by Bethany-Kris
This was not the woman who had tricked him—the woman who had made his dick as hard as steel just as easily as she had irritated him. And at the same goddamn time, too. No, this wasn’t that woman, and he had no intention of dealing with this fucking shell of her, either.
This was not what he wanted at all.
He wanted to fuck with her.
Like she had fucked with him.
Fine.
Then, he would try for something a little more pointed if this wasn’t getting a reaction out of her.
“That question I asked about,” Caesar said.
“You really need to go,” she deadpanned.
“Nah, I’m good.” Caesar kneeled down a bit to rest his arms along the window ledge of the door, and stared straight at Aria even though she refused to look at him. “That question—was it for him, your husband, I mean?”
“Was what for him?”
“Killing your father. I didn’t forget what you told me, after all. So, if I am to assume you manipulated me in to doing that for whatever reason—since apparently nothing I do is because I actually chose to do it when it comes to you—then why? I figured … it must have been for him. It’s Raffe, right?”
She stiffened at her husband’s name.
Maybe she didn’t like Caesar saying it.
So, he did it again.
“Yeah, Raffe, they told me,” he murmured. “And now that your father is out of the picture, I bet it’s your husband that’ll be heading your little clan.”
Heat colored her cheeks with a light red.
Anger flashed in her eyes.
Still, she stayed quiet, and unmoving.
“Was that it—all your work was to move your husband along in your business while you had the chance?”
He got nothing in response.
Not even a blink of those long, dark lashes.
Goddammit.
“I wonder,” Caesar drawled, going for broke, “how he would feel then to know that you did everything you possibly could for his cause—including getting on your back for me, and spreading those legs of yours as wide as you could? Would he care that I know what your pussy tastes like, or how you sound when you’re screaming my name? Would he, Aria? Do you care to find out?”
Her throat constricted beneath that silk scarf at the same time her eyes closed. A tic showed in her cheek, but just as quickly, she relaxed and opened her eyes again. Only this time, she wasn’t staring out the window.
No, she was looking at him.
Caesar didn’t see the anger or fear he had hoped to find looking back in her gaze, but there was a threat. A silent promise of violence coming his way, and fast, if he continued to stay in her path.
Hurricane Aria.
Beautiful.
Enthralling.
Dangerous.
It was fitting.
Finally, something.
He had gotten something from her.
Caesar flashed her one of his grins. “You know, it’s better he learns now what kind of woman you are—that all women are exactly the same when it comes right down to it. They’ll do whatever they want to get what they want. They don’t give a fuck who they harm in the process. You’re not any different. You’ll still get on your knees or spread your legs for a man the same way the next one will.”
He couldn’t hide the heat in his words.
The hate.
Not even his pain.
Not pain because of her, no, but pain nonetheless. Pain he refused to indulge because it all too often left him in a terrible and desperate place. A place that led him to bad and rash decisions, and left him with a deep need to hurt others just to get rid of his own ache; to get rid of his own shame.
No one could possibly understand.
But he was right.
“All women do this,” he told her, “just in different ways.”
Aria was silent for a long stretch before she finally spoke again. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
“Excuse me?”
“Women,” she clarified. “For you, that’s what it is. You hate women. Why do you hate them so much, Caesar? What woman hurt you this badly that this is the first place your mind goes when you feel slighted by a female—to a place where you have to hurt her, and humiliate her with something like sex?”
Caesar chuckled dryly, and stood straight. “What, do you think you don’t deserve what I am doing to you?”
“Oh, Caesar …” Aria shook her head, and gave him a pitying look. “You’re not doing anything to me that I didn’t already expect. I did ask for you to step back—to help me that way so that we could both get what he wanted. Remember, I tried to warn you.”
Wait, what?
Caesar opened his mouth to ask just that, but the man stepping out of the restaurant earlier than he should have kept him quiet. Raffe’s gaze narrowed in on Caesar standing beside the car the second he stepped into the light.
The rage in the man’s eyes should have been a clue to leave.
The mask of calm Raffe kept firmly in place was a lie.
“He has people watch me all the time,” Aria murmured, her gaze never drifting from the windshield. “Why do you think I wouldn’t even look at you? I can’t entertain even the idea of impropriety. I warned you.”
Again with that shit.
He didn’t hear warnings.
He only heard challenges.
A smaller man—with no pride and a hell of lot less ego—might have taken a step back from the car, or even made an effort to put more distance between themselves and the man coming their way, but Caesar wasn’t that guy. Arrogant to a fault, even if it was the very thing that might kill him one day.
He couldn’t help it.
He was who he was.
“Caesar, right?” Raffe asked, dark eyes narrowing into vicious slits. “Yeah, Angelo Accardo’s oldest fucking prick. I haven’t gotten the chance to speak with your father since I got back in the city, but today seems like a good damn place to start—a lesson, if you will. I think you’re all due one. Especially where my fucking territory is concerned.”
