The second level was mostly guest bedrooms, obviously untouched. The living room, dining room, kitchen, another sitting room, sunroom, and Nico’s office were all on the main level. One of my favorite pieces of furniture in the entire house was his dining table. It looked like it had been assembled from whiskey barrels. Rustic and worn, there was metal pipelining along the edges that looked exactly like the metal fittings that were bolted into whiskey barrels.
It had character. I loved it.
Moving on from there, I ventured downstairs where I found the gym. But after seeing the imprints of Nico’s butt cheeks on the bench press and inhaling the not unpleasant manly musk in the air, I made a mad dash out of there and sprinted to the room at the opposite end of the hallway.
“Holy shit.”
There were bottles of alcohol everywhere.
Racks and racks of it—wine, beer, whiskey, bourbon, scotch, vodka. Everything you could name, it appeared to be here. I recalled seeing a random article about Nico having one of the largest privately owned collections of liquor and spirts in the world during my Google search, but I’d skirted right past it.
In the center of the cellar-type room was a sitting area with blood red leather furniture placed around a huge fireplace. A pool table sat along one wall, with a small bar in the corner. It was essentially the most expensive man cave I’d ever seen. The epitome of all men’s fantasy lands.
It was a booze bunker.
I noted that the few wine and whiskey bottles I examined were highly sought-after labels and expensively priced. So, he wasn’t just a collector for the sake of being a collector. He actually did his research and only bought the best of the best. Impressive.
I didn’t get a chance to inspect the rest of his inventory because I heard the front door open and close above my head, followed my multiple sets of footsteps.
Great. The hubby was back and with company.
Quiet as a mouse, I tiptoed up the stairs, hoping I’d be able to sneak past them and up to my room without being noticed. But I froze like a statue when I realized the new arrivals weren’t Nico and his buddies.
They were women.
Three of them. All small and petite, with dark hair and dark skin. Maybe slightly younger than me. Of course, each one of them was gorgeous.
It seemed that Nico definitely had a type, and it wasn’t me. In fact, it was the polar opposite of my long legs, blond hair, blue eyes, and microscopic boobs.
That’s good!
I didn’t want to be his type.
But that didn’t stop the green-eyed monster from stepping onto the scene and snagging the reins of my emotions. Nico knew I would be here, yet he’d still invited his regulars over. It was irrational to feel hurt by that. The man was an egotistical, self-involved arse. What did I care if he wanted to continue his whorish ways while in matrimony with me? It was probably good that he did. Because then I would have absolutely zero temptation to touch him.
It wasn’t like the hollow vows we’d recited to each other actually meant anything. I hadn’t anticipated that he’d maintain a steady string of one-night-stands while I was here, but what was to stop him? We had no claim on each other. Not really.
But I didn’t have to bear witness to it.
I was going to have to speak with him about taking his gang bangs elsewhere. I wouldn’t make a fuss or ask questions as long as I didn’t have to see it with my own eyes or—God forbid—hear it with my own ears.
Three pairs of eyes went wide when the women noticed me.
Ah, Prince Charming didn’t mention he tied the knot, did he?
Must have been quite a shock for them. So help me, if they actually asked me to join them…
“I was wondering when the harem would arrive,” I muttered dryly. “Look, I’m not his boss, so I can’t tell him where he can or can’t stick his wick. How about we just say, you stay out of my way, and I’ll stay out of yours. Sound fair?”
Their mouths were all agape.
Then the one wearing a black leather jacket and liquid leggings said, “Did she just accuse me of sleeping with my own brother?”
All the blood drained from my face.
Brother? Oh, God.
How did I not know that Nico had siblings?
“Wait, you’re his…sisters? Not his…?” I trailed off, cringing. I just needed to shut up.
When they all burst into laughter, some of the pressure in my chest eased.
“I’m the sister,” Leather Jacket said between wheezes. “Nico’s only sister. Gia.”
I warily shook the hand she offered. “Um…Lexi.”
“I’m the soon-to-be sister-in-law,” the one with dazzling almond eyes said. “I’m Jasmine, Cris’s fiancé.”
After shaking her hand, the third one with lustrous, curly brown hair introduced herself. “Roxy. Ace’s girlfriend.”
I bit my lip, feeling pretty stupid. “Who are Cris and Ace?”
They shot each other confused looks. “Nico hasn’t told you anything, has he?” Gia asked speculatively.
“About…?”
She groaned. “That jerk-hole.”
Roxy blew out a breath, stepping forward to wind her arm through mine. “Oh, honey. Let’s sit down. This is going to take a few minutes.”
An hour later, my head was a swirling vortex of facts about Nico, the Rossettis, and their most recent involvements with the New York Firm. Batya mentioned Nico had connections with the five families, but I didn’t realize they were to this extent.
“Wow,” I murmured when they finished laying out the events of the last several months. “I can’t believe all of that has happened.”
