“You know how crazy my hours can be, combining time in the office with rotating through our locations.” I nodded and smiled, since I had his odd hours and time spent at the clubs to thank for meeting him in the first place. “Your job would be similar, and at least in the beginning we’d follow the same schedule.”
“I’m intrigued,” I admitted softly. “But I need some time to think about it. Accepting a job like this is different than cocktail waitressing. It’s a long-term commitment, and that means making my move here permanent.”
He cocked his head to the side, his eyes darkening a shade. “You made a long-term commitment to me when you became my woman, Ariana. We haven’t specifically discussed it, but I thought that meant you’d already decided to stay in Chicago since I’m here.”
“I’m fully committed to our relationship, baby. But you’re right; we haven’t discussed me staying in Chicago past my niece or nephew’s birth and the end of the hockey season.” I’d been thinking about it off and on over the past two weeks, but I’d hesitated to bring it up because it was a huge decision. Now that we were talking about it, it was time to pull up my big girl panties and have a conversation with him about the future. “Would you like me to live here permanently?”
“Fuck, yeah. As far as I’m concerned, you already do,” he growled. “And if you decide to head back to Vegas instead, then be prepared to get a bigger place out there because you’ll need room for me too.”
I sat there stunned for a moment, blinking repeatedly while I stared at him. “You’d move to Vegas?”
“For you?” I nodded. “If it was that important for you to go back after you spent almost half a year here with me? Fuck yeah. But then I’d do my best to convince you that we should split our time between the two places since my mom, your sister, and the baby would all be here.”
I was blown away by his answer. Not just because he was so willing to change his entire life for me, but also because he’d factored the people who were important to me into his thought process. It wasn’t all about him; it was about me too. Then again, I shouldn’t be too surprised since he was always saying and doing things to show how important I was to him.
All of that added up to one thing. After only two weeks with him, I was able to answer, “I’m ninety-nine percent sure I’m going to stay in Chicago. I just need a week or two to figure some stuff out. Like if I’m going to accept the amazing job opportunity you just dropped in my lap, and when I’d be ready to start since helping Alessia needs to remain my top priority over the next few months.”
“I’ll let you leave it there for now since these are big decisions, but be prepared for me to be relentless when it comes to getting that last percent from you.”
Considering how amazing he’d been so far, that was more than okay with me. “Deal.”
“Now that we’ve got that settled”—he raised half-way up off his seat, reached out, grabbed me, and lifted me onto his lap before sitting back down—“we need to have another serious conversation.”
I thought we’d just covered all the relationship talk bases. “About what?”
“About you keeping important shit from me.”
My head flew back and I stared at him in surprise. “What important shit? We’ve talked about where I’m going to work. Which city I’m going to live in. We spend all of my free nights together, unless I’m with my sister. There isn’t much that happens in my days that you’re not aware of.”
“Louie DeFiglio.”
Shit. That certainly qualified as something important. And it explained why Alec had been weird with me earlier; he was the one who’d spilled the beans. “I swear I wasn’t keeping it from you on purpose.”
“Then why haven’t you brought it up?”
I rested my head on his shoulder and admitted softly, “Because I’ve basically been avoided thinking about it since I’ve been here, other than telling Alec about the whole mess the first day. I’m out of Louie’s reach and the deadline for my mom to pay him back already passed. She’s left me a few voicemail messages, but I haven’t talked to her. I don’t think I want to since I have a feeling the only reason she’s reaching out to me now is because Louie told her about the deal he wanted to offer me. It’s the only thing that makes sense. She sure as hell knows I don’t have fifty grand to give her, and she was doing a bang-up job of avoiding me before he sent his guys to my apartment.”
I wanted to curl up in a ball and cry, but then his arms tightened around me. It made me feel safe and cared for at a time when I desperately needed it.
“I’m sorry, gorgeous.”
“Me, too. I should’ve brought it up the night we had sex for the first time. It was one of the reasons I was so relieved. Because I was halfway across the country from the mess my life had become, in a beautiful place with the best man I’ve ever known.”
“The mess wasn’t your fault. It’s your moms.” He pressed his forehead against mine. “And you only added to the conservatory’s beauty; the same way you make me a better man.”
Chapter Fourteen
Mark
Ever since Alec had told me about Ariana’s situation with the bookie back in Vegas, I couldn’t get it out of my head. I’d spent hours upon hours thinking about it. I kept turning it around and around in my brain, looking for a solution. And talking to Ariana had only made me more determined to figure it out. She’d been devastated by the possibility that her mom would be willing to use her to get out of the mess she’d created.
I’d wanted nothing more than to fix everything for her. To get Louie DeFiglio out of her life. To force her mom to realize what she was close to losing—access to her daughters and grandchildren. Because Alec and I would work together to keep her out of their lives if that’s what it took to keep everyone safe. Being in Chicago allowed for a certain amount of protection, but only for so long. It was a temporary fix at best.
Eventually their mom would realize the sisters were together. If DeFiglio dangled a big enough carrot under her nose—and all indications pointed to that being a possibility since her debt to him was past due, but she wasn’t in the hospital or morgue—she just might tell him where to find Ariana. I wasn’t about to let that happen…which meant I needed to ensure it didn’t.