“This isn’t your territory,” Caesar returned. “These streets are no man’s land.”
And it was well known.
Raffe laughed darkly. “I’m not talking about the streets, cafone. Step away from my wife before I use your head and the cement to make a piece of conceptual art for my goddamn living room.”
Damn.
Caesar always did appreciate a good threat.
Even if it was on his life.
Aria still hadn’t moved. Her gaze never drifted away from the window.
Raffe came closer; Caesar refused to move.
The two men came toe-to-toe next to the car, and Raffe reached in to cup Aria’s cheek with a large palm that all but swallowed half of the side of her face whole. Caesar didn’t miss the way her eye twitched, or how her flinch came and went all in a blink.
But he had seen it.
And he wondered …
“I’m sure you know the baseball analogy,” Raffe said, drawing Caesar’s attention away. “This is strike one for breaking my rules—now your family loses something for it.”
Caesar smirked even in the face of the man’s rage. “Is that a threat? My father doesn’t take kindly to threats.”
“You—”
“But me?” Caesar asked. “Well, I fucking love them.”
Raffe nodded, and his white teeth flashed in a half-sneer. “Good to know. Unfortunately, you haven’t had to deal with me yet in this business as my wife has been handling it. So, it’s a good time to learn, isn’t it? Don’t ever approach my wife again. And do let your father know what comes next could have been avoided, and should he want to prevent it from happening again, then I am willing to negotiate for what I want.”
“Call from Cain,” said the robotic voice over the speakers of Caesar’s 1969 Corvette. The Bluetooth and stereo system was just
about the only thing that wasn’t vintage on the car.
“Answer,” Caesar said.
Cain’s voice came over the speakers not a second later. “We’ve got a fucking problem, man.”
“If it’s that my father is calling you because I won’t pick up his calls, then I really don’t consider that a fucking problem, Cain.”
“What—no.”
Caesar’s attention was firmly on the road, and on the fact that he was nearly home. Another block, and he could get inside his place, shut out the world, and figure out his next move against Aria … or her fucking husband.
Yes, that sounded—
“Alice is dead,” Cain said.
Caesar saw black smoke coloring the sky at the same time his friend said three words he never really expected to hear. He was stuck between trying to figure out a response for his friend, and realizing that smoke in the sky was coming from … shit, his penthouse apartment at the top of the apartment building.
He could already see it from a block away.
He knew it was gone.
He just … knew.
“Delivered flowers … doorstep … your brother was upstairs when it went off … not hurt … she’s dead.”
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Cain droned on.
Caesar drove slower until he was forced to pull his Corvette to a stop behind a barricade set up by a team of several firetrucks. Probably trying to contain the blaze.
He probably should have been sad about his half-brother’s wife, but he hadn’t felt anything for that woman since the moment she jerked him off under the table at a family dinner, and then let him up her skirt. That was just how it worked for him, really. He couldn’t change it.
Hey, at least Daniele survived.
“The boss got a call right after—Raffe Ferri claiming the bomb on Daniele and Alice,” Cain added.
Caesar nodded, figuring that’s what it was.
Shit.
The man didn’t waste time.
He gave a threat; he followed through.
Interesting …
“Caesar, did you hear anything I just said?” his friend asked.
“He doesn’t fuck around, huh?”
“What?”
“Raffe—he threatened the Accardos today when I had a run-in with him. Said we were going to lose something.”
Caesar’s whole life—his only safe place in the world—was burning down right before his eyes, and he felt cold all over.
“You’re going to need to get to your father’s place, Caesar.”
“I guess Canada is a bust for now.”
“Why are you—”
“Gonna call that a win,” Caesar added in a murmur.
Silver linings.
Even if his home was burning.
“Are you okay?”
No.
No, he wasn’t okay at all.
Far from it.
He just had to figure out what he was going to do about it.
TEN
“SMILE.”
Raffe’s order raked like hot coals over Aria’s nerve endings, but she did as he told her. He gave her a little nod from the driver’s seat as he navigated the car into a parking spot close to the front door of a restaurant she preferred.
At least, he had given her that today.
“Bene,” Raffe murmured in praise, his hand snaking across the middle of the vehicle to curve tightly around her thigh under Aria’s skirt. “It’s about time you stop pouting—you need to do this, and you know why.”
She hoped Raffe didn’t feel her shiver.
Or see the fire in her eyes.
It was getting harder to hide it.
“Better business, I know,” she said.
“Yes, and after those tricks I pulled on the Accardo family last week, we cannot afford for any of our clan to be fighting when we have to be focusing on the bigger picture. Even the women of our clan.”
“Have they called yet? The Accardos, I mean.”
Aria was out of the loop more often than not now that her husband was back in the picture. Raffe, like he always did, stepped in, took control, and managed every little detail down to the very last thing someone might think of. He didn’t care to fill Aria in on things he didn’t think were important for her to know.
Especially now that she wasn’t handling it all.
It irked her.
