignment and caught up on her studying rather than reading a romance novel.
Fortunately, Vincenzo hadn’t forced anyone to come and sit with her during this time to she didn’t have to deal with any more scary stories. Daniel hadn’t returned either, and it made her a little uncomfortable that she hoped he’d in some way ended that guy.
She wasn’t normally a girl prone to violence, but she didn’t like his friend. In the last couple of days, she’d learned a lot.
Not everything was about the mafia either. He worked for them, but he wouldn’t go into their secrets and even though he spilled the beans on the mistresses, it wasn’t exactly news either. They made films about the mafia, so she imagined a lot of stuff was there and easy to find.
“I was at the diner because of Daniel. It was late. I was hungry, and he picked the diner. I normally go in for an Italian place.”
“Is that your favorite kind of food?” There was that little smile to his lips. She noticed he got that from time to time when she said certain stuff, and she wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was the weird questions she asked.
This was the first time in her whole life when she’d been alone with a guy. Not only that, what else was she supposed to ask him?
“I love Italian. I do think it’s the best food on the planet.”
“I like Chinese,” she said.
“No.”
“Yes. Nothing you say is going to change that. They’ve got eggrolls. There, done,” she said. “And shrimp toasts, which I love so much.”
“Italian has meatballs.”
“Meh.”
“Seriously?” he asked.
“If that is all you’ve got to say then I can add noodles, rice, spareribs, I mean, come on, they’ve got wontons. They so beat Italian any day.”
“Pizza.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I’ve never really liked it. I mean, cheese, granted, but the bread part and everything else I don’t like.”
“I don’t even know if I can let you live.”
She burst out laughing.
In the two days they’d been together, she found herself growing less and less afraid of him. He wasn’t someone to be scared of.
Vincenzo wasn’t going to hurt her. He took care of her, running her baths, feeding her, checking her wound, redressing it, helping her.
He’d even taken her assignment to her professor and gotten the notes she would need in the two classes she’d already missed. If he was such a bad guy, he wouldn’t have done that for her.
“You’re the first person I know who doesn’t like pizza.”
“It’s not like I grew up on it, you know. At the home where I stayed, pizza wasn’t a luxury they could afford. We got food, but it always had to be stuff that helped to fill us up. Not something because it tasted good.”
“I remember what that was like.”
This made her pause with her fork to her lips. “You were in a foster home?”
He nodded.
“But I thought … how can you have been in foster homes if you’re part of the mafia?”
“I’m not one of their bastard sons, Arika. I told you. I work for them. The mafia did take me in and in a way I’m close with one of the families, but I came from the foster system. I was dumped on the orphanage’s doorstep when I was nothing more than a baby, only a couple of days old they said. My birthday is unknown, so they gave me the date I was dumped instead. I was nearly a teenager before the mafia took me in.”
“The same for me. No one knows anything about who I am or who left me.” She shrugged. “I was there in a little car carrier. I didn’t have anything else but the blanket the hospital wrapped me in.”
“Didn’t they check their records at the hospital?”
“They did, but they couldn’t locate my parents. It looked like I wasn’t even born there. That whoever had the blanket either worked there or had given birth there before or something. I’m not really sure. It’s all kind of hazy.”
“You never thought to look into it?”
“Getting a PI is a lot of money. I’m trying to build for my future. Besides, I wasn’t good enough to want back then, and no one ever came back for me. So, I never even considered looking for them, seeing as they never came back for me and I never got adopted out. Why go hunting for someone that clearly didn’t want you?”
“You’re not upset by that?”
“In the beginning I was. Whenever a new family would come and I’d never even get looked at twice, I’d wonder why. You know. I’d be sad, and I’d cry for a little bit. Over time I didn’t even bother trying. I didn’t stand up as tall or smile or show the nice new family what a great person I was.” She shrugged. “I concentrated on my studies as I knew one day I’d be out of there and I wouldn’t have anyone but myself to rely on. So that’s what I did.”
“I was never adopted out either.”
“You were taken by the mafia or a family within that group of people. You were adopted.”
“My reputation preceded me. I had a thing about hurting … stuff. They heard about me, and the next thing I know, those skills I’ve been told to stop, they’re wanting me to explore. Soon, I’ve got everything I ever wanted, and in time, I found my use for them. It wasn’t for a family though, Arika. They didn’t adopt me to let me be their son. I’m a means to an end.”
“Doesn’t that bother you?”
“No. I got out of foster care, and I make a very good living.”
“I gathered that. You’re living in the suburbs.” She’d gotten out of bed this morning and looked outside to see the beautiful street where he lived. “Why do you live here?”
“It relaxes me. There’s not a lot of danger here unless you don’t mow your lawn on time.”
“I did hear that the suburbs can be deadly.”
He winked at her. “I’m the only deadly thing here.”
She finished her food and didn’t like the way his wink affected her. It wasn’t a problem; of course it wasn’t. He probably winked at a lot of women. What she didn’t like was how good it felt to have him wink at her. Her stomach tightened, which caused a little pain, but she felt the wetness between her thighs.
She was attracted to him.
When had she stopped fearing him and now found him attractive?
“Considering you hate Italian, you made quick work of that.”
“Your food is great.”
“I will change your mind on your cuisine choice.”
“If you could never have Italian again, what would you do?”
“Quite simple, that’s not an option.”
She saw the seriousness on his fac
e and couldn’t help but chuckle, then wince. “You’d fight to always have your way?”
“Always. There’s no such thing as living anyone else’s way. I won’t allow it.” He leaned in close, and she got a scent of his cologne.
Again, the arousal hit her quite unexpectedly.
Leaning back, she tried to stay away from him. The shirt she wore was one of his, and his closeness didn’t really help matters.
“I’ll be up with dessert.”
“I get dessert as well?”
“Every lady should have dessert.”
When she was with him, he made her forget just how plain she was. She wasn’t being a party pooper over this. Everyone she was with told her how plain she looked, how she needed to change to enhance what little beauty she had. One of the old waitresses at the diner said she should learn to be hot in the sack so then men would come crawling back for more.
She, personally, just wanted to be left alone.
However, Vincenzo made that quite impossible.
She enjoyed his company far more than she should.
Not only did she enjoy his company, but she looked forward to it as well.
He made her laugh, which she loved regardless of the pain. He made her smile and feel warmth where there wasn’t any. There was a lot she liked about him, but she knew deep down, it couldn’t last.
They were in different worlds, and even though for now theirs had collided, it didn’t mean they’d work.
Chapter Five
A few days later Vincenzo watched as Arika walked slowly into the room. The wound in her abdomen was healing. The doctor had said it hadn’t punctured any major organs or arteries as he’d been able to remove the bullet and stitch her back up. What he had warned about was the recovery time and the potential pain, seeing as it was in her abdomen and the muscles people used for simple things like walking, getting up and down, lifting cups, or books. Anything that required some strenuous activity would cause pain and would also prolong the recovery time.
She took things slowly.
He watched as she walked into the room and sat down on the sofa. She never came close to him unless he moved into her space. He wasn’t sure if she was afraid of him or not. Several times when she’d looked at him, he was sure he caught a flash of desire, of need, reflected in her eyes. It would be gone as quickly as it appeared.