Ruthless: Mob Boss Book One

by Michelle St. James

  She settled into the rocking of the boat. By the time Ed downshifted, she had been lulled into a kind of trance by the sting of the wind on her face, the bouncing of the bow against the waves.

  She walked carefully toward Nico as the boat slowed even further. They were approaching a small island rimmed with rocky shoreline. There was no harbor here. No restaurants or markets or tourists. In fact, the place looked deserted, and she marveled again at Nico’s ability to find—or create—so much isolation.

  Ed steered the boat toward a rickety looking dock on a small beach.

  “Had Martha stock the fridge and cupboards for you,” he said to Nico. “There’s a storm coming in, so we won’t be able to get back out here for at least a couple days.”

  “I understand,” Nico said.

  Ed cut the engine and they coasted the rest of the way to the dock.

  Nico jumped out of the boat and tied on, then held out his hand for Angel. She waited while Ed and Nico exchanged a few more words. Then Nico was throwing the ropes back into the boat, and Ed was heading away from the island. The boat’s motor was just a hum in the distance when Nico finally turned to her.

  “Ready?”

  She nodded, which was stupid. She hadn’t been ready for anything that had happened in the past week and a half.

  He lifted both their bags off the dock and started walking.

  They made their way up the dock and onto the sandy beach, then continued into a dense copse of trees. There was no traffic, no planes overhead, no construction equipment or people talking. It was like being at the end of the world.

  The wind blew sharp and cold, and Angel pulled Nico’s jacket tightly around her as they moved through the woods. The sun was nowhere to be found, the little light that managed to make it through the trees casting the forest into a kind of twilight even though it couldn’t be much past noon.

  Finally they emerged into a clearing with a dirt road leading up a small hill.

  “Are you all right?” Nico asked her.

  She nodded.

  “We’re almost there.”

  She followed him up the dirt road. When they got to the top of the hill, she spotted a house in the clearing below them. She tried to take advantage of the view by scanning the surrounding area, wanting to to get a feel for how many other houses were on the island. But all she could see were trees, and the ocean unfurling like cold steel on every side.

  She followed Nico toward the house. It was bigger than it had looked from a distance, with a peaked roof and walls of glass that opened to decks and porches on every side.

  Nico led her up a walkway to the front door and pulled a key from his pocket. He unlocked the door and stepped inside. She heard the electronic beep of buttons being pressed from inside the foyer. A soft chirp emitted from the control panel, and he held the door open wider.

  “Come in.”

  She stepped into a vaulted foyer with polished wood floors and stone walls on either side. Nico shut the door, picked up their bags, and headed farther into the house.

  At first it seemed small, but then they cleared the foyer, and it was like emerging from a cave onto a cliff. The room was huge, with a wall of glass that looked out over a wild beach enclosed with rock. The water seemed close enough to touch, the roar of the waves audible even with the doors closed. It was dizzying, all that sea and sky, and she reached down to touch an overstuffed chair for balance.

  Nico strode toward the glass and Angel saw that they weren’t windows at all; the entire wall was made of doors. He slid one open, and it disappeared behind the the rest of the glass. The briny scent of the sea instantly invaded the room, the sound of the water crashing against the rocks on either side of the private beach.

  She took a deep breath almost against her will. The sense of calm that settled over her felt like a betrayal. This wasn’t some kind of romantic getaway. She was still being held against her will.

  Nico turned back to her. “I’ll show you to your room while the house airs out.”

  He led her up a set of open stairs to the second floor and a large hallway. They passed one closed door before coming to a stop at another.

  “There’s a deck, and a private bath,” Nico said, leading her into an airy space that seemed to hover over the sea. “No cable, I’m afraid, although there are some DVDs downstairs.”

  She stepped into the room. What was the expected etiquette when you were being shown first class accommodations by your captor?

  “Thank you,” she said. Absurd.

  “You should feel free to make yourself at home while we’re here.”

  She folded her arms over chest. “How long will that be?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I need to regroup. Think about what happened back at Headquarters. We’ll ride out the storm here at least. Then we’ll see.”

  She nodded.

  “There’s food in the kitchen. Have a rest and I’ll see you for dinner.”

  He shut the door behind him.

  A quick look around revealed a well-appointed bedroom and luxury bathroom, complete with a soaking tub overlooking the water. She unpacked her few belongings, undressed, and climbed into the tub.

  The sea was mesmerizing, and the glass wall made her feel like she was suspended between the sky and the ocean. She refilled the water twice when it got cold. When her fingers started to prune, she wrapped herself in a towel and squeezed the water out of her hair with another one. Then she climbed naked into the massive bed and pulled the heavy covers over her body. She fell asleep with the sound of the water crashing against the rocks below her window

  23

  He poured himself a drink and walked to the window overlooking the ocean. It was too cold to keep the doors open to the deck, but he made no move to close them. He was exhausted from the sleepless night and the long drive, but he wanted to call Luca for an update. Then he’d need to unpack and shower, make dinner. The icy air woke him up, made him feel alive.