I took a sip of the wine we’d popped for this little pow-wow. Gia insisted that Nico wouldn’t mind us raiding his stash, saying “he has enough booze to keep him hammered through five zombie apocalypses.”
And when she put it that way…
Jasmine scrunched up her nose. “Try planning a wedding in the middle of this hurricane. It’s been a nightmare. I actually considered getting all the guys fitted for Kevlar vests to wear under their tuxes.”
My hand went to my throat. “Is it really that bad?”
Jasmine’s eyes widened, her hand squeezing my arm. “Oh, my God, no. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to freak you out. Raphael Esposito and the Gabbianos are in jail, so most of the danger has passed. It’s just…we have to be on our guards for a while, you know?”
“But you’re used to that, though, right?” Gia asked. “As Sergei Kozlov’s daughter, you’re not exactly new to this game.”
They definitely weren’t treating the new girl with kid gloves. I appreciated that. “No, I’m certainly not.”
“How are you doing with all this?” Roxy asked gently. “It’s got to be a huge adjustment.”
That was like saying Chernobyl had been a small campfire.
“As well as I can, I suppose. I haven’t had loads of time to really stop and think about it.”
“If it makes you feel any better,” Jasmine interjected, running her finger around the rim of her wine glass, “Cris said Nico is just as freaked out as you are.”
Did that make me feel better? A little, I guess. That meant we were both wandering through this unprecedented experience blindly. Maybe we were more on the same page than I thought.
“When did Nico talk to Cris?”
“Last night,” Jasmine answered. “He came by our place.” She laughed. “I swear, the man barely notices when he gets shot, yet he acts like he’s dying of a terminal illness after saying ‘I do.’”
My mind glommed onto the first part of her statement. “Nico was shot?”
Roxy winces. “Yeah, a couple of months ago. It was just a graze on his neck. Didn’t even need stitches.”
She said she was in medical school, studying to become a doctor, so I guess she would know.
On his neck, though.
What if it had been just a little higher? Something icky coiled inside me at the thought of Nico i
n pain, or worse. Again, I had no idea why I cared. Like Gia said, he was a jerk-hole.
“He helped save mine and Cris’s lives before that,” Jasmine added.
My heartbeat picked up its pace. “How?”
“After Cris shot Stefano Esposito and got me out of that warehouse, we had to run down six flights of fire escapes. When the explosion went off, Cris and I were thrown from the second story stairwell. Cris was knocked unconscious, and I was pretty out of it. Nico carried both of us to safety. The fire escapes above our heads collapsed seconds after he got us out of the way.”
Nico had put himself in danger to save them? He hadn’t known whether or not those stairwells would collapse on top of him as he’d carried them away.
Over and over he’d professed that he wasn’t a hero.
But I was starting to think that Nico was a big, fat liar.
“All right,” Gia said, pushing to her feet. “Enough of this maudlin chit-chat. We’re taking you out, Russian.”
When I opened my mouth to protest, her hand sliced through the air, cutting me off.
“No arguments. We’re your sisters now, and this is our sacred duty. Consider this your engagement party, bachelorette party, and wedding reception all rolled into one.”
I grinned. “Well, in that case.”
They all cheered as we clinked glasses.
I hadn’t had any girl time in a pathetically long time. And it felt amazing. Just what I didn’t know I needed.
“Where to?” Roxy asked, bouncing up and down on her cushion.
“Oh! O’Malley’s is doing Battle of the Sexes tonight,” Jasmine suggested excitedly.
Gia whooped. “Let’s hit it.”
Little did I know that my new sisters were about to toss me straight into shark-infested waters.
And a certain man bun-wearing, whiskey-loving smartass smelled my blood in the water the second I walked through the door.
The image of Lexi in a bikini, splashing around in my goddamn pool, was haunting me.
My concentration had been fucked ever since she’d uttered those damning words. To make matters worse, she’d been prancing around my house in those silky little pajamas that were no more than a few tiny scraps of material sewn together with some lacy edging.
So, rather than go back to the house after work to endure more of that torture, I’d asked my brothers to meet me at our favorite haunt, smack dab in the heart of Brooklyn, O’Malley’s Irish Pub and Grill.
“Needed a night away from the ‘ol ball and chain, huh?” Luka snarked.
Nothing I hadn’t come prepared for.
“He’s probably just pissy that he can’t even get laid by his own wife,” Rome quipped.
All four of them snickered, Cris being the only decent one to try and hide it behind his glass of scotch.
I glowered. “Just for that, you dickheads can buy every round for the rest of the night.”
“Now, are you sure you don’t need to check in with the missus first?” Ace asked. “She may not want you staying out too late.”
“Ah, the husband curfew,” Luka mused. “I’ve heard of this.”
