by Renee Rose
“Mr. Tacone.” They nod their deferential greetings. Nico presses his thumb to the pad, then brings his eye level for a retinal scan.
High tech.
The heavy door unclicks and one of the guards pulls it open for us.
We step into a giant, room-sized safe. Carts of neatly bundled cash make my eyes bug out, but Nico heads over to a cabinet, which he opens. He pulls out a rectangular object draped in black cloth.
Art.
I rush to his side, my heart already beating faster. I know before he uncovers it it’s a Picasso. Even so, a shudder of pleasure, of recognition, runs through me. It’s from his blue period, of a woman sitting in a chair.
“Nico,” I breathe. “Where did you get this?”
He doesn’t look at the painting at all—he’s only watching my reaction to it.
“I occasionally collect debt payment in the form of fine art and gems.”
“Do you know what this is worth?”
“I had it valued.” He says this casually, like the ten million-dollar painting isn’t what interests him.
“What’s the name of this one? I’ve never seen pictures of it.”
“Woman in Chair.” He reaches in the cabinet and pulls out another painting, then another. He unveils four Picassos, one Rembrandt, two Rothkos and a Renoir.
I’m practically swoony by the time I’ve examined them all up close. “You should have these on display. Set up the Bellissimo Museum or something.”
Nico has his hands in his pockets. He’s standing back, observing me, like I’m the rare and valuable masterpiece. “I could. I’d have to invest in heavy security. Plus, then everyone and their brother knows how much wealth I have sitting around here.”
“True, but it could be a draw. It might set your casino apart as something really special The must-see of Las Vegas.” I gasp as an idea occurs to me. “You could make the whole place about art. Go with Italian artists and decorate the different towers in different periods.”
Nico’s eyes glitter and his lips curl into a smile. “That’s an idea, yes.”
He wraps the paintings back up, one by one and replaces them. When he takes my hand to lead me out, he says, “You really love them.”
My mouth falls open. “How can you not?”
He chuckles. “For me they’re just a different form of currency. A diversification of my portfolio. For you, they’re like—I don’t know—living beings.”
I laugh, because that’s exactly how I see art. “Yes. Incredible beings. They should be on display.”
He leads me back out to the elevator. “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll set up a museum—redecorate the Bellissimo if you direct and curate it.”
I stop mid-stride. “Really? You’d let me curate?”
“Of course. Who the fuck else would I hire?”
I throw my arms around him because those paintings are already in my soul. Already calling to me, begging to be shown, to be celebrated. “Thank you. I’d love to.”
He smiles down at me. “You’re happy.” He sounds half-surprised, half-satisfied.
I kiss his stubbled jaw. “So happy.”
“Good.”
He takes me back up to his place, but when he opens the door, he ushers me in, but doesn’t close it. “I have work to do, but I want you to sleep in my bed tonight.”
He doesn’t ask. It’s an order.
“What if I say no?” I ask, testing.
He raises a brow. “Why would you?”
Good point. Why would I? Just to prove he doesn’t own me? Didn’t I just promise he did?
I guess I need to know how deep I’m in. Would he let me go if I said no? Or would he hold Tanner over my head? How real is this?
I take it back—I don’t want to know. I want to stick my head deep in the sand and enjoy what I have. An incredible new job opportunity.
And a man who thinks I’m the cat’s meow.
And the fact that he’s a dangerous criminal can just get swept under the rug for the moment.
“I don’t have my toothbrush here.”
Nico’s lips twitch. “I’ll have one brought up for you. I need to go and I don’t want you running around the casino by yourself.”
I roll my eyes and he cocks a stern brow. “Indulge me, cucciola mia. I need to know you’re up here keeping my bed warm with this hot little body.”
He pulls me against him and I melt into his hard-muscled form.
“What’s cucciola?”
“Pet. I called you my pet.”
That seems a fitting name for a woman he thinks he owns.