  The waves were already bigger than they’d been when Ed had brought them over, and Nico could almost taste the impending storm. There was a tang to the air, like electricity gathering force. The reality of it gave him a kind of peace. There was nothing he could do now about Carlo and what had happened at Headquarters. He was surprised to realize he didn’t mind the imposed distance from the situation, although he was beginning to suspect it had more to do with the fact that he was with Angel than any desire to leave it all behind.

  Angel.

  He didn’t believe in love at first sight. In fact, if he hadn’t seen it for himself in his parents, he might not believe in love at all. But her name had been like an echo in his mind since that first night in his apartment. He saw her face when he slept, when he ran in the first light of early morning. He hadn’t scheduled another appointment with the escort service, because he couldn’t imagine touching another woman after tasting Angel.

  And this. This was the biggest mistake of all.

  No one knew about the island in Maine. Not Luca. Not Carmine. No one.

  It had been his father’s idea; a place to hide. A place no one could find him if he found himself under attack—or simply in need of an escape. Nico had bought the island with some of the money left to him by his parents. The deed was listed in the name of one of many offshore corporations Nico had set up for just this kind of purpose.

  No one would ever find him and Angel here, and he had the sudden desire to leave it all behind. To keep her with him and start over with nothing but the two of them and the sky and the endless sea.

  But that was ridiculous. Angel despised him. Maybe she wanted him. Sometimes. But that was just lust. She was the daughter of his sworn enemy. And he had brought her here.

  He closed the doors and turned away from the window, then climbed the stairs to the second floor. His room was next to he one he’d given Angel, and he could hear the water running in her bath. A minute later, it shut off, and he had to forcibly banish the thought of her naked body, water
lapping at her perfect pink nipples, working its way between her legs.

  It was too late. His cock was already hard, and he turned the shower on cold, then stripped and stepped in. He stood there for a long time, letting his skin grow icy as penance for being stupid. When he couldn’t stand it any longer, he toweled off and put on a pair of loose sweatpants and a T-shirt.

  He pulled a rosary from the nightstand and sat in the chair in front of the big window. The beads eased through his fingers as he went through the sequence of events at Headquarters. How had Carlo known that’s where Nico was keeping Angel? Or had it been a lucky guess? He hadn’t been surprised by their attempt to rescue Angel. It was their willingness to give her up that worried him.

  Do you think I care what happens to this bitch?

  Angel hadn’t said anything about it, but she had been in survival mode, had probably gone into shock after Nico killed the man holding her. Did she even remember it?

  He wasn’t surprised. Not exactly. Carlo was the worst kind of criminal; an old-school thug hiding behind a facade of normalcy. He had been one of the biggest critics of Nico’s business plan, and Nico remained convinced it wasn’t the plan Carlo objected to—it was the lack of violence.

  Nico had done his research, had run the numbers. If it was all about profit, every family in the Syndicate would be making the same changes. No, Carlo just liked to hurt people with all the stuff Nico made off limits—human trafficking, child porn, sending drugs into schools, issuing high-interest loans to desperate people who couldn’t pay them back, forcing small business owners to pay for protection. Nico had banished them all in favor of cyber theft from corrupt corporations and individuals, loans for small businesses that were vetted by his underwriters, and protection for companies that could afford to pay for the Vitale influence. Bookmaking was still a legitimate enterprise, but gamblers were carefully screened and cut off before they could do too much damage to themselves or their families. There were bribes—for building permits and liquor licenses and a thousand other petty things that businesses needed to do business. But as organized crime went, it was somewhat civilized, and Nico was proud of the fact that violence and death had become increasingly rare within his organization.

  But what had happened at Headquarters wasn’t civilized. Because if those had really been Carlo’s men, they weren’t there to rescue Angel at all. They were there to send a message to Nico. To make it clear that Carlo would sacrifice his daughter rather than give in to Nico’s demands.

  Nico had already known Carlo didn’t care about the honor code that protected the families of Syndicate members; he just hadn’t realized the bastard didn’t care about his own daughter either.

  He set down the rosary beads and ran a tired hand through his damp hair. He didn’t want to be the one to tell Angel about her father. It had been bad enough to tell her Carlo was part of the Syndicate. How would she feel when she found out the rest?

  He picked up the phone next to the bed and called Luca. Everything was under control, thanks to a couple of their friends at NYPD, and Luca insisted that it was best for Nico to be out of sight while everything settled down. There had been no data breach, and none of Nico’s men had lost their lives, although Vincent’s head had been grazed by a bullet in the basement firefight. Luca had already put out the word that Carlo’s men had failed. Nico gave him a few last minute instructions, then hung up.

  He knew he should call Carmine, too, but exhaustion was pulling at his eyelids. Carmine would only remind him that taking Angel had been ill-advised, and while Nico counted on his Consigliere for advice, he really wasn’t up for an “I told you so”, however sensitively it might be phrased.

  He stretched out in the chair, not wanting to sleep too deeply in case Angel woke up.