A week after my conversation with Ariana, the perfect opportunity fell into my lap—Alec’s team had an away game in Vegas. His coach knew that Alessia was expecting their first baby and was from Vegas. So he hadn’t questioned it when Alec had asked if he and Jason could fly home separately from the team in order to take care of some family business while he was in town. Ryan would’ve joined us, but a broken bone had put him on the injured reserve list and he’d flown to PyeongChang to cheer Tamara on while she was competing as a speed skater at the Olympics.
But with two professional hockey players—plus my best friend, since Andrew refused to let me fly out to Vegas without him at my back—and a private plane waiting for us at the airport, I felt confident we could handle whatever came our way.
“You sure you want to do this?” I asked Alec and Jason as we stood outside the doors of the bar where I’d learned that Louie DeFiglio liked to do business. “You guys continued your winning streak tonight. If you keep it up, you’ll definitely make the playoffs. We don’t know what’s going to happen in there with DeFiglio, but whatever it is could put your places on the team at risk.”
“Neither of us will think any less of you if you want to wait out here,” Andrew added. “You’ve spent your entire lives trying to get where you are right now. It’s a lot to risk, the possibility of being stuck watching your team win the cup without you.”
“We’ve all got a lot to lose,” Alec argued.
“But at least nobody can fire Andrew and me from our jobs,” I reminded him.
He reached for the doorknob and looked back at me. “I don’t care how long I’ve been playing hockey, or how much I want it. Alessia’s happiness is worth more than a fucking championship.”
�
�There’s no way you guys are going in there without me. Not when I know you’d do whatever it took to help me if it was Cee-Cee who was in trouble,” Jason added as he followed Alec inside.
“Damn fucking right we would,” Andrew muttered.
I followed behind them until we hit the bar, and then I took the lead. “I need to talk to Louie DeFiglio,” I told the bartender.
His eyes slid to the right as he answered, “I don’t know who you’re talking about, man.”
I dropped a hundred-dollar bill down. “I’m not a cop here to bust him. I just have some business to do with the guy. The kind of business that comes with a lot more bills like that.”
He pocketed the cash and gave another look to the right before jerking his chin in my direction. I turned and found a big guy walking our way. He must’ve been at least six foot four and three hundred pounds.
“The hired muscle,” Andrew murmured.
I nodded and replied softly, “At least it means we’re in the right place.”
“The boss doesn’t do business out here. If you want to meet with him, you’ll need to follow me.”
“Lead the way,” I agreed, and we all stepped forward in unison.
His gaze landed on Alec and recognition flared in his eyes. “Aw, fuck. This ain’t gonna be good.”
“You a hockey fan?” I asked, drawing his attention back to me as we followed him through the crowded bar to a door in the back that was marked “Employees Only.”
“Yeah, but that ain’t why I placed your friend’s face so easily.”
“Then what was it?”
He glanced up at the camera stationed above the door. Shifting his body away from it, he slowly reached for the door to mask our conversation as he said, “I did some research on a client’s family for the boss recently. Your friend’s picture was in the file I turned over to him. He’s married to one of the daughters, but not the one my boss is interested in.”
Fuck. “Has he been looking for the other one?”
He gave me a small nod of confirmation as he waved us ahead of him. “Last door on the left.”
Andrew led us down the hallway. Since DeFiglio’s guard seemed willing to talk, I hung back to get as much information out of him as I could in the short time I had. “Has he found her yet?”
He shook his head. “The girl took my warning to heart and took off without a trace a few weeks back. The boss thought her mom would be able to pull her back in, and it wasn’t until a few days ago that he started to realize she’s not going to be able to fulfill the promise she made to him.”
“What promise was that?”
A muscle in his jaw jumped. “That she’d make sure her daughter met with him if that’s what it took to forgive her debt.”
That promise was going to cost Ariana’s mom a fuck of a lot more than fifty thousand dollars—she was going to lose her family. “That’s not going to happen.”
“I fucking hope not,” he murmured right before we walked into DeFiglio’s office.
Andrew, Alec, and Jason stood off to the side, allowing me a clear path to the desk in the middle of the room. The guy sitting behind it was probably in his mid-thirties. With his slicked back hair, the top four buttons on his shirt undone, and several thick, gold chains resting on his hairy chest; he looked like someone from Hollywood had cast him to play the role of a sleazy bookie in a low-budget movie.
“Louie DeFiglio?”
He stood up, and I was pleased to note that I had three inches and about twenty pounds on him. With my three friends behind me to handle Louie’s guy—who didn’t seem too thrilled with his job—I relaxed a little, knowing the advantage was on my side.
“Yeah, I’m Louie.” His gaze dropped to my custom tailored suit that cost at least ten times more than the shirt and pants he was wearing. I’d chosen it to make a statement—that I had plenty of resources of my own. “You want to place a bet? I usually take new clients by introduction only, but you look like you’d be good to cover any of your losses.”
I shook my head and pulled a bank bag out of my suit coat pocket. “I’m not here to gamble. I want to cover someone else’s loss with you.”