How could she plan when she didn’t know what she was fucking planning for? How could she work her angles when she didn’t know when the corners were coming? How could she keep her secrets from Raffe when—
Raffe arched a brow. “Not yet.”
Aria let out a tiny breath.
To her husband, it might have sounded like frustration. To her, it was an exhale of relief because yes, she was still one step ahead of Raffe.
At least, for now.
He still didn’t know the things she had done to get them where they currently were with the Accardos, and if she could help it, he would never know until it was too fucking late. She had been banking on the fact that Angelo Accardo wouldn’t want his own people to know his son had been messing with the enemy, too.
But all that guesswork was just that—a guess.
“Are you dallying now?” Raffe asked sharply.
Aria passed him a look, and then the restaurant, too. “I thought we were talking, actually.”
“Well, now we’re done. Go to your lunch, and make nice like I know you can. Be pleasant.”
Yes.
Be pleasant to a woman who had challenged Aria at every turn, spoke out against her, and was very possibly fucking her husband. Although, she really didn’t give a shit about that last one at all. She had no care or concern for her husband in the grand scheme of things. Certainly not enough to try and stake claim over him because of petty jealousy.
The bitch could have him.
Aria nodded, and reached for the passenger door handle. It was Raffe’s voice that made her hesitate just a moment longer.
“And remember, Nico is watching—he’ll report back. I’ll be three blocks over checking on some business.”
Yes, Nico …
She smiled slyly.
Raffe didn’t see it because she was already getting out of the car, and closing the door behind her. He revved the engine—another warning to Aria—as she rounded the front of the Mercedes, and headed for the restaurant’s entrance. He didn’t even pull away and drive off until she was safely inside the place.
Aria hadn’t even gotten a glimpse of Nico, but it didn’t matter. He was watching.
She checked her watch—quarter after twelve, it read. Fifteen more minutes. Nico would do his job. It just wouldn’t be for Raffe.
Aria might not have been in the game to her husband, but she was sure as hell still playing what angles she could to make sure the plans she had worked so hard for went down how she wanted and needed them to.
She did a quick survey of the restaurant, and the small bar. Her guest was nowhere to be seen as she stepped up to the podium to speak with the woman tapping on a tablet.
“Mrs. De Rose,” she greeted, never glancing up. “Private room today?”
“As usual.”
“Follow me, then. Your husband won’t be joining you?”
“Not today.”
Unfortunately.
“But I will have another guest,” Aria added.
This whole thing might have gotten rid of him, too, but Raffe had other things to do. He didn’t like to go along with whatever Aria asked of him. But she damn well better do everything he asked of her.
Funny how that worked.
Aria kept a close watch on the time even as she was led into the private area, she seated herself to the right side of the table just offset from the large windows, and her wine glass was filled halfway with a pink Rosé. No schnapps today. She needed to be fully alert, and ready to fucking move when the time called for it.<
br />
She only grew more irritated the longer her guest made her wait. Whether they showed up or not, the show was still going to go down at twelve-thirty sharp.
“Drinking this early in the day, Aria?”
And there she is.
Aria tilted her head just enough to get Giovanna Bruno in her sights, and smiled coldly. “I think this whole lunch calls for a drink, doesn’t it?”
“You can’t even pretend to like me, can you?”
Even as the woman spoke, she moved across the private dining room, and sat down opposite to Aria on the other side of the table. In full view of the windows overlooking the busy main street in front of the restaurant.
Exactly where she needed to be.
“Why would I pretend anything?” Aria asked.
Giovanna—in her tight red dress, full makeup, and perfectly coiffed black hair—seemed almost smug. And Aria wouldn’t be surprised if the woman felt like this whole day and lunch between them was some kind of battle won for her.
A lunch Raffe ordered.
Peace he wanted.
Apologies from Aria.
Giovanna’s respect intact.
It was never going to happen.
“Why would I pretend to give a shit about the woman who acts against me?” Aria asked quietly. “Or who fucks my husband, and thinks I don’t know about it?”
Giovanna’s face turned a molten red at Aria’s statement, but she was more interested in checking the time on her watch.
12:29 PM.
Almost.
Aria glanced up. “Oh, and don’t try to deny it. I really don’t care. I do wish that if he was busy fucking someone else, he would leave me the hell alone. But we don’t always get what we want, do we?”
“I—”
“Is he softer-handed to you in bed than he is to me?” Aria laughed, and tugged the scarf away from her neck that had become a permanent fixture in her life again since Raffe’s return. Giovanna’s gaze drifted to the dotting of bruises along the side of Aria’s neck—all in different shades of healing. Fingerprints imbedded into her skin where Raffe liked to grab and squeeze for any number of reasons. He was not careful. He didn’t stop when he was told to. She didn’t want him touching her at all—certainly not like this. “For your sake, I hope he was.”
Giovanna’s gaze snapped back to Aria at that remark. “Was—that implies it won’t happen again.”