  It seemed like only a a few minutes later that he opened his eyes to the sound of footsteps. The room was dark, the ocean invisible beyond the windows. He walked to the door and peered into the hall. Angel was there, standing at the top of the stairs with her back to him.

  “Angel?”

  She turned. “I think I heard thunder,” she said.

  “Probably.”

  The wind had kicked up, whistling outside the windows as the ocean beat fast and frantic against the rocks. She jumped as a bolt of lightning cracked the sky, spilling blue light into the house.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She crossed her arms over her chest. “A little disoriented.”

  “A lot’s happened.” He hesitated. “Come here.”

  She regarded him with suspicion. “Where?”

  “My room.” She narrowed her eyes, and he smiled. “There’s a phone. I thought you might like to call your brother before the storm knocks out phone service.”

  “David?”

  He hated himself for the light in her eyes. All of his phone lines were blocked for anonymity. He could have given her this at any time and he hadn’t.

  “Yes. Come on.” She followed him into his room, and he turned on the light next to the bed and handed her the house phone. He didn’t let go when she closed her hand around it. “Things are… volatile between our families right now, as I’m sure you know. Can I trust you to keep David out of it?”

  She ripped the phone from his grasp. “I would never do anything to put my brother in danger.”

  He nodded, the ferocity of her words taking him by surprise. “Go ahead.”

  She dialed then turned her back on him.

  She breathed his name a moment later. “David. It’s me.” She paused, then let out a strangled laugh. “I know. I’m sorry to worry you.”

  Nico felt like an intruder, but he didn’t dare leave her alone. She had promised not to endanger her brother, but he had to make sure she didn’t let anything slip about their location.

  He shouldn’t have worried. She was pro, telling David how she’d decided to make a last minute trip to Cancun, how she and her friend, Rachel, were drinking margaritas and dancing and sleeping before winter really set in in New York. She asked about David’s midterms, about a guy he was interested in, and about his roommate who was apparently a slob. She was so calm, Nico almost bought it himself.

  A couple minutes into the call, after the initial rush of conversation, she sank onto Nico’s bed with the phone still cradled against her ear.

  “I haven’t heard from him either,” she said into the phone. “But I’m sure he’s fine. You know how he is.” She sighed and lowered her voice. “He’ll come around, David. He loves you.” A pause. “Because I know.”

  They exchanged a few more words before Angel said she had to go.

  “I love you, too,” she said. Her eyes flickered to Nico, leaning against the wall. “I can’t wait either. Okay. See you soon.”

  She disconnected the call, but didn’t immediately give up the phone. He waited, wanting to give her time. Finally she set the phone back on the receiver and stood.

  “Thank you.”

  It was cold, and Nico knew she resented having to be grateful for something as simple as making a phone call. He didn’t blame her.

  “I should have done it sooner,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  Her shoulders seemed to soften.

  “Hungry?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Very.”

  “Good. Let’s go downstairs. I’ll make dinner.”

  24

  She sat on a stool while Nico cooked. She thought about offering to help, then felt stupid. It wasn’t her job to help Nico Vitale keep her prisoner.

  They didn’t speak while he moved around the kitchen, marinating steaks and making salad. Her feelings for him were increasingly complicated. How could she hate him so much and still notice how defined his arms were under the sleeves of his T-shirt? How could she want to get away from him at the same time she wanted to press her body against his, reach inside the waistband of his sweats and take him in her hand, feel his mouth on her breasts?

  She was grateful he’d let her call David�
�she’d almost wept with relief at the sound of his voice, so even, so normal—but she was also pissed at herself for being grateful, and at Nico for putting her in a position to appreciate so small a favor.

  This was supposed to be simple. Nico had kidnapped her, was keeping her prisoner. She should hate him.

  He cooked the meat on an indoor grill and took everything to the table. The first splatter of rain hit the windows as they sat down to eat. It was disorienting, sitting in the house with nothing but darkness and the raging storm outside. Like she and Nico were floating calmly through space in the middle of a hurricane.

  The steak was perfect, rare and tender. She hadn’t eaten since the snacks they’d grabbed at the gas station early that morning, and she had to force herself not to inhale the food in front of her.

  “You don’t like the wine?” Nico asked, eyeing her untouched glass.

  She couldn’t tell him that she didn’t trust herself even remotely drunk around him. “Just not in the drinking mood.”

  “Can I get you something else?”

  “The water’s fine.” She took a bite of salad. “How long have you had this place?” She told herself it was to ease the tension of their silence, but the truth is, she was curious. From a penthouse apartment in New York City that must have cost millions to a house that was both sleek and rustic on an island in the Atlantic. Nico was an enigma. Just when she thought she had a handle on him, he threw her another curve ball.

  “A couple years,” he said, looking at the wineglass in his fingertips. “I bought it after my parents died.”

  “Why?” she asked. “I mean, it’s beautiful, but it doesn’t seem…” She shook her head.

  “What?” he prompted.

  “It doesn’t seem like you.”