“I’m in the business of making money, and I’m happy to take it from whoever’s willing to pay. Whose debt did you want to cover?”
I unzipped the bag, pulled out fifty grand, and dropped it on the desk. “Alexandra Valenti.”
He picked up the cash, his lips curling up in a snarl. “It was fifty thousand three weeks ago. Now it’s sixty-six thousand five hundred and fifty. I charge ten percent interest each week a payment is late.”
I pulled out two more stacks of ten thousand each and removed some bills from one of the stacks before handing them over. He took the money, but his expression turned uglier. “The daughter thought herself too good to listen to my offer, knowing her mother’s life hung in the balance, but she sold herself to you to pay off the debt?”
Shoving the bank bag back in my pocket, I reached over the desk, wrapped my fist in the collar of his shirt, and pulled him close. I heard the sounds of a scuffle behind me, but I was depending on the guys to keep DeFiglio’s man off me long enough to be able to drive my point home as forcefully as necessary to make sure it stuck. “Be very fucking careful what you say about my woman.”
“Bah! You’re welcome to her. You covered the mother’s debt. Consider her bought and paid for. The whore is more bother than she’s worth anyway.”
Hearing him mouth off about the woman I loved like that—and yeah, it was a hell of a time to realize I loved her—had me seeing red. Yanking him closer, I slammed my fist into his jaw. I was only able to land three punches before I was pulled off him and shoved against the desk with my arm twisted behind my back. My face nailed the corner of his keyboard, and I was seeing stars when DeFiglio’s guy hefted me up and hauled me towards the door. Another guy, bigger than the one holding me, was blocking the doorway so Andrew, Alec, and Jason couldn’t get back inside.
“You okay, boss?” the bigger guy asked.
“Does it look like I’m fucking okay?” he answered, wiping blood from his chin with the back of his hand.
“You want us to take him out back and rough him up more?”
“More?” DeFiglio spotted my swollen eye and some of the anger left his expression. “A busted lip for me and a black eye for him. Considering he just paid off a substantial debt I didn’t think I was going to be able to collect on, I’m willing to call it even this time. But if he ever steps foot in my place again, I won’t be as generous.”
“Stay away from Ariana and her mother, and you’ll never see me again,” I promised.
“I don’t make it a habit of taking bets from people who can’t repay their losses—one way or another. She has no money. No other assets. Nothing to use as collateral.” Louie smirked as I struggled in his guy’s hold at that verbal jab. “Alexandra Valenti is to be considered persona non grata around here. And people who don’t exist to me aren’t allowed to place bets.”
“C’mon, you heard the boss. It’s over.” The guy holding me strong-armed me out of the office. The bigger one stayed behind to take care of Louie. The limo we’d taken from the airport—another statement—was waiting in the parking lot.
Louie’s guy loosened his hold on me as soon as we walked outside, but he followed me over to the car.
“Thanks for doing what you could for Ariana.” I touched my eye and winced. “And for going easy on me.”
“No problem. It’s one thing to have to collect from people whose bad decisions landed them in hot water. It sucks, but it’s part of the job.” He shrugged his massive shoulders. “Your woman was different. She was innocent and didn’t deserve to be pulled into this shit.”
Grabbing my wallet from my pants pocket, I pulled out a business card. Then I slid it into his palm as I shook his hand. “If you ever decide you want out of Vegas, there’s a bouncer job waiting for you in Chicago. Your pick of any of our bars or nightclubs.”
“I hope you do,” I told him as I climbed into the back of the limo.
“You hope he does what?” Alec asked.
“I offered him a job as a bouncer.”
“The dude gave you a black eye. Is that part of the usual interview process?” Jason joked.
“Too bad it isn’t,” Andrew chuckled. “Because then he would’ve had an explanation for the eye when Ariana wants to know what the hell happened tonight.”
“Fuck,” I groaned, my head dropping against the back of my seat. “Do we have any ice?”
Alec dug through the wet bar and put together an impromptu ice pack.
“Thanks, man.” I pressed it against my face.
“We’ve got some anti-inflammatories on the plane.”
“I’ll take ‘em,” I mumbled.
“You’ll want to clean up your hands, too,” Andrew suggested. “Your knuckles are looking a little rough.”
They felt more than a little rough, but they were a dull throb compared to the pain from my eye. But all of it was worth it to know Ariana was safe—I just had to hope she saw it the same way. “In hindsight, we probably should’ve told our women where we were going tonight.”
“Speak for yourself,” Alec scoffed. “Alessia and Cee-Cee knew Jason and I were in Vegas tonight.”
I lowered the ice pack to glare at him. “Only because you had a game there!”
“Josie knows that I flew to Vegas for Alec’s game.”
I switched my glare to my best friend. “So what you’re all telling me is that I’m the only one who didn’t tell their woman they were going to be in a different state tonight?”
All three of them nodded, but Alec defended my decision, “It’s not like you could’ve told Ariana. A trip to Vegas one week after you found out about that shit bag trying to pressure her would’ve set off a ton of red flags. She would’ve figured out what you were up to in no time flat, and then she would’ve either tried to stop you or come with.”
Chased into Love (Bachelorette Party Book 4) Page 9