I swallow down my nerves. He respects me. He just created a dream job for me. I don’t need to be afraid.
Or do I?
Chapter 10
Nico
I enter my suite around five in the morning. Like every night this week, Sondra’s in my bed sleeping. Where she belongs.
My guys found the drugs in her car—a half pound of molly, which has a street value of more than $30K. They delivered it to her asshole ex with a mild beat-down and the warning to never contact Sondra again. Problem solved. I’m not even pissed anymore, because I got to be her hero.
I stand in the doorway and look at her, so beautiful, her expression sweet in slumber. If I were a decent man, I’d let her sleep. But I can’t fucking sleep until I’ve put my dick into her, so I take off my clothes and climb over her.
She murmurs something in her sleep, her knees parting to make room for me. My cock is harder than stone, already leaking for her. I’ve been waiting for this moment all fucking night, but I had three private games to manage that took my attention.
Sondra’s wearing a tank top and a pair of pink satin panties. I tug up her tank and feast on one nipple.
“Nico.” She weaves her fingers into my hair, her eyelids fluttering as she wakes.
I love hearing my name on her lips. I thumb her pussy over the triangle of silk covering it. “You’re wearing panties in my bed, baby.”
She smiles. “Oops.”
I pause for a beat, trying to work out if she means what I think she does. Last night, in a fit of filthy talk, I told her I expected to find her pussy bare when I come to bed.
“Are you hoping for a spanking?”
Her grin grows wider and she arches into me.
I yank down the panties. “You’ll be punished for that, amore.”
She rolls her hips on the bed. I flip her over to her stomach and slap her ass. It’s so spankable, but I’m low on patience tonight. I smack her cheeks a half-dozen times and then knock her legs wide. “Spread ‘em for me, angel. I’m harder than steel for you and I have been all night.” I grab a pillow and shove it under her hips to give me a better angle. “No foreplay for you, naughty girl. You’ll have to take my cock exactly how I want to give it to you.”
She raises her ass. Oh hell, a few slaps won’t kill her. I meant to keep them light, but the second my hand connects with her ass, I want more. I smack her harder, louder. Four more. She moans, wantonly. “I gave you one simple rule. Keep this pussy bare for me.” I push her ass cheeks wide. “Makes me think you wanted my punishment.”
She makes an mmm sound.
I grip her hair and lift her head. “Did you?”
“Yes!” she gasps.
I release her hair and massage her scalp to take away the sting.
“Maybe I should fuck your ass to teach you a lesson.” She goes rigid, which wasn’t what I was going for. Still, I pull her cheeks wide and bump the head of my cock against her anus to make her squeal.
“No, please,” she whimpers.
“Are you going to be a good girl?”
“Yes, sir.”
Oh Madonna. I love it when she calls me sir. I roll on a condom and push into her without preamble. She’s already slick with her own juices, but she cries out. I stop at the hilt and bite her neck. “Okay, baby?”
“Yes. Yes, Nico.”
Damn. I’m one stroke in and already need to come, ju
st because she said my name. “That’s right, baby. Say my name. Whose cock are you going to take?”
She moans and even through the condom I can tell her pussy got wetter. “Yours. God, yes.”
I mutter several curses in Italian as I continue to plow into her. She’s so soft, so willing. So fucking responsive. It’s like our bodies were made for each other’s. I need her with an intensity that humbles me.
This is what drives me to act like a possessive asshole. To want to own her, control her. I know it’s not right, but I can’t stop myself. And while it turns her on, I also know it scares her. Which also turns her on. I’m learning everything that makes my little art historian tick.
I push her ass cheeks apart to give her the sensation of my loins against her asshole and she cries out, excitement wavering in her voice.
“This ass belongs to me, doesn’t it, bella?”
She moans with each quick pant, a tapestry of sound to accompany the slap of flesh against flesh.
“Say you need this cock, baby. Say you need it as much as I need your tight little pussy.”
“I need it,” she pants. “I need it so badly.”
It’s all over for me. My eyes roll back in my head. I ride her like my life depends on it, like if I don’t fuck her hard enough, neither one of us will survive. She fists the bed sheets, screaming with each thrust.
My balls draw up painfully tight, thrusts become erratic. “Come for me, angel. Come as fucking hard as I’m going to.”
I release, burying myself deep inside her and climaxing so forcefully I nearly black out. I’m gone for a few moments, and then I realize my weight is on her and I roll off, pulling her to spoon against my front, our bodies still connected.
I finger one nipple, gently squeezing and tugging. “Baby, you have no idea what you do to me.” The orgasm has me grateful. I want to offer her money, gifts, anything she’ll take. But I don’t want her to feel cheap, either. I know it’s a sensitive point for her. Every day I thank the stars I figured out a position she loves that I can pay her to do. “What can I do for you? Tell me what you need.”
She goes quiet for too long, which makes me itchy. Something’s on her mind. Something she’s not sure how to say.
I pull out of her and throw the condom in the wastebasket beside the bed. She half-rolled to her back, but her head’s still turned away from me. I roll her to face me. “Tell me, baby. I’m not making you happy. What is it?”
She blinks for a moment, then draws a breath. “Am I your girlfriend, Nico? Your booty call? What am I to you?”
I lean up on one elbow, trying not to show my alarm. This is the conversation I’ve dreaded. Can Nico Tacone have a girlfriend?
“What do you want to be?” I stroke her hair back from her face, but she jerks away, irritation in the movement.
“Are you asking if there’s someone else, baby? You have to know there’s not. You think I could come this hard if I were fucking another woman?”
She drags her lip through her teeth. “No,” she says slowly. “I don’t think that. It’s one of the things I like about you. You make me feel so desirable. If I had one hint there was another woman, I’d be out of here in a heartbeat. After Tann—”
I raise my brows and a warning finger. “Don’t say his name.”
“Well, you know what happened with him. I’m never doing that again.”
Alarm bells are going off in the back of my head. She’s telling me something important. She’s not going to tolerate infidelity. Which isn’t a problem.
Except for my fucking marriage contract.
Twenty-two years ago, my father made an arrangement with Giuseppe Pachino to permanently combine our two families. Because they are both old-world men, neither balked at the idea of binding a ten-year-old boy to a newborn girl without their consent. In fact, they celebrated the return to the old customs, their wisdom and our combined prosperous future. Giuseppe has no sons, and so my father, I believe, thought he was providing me with the chance to one day be boss of a powerful family. He didn’t realize I’d make my own chances. Become boss on my own terms.
But the two crime families have operated with mutually beneficial terms ever since.
I know very little about Jenna Pachino. I’ve avoided her like the plague. I kinda figured she must be as horrified by the contract as I am and would take my absence as a relief.
But I haven’t cancelled the contract. Only my father can do that, and he’s sitting in jail. And until now, it didn’t really matter to me.
And I shouldn’t consider it now. Because—
Fuck. I’ve been quiet too long. Sondra’s face closes.
“There’s no one else,” I say fiercely, to counteract whatever conclusion she’s drawn.
Except it’s a fucking lie, isn’t it?
“I don’t think you want to be permanently bound to me, though, baby. Do you know what I am?”
Even in the filtered light of the city coming through the windows I see her pale. Her mouth cinches up.
I grip her jaw. “I will fucking possess you. I’ll claim you for life. But I’d be condemning you to eternity with the devil. Crime is in my blood. Violence is behind my name. I’ve tried to distance myself. I try to keep my hands clean over here, running a legit business, paying taxes on the money we make. But I’ll never be free of it. And I don’t want to take you down with me.”
Her eyes fill with tears and she rolls away. I catch her by the waist as she sits up, her back to me.
“Please. Don’t go.” What am I asking her? My brain races, trying to come up with some solution, some compromise that will keep her in my bed. “Give me just a little more time with you. I’m not ready to give you up. Stay. Get my museum up and running. Redecorate the casino. Then I promise I’ll let you go.”
She turns to look back at me. I see longing and pain reflected in those beautiful blue eyes.
“I never beg, baby. That’s how much you mean to me.”
She doesn’t turn around. “What am I agreeing to?” Her voice sounds hoarse. “Just sex?”
“No.” My voice is harsh. Her question makes sense. Sex is all I’ve had time to give her, and yet the idea of her suggesting that’s all I want pisses me off. I need so much more than sex. I crave possessing her—body, mind, soul. “Girlfriend, if that’s how you want to define it. I want your time and attention, too.”
She gives a snort and I realize my lack of presence has been felt.
“I’m sorry I’ve been so busy, angel. I will make time for you. I promise.”
Even I hear the emptiness of the promise. Because it’s one I’m not sure how to deliver. This casino takes up twenty-three out of the twenty-four hours in a day, and the remaining hour it’s still in my thoughts, which is why I can’t sleep without fucking Sondra like a raging bull.
But if that’s what she needs, I’ll figure it the fuck out. I always do.
“Come back to bed, bella. You know I can’t sleep without you beside me.”
She allows me to tug her down to the mattress and wrap my longer body around hers. Within a few moments, her breath slows and she falls asleep. Me—I’m awake for an hour before I finally give up on sleep and go take a shower.
Sondra
“You’re falling for him.” Corey kicks her legs in the Bellissimo pool. We’re sitting on the side near the faux boulders and man-made waterfall, a week after Nico begged me to stay and promised to make time for me. It hasn’t happened.
“No, I’m not.”
“Bullshit. If you weren’t, you’d be perfectly happy to stay with him, let him pay for all your expenses and have great sex until you figure out your next move. But you’re not. You want something more.”
I drop into the pool, keeping my arms above the water. The knot of dread tightening in my belly tells me she’s dead on. I want something more and Nico can’t give it. He’s made that abundantly clear. Although I’m not sure if he’s telling me the whole story.
After being lied to and
cheated on more times than I care to admit, an alarm bell is going off somewhere in my subconscious. But maybe that’s just me being paranoid. Maybe I’m too damaged from my past mistakes to even know a relationship worth fighting for when it bites me in the ass.
“Well, something more isn’t on the docket.” I walk through the water, letting it cool my skin, warm from the sun.
“So you need to figure out what you want. If you need to protect your heart, you should go now. Or you could decide to just get everything you can out of this experience—great sex, resume building, publicity, a story to tell your grandkids—and ride it out until the museum’s set up, like he suggested.”
“Yeah.” I wish it were that easy. But my heart is totally in play. And it’s already showing signs of damage. And yet no part of me is willing to walk away yet.
I’m not sure why not—because it’s so intoxicating to be desired, I guess. And I might tell myself he’s all talk—this is the smooth-talking Romeo who has me under his spell, except I see first-hand how well he sleeps after we’ve had sex. He looks ten years younger afterward, the lines in his face easing, the light coming back into his eyes.
It’s egotistical to believe, but I think he needs me.
I climb out of the pool and wrap a towel around my waist. “I’m going to go work on the museum stuff.”
Corey pulls her feet out of the water and slips them into flip flops. “If he promised to make more time for you and he hasn’t delivered, you should demand it from him. That was the arrangement you had.”
Demanding anything from Nico Tacone is a big, fat laugh.
“Or you could just show up on the floor tonight in a sexy dress and watch him flip out.” A wicked grin plays around Corey’s lips.
I pause in the act of picking up my swim bag. Nico’s jealous enough that he didn’t want me dealing cards or cleaning anyone else’s room. It probably wouldn’t take much to tweak him into action. “That would guarantee a reaction.”
Corey smiles. “I have the perfect dress you can borrow. A slinky red wrap-around. Wear it with a pair of fuck-me pumps and he’ll forget all about work for the night.”