I couldn’t even threaten to kick all of their asses because I’d brought this upon myself, in more than one way. So, I was going to sit here and take my ribbing like a fucking man.
“I need more whiskey,” I grumbled.
Didn’t mean I wouldn’t be wallowing in a mixture of self-pity and sexual frustration while I did it.
The bar was beginning to fill up for the Battle of the Sexes event that was starting soon. O’Malley’s was popular for its live music, trivia nights, beer pong tournaments, karaoke, and a slew of random games to bring in patrons, like tonight. Because of the rising noise surrounding our table, I didn’t notice what had caught Cris’s and Ace’s attention over my shoulder.
“Did you tell them we were going to be here?” Ace frowned at Cris.
“I only texted Jasmine where we were, like, ten minutes ago.”
I turned around on my stool and instantly locked eyes with Lexi’s sapphire gems. She froze on the spot, looking a little spooked and a lot intimidated. Gia, Roxy, and Jasmine preceded her to our table, all of them smiling and offering greetings.
Lexi approached much slower, like she was being led to the gallows. I wanted to soothe her nerves somehow, ease her anxiety. For some reason, I wanted her to feel comfortable not just around me, but around my family, as well.
Mother of Christ, she just had to look stunning, too.
The lightweight dress she wore was cream with a red rose print. Transparent long sleeves, cinched waist. And damn, was it short. Though it probably hadn’t been made that way. Lexi’s legs just made anything look too short. Those gracefully long stems were wrapped up in scarlet-colored tights that I wanted to tear off her body and shred to pieces. Her hair was held up by a clip, a few tendrils hanging down to frame her face.
And of course, she couldn’t go without her red lipstick, could she?
Cris kicked me under the table, breaking our eye contact. It was only then that I realized how long I’d been staring at her. He inclined his head toward Lexi, basically telling me in his silent way remember what we talked about and don’t be fucking rude.
Clearing my throat, I rose to my feet. When I ushered her closer, my body loomed over hers, but I kept my hands to myself. “Everyone, this is Alexia Kozlov. Lexi, this is Cris, Ace, Luka, and Rome. They’re dicks on any other day, but they’re going to fool you by trying to be charming tonight.”
“I thought that was your department,” she deadpanned.
That sent the entire table into uproarious cackles.
Our eyes met for the briefest of moments. Hers sparkled with pleasure, maybe even a little mischief. I felt my upper lip curl in response.
“Not bad, legs,” I said in a voice that only she could hear.
“I’ve been saving up my own charm for the right moment,” she replied. “Taking my cues from you, I guess.”
Instead of sparking irritation, that only made my grin widen.
“Four days in and she’s already got your number, bro,” Luka guffawed.
Lexi huffed. “He likes to pretend to be the International Man of Mystery, but it turns out he wasn’t all that hard to figure out.”
That set off another round of laughter.
I bent down and placed my mouth at her ear. “Careful. That smart mouth is going to get you in a whole mess of trouble one of these days.”
Her eyebrow notched up in challenge. “Maybe that’s what I’m going for.”
She did not just say that.
She couldn’t have.
Because that was the kind of talk that could blow shit wide open for us. If I got even the tiniest inkling that she wanted to spread her sensationally long legs for my cock, I’d slam inside her so fast she wouldn’t even have time to blink. Maybe if she understood what asking for sex from me truly meant—how it would impact our situation—she wouldn’t have been flirting.
If she thought the shooting at her father’s compound had been dangerous, she had no fucking clue what I could do to her.
Bullets had nothing on the kind of damage I was capable of inflicting.
The level of destruction I was prone to causing.
Sex would be our worst enemy. The most dangerous gateway drug. The most addictive high.
I averted my gaze when I felt beads of sweat gather at my temples.
“So, you guys ready?” Gia asked the table, rubbing her hands together.
Ace frowned. “Ready for what?”
“To get your asses handed to you by a bunch of girls.”
God, she was cute. And unbelievably sexy. I didn’t know a woman could be both of those things in equal measure until I met Lexi.
Round one of our Battle of the Sexes game was multiple choice. By the time it was Lexi’s turn, the guys were ahead by one point. She looked scared as hell when Jasmine turned to her for her first question.
“Okay, Lex… W
hat country is Heineken beer made in? Denmark, Holland, or Germany?”
Too fucking easy. But would she know it?
Lexi’s eyes confidently met mine. There was no hesitation. “Holland.”
I smiled.
“Correct!”
Her entire face glowed with pride. Her pale, supple cheeks flushed a rosy pink, and her smile wouldn’t stay off her face. My favorite look on her so far.
Happiness.
“All right, Nico’s up.”
Cris held up a card in front of me. He laughed under his breath as his eyes flew over the question before he read it aloud. “When do you eat the top of your wedding cake? First anniversary, day after the wedding, or the wedding night?”
Jesus Christ.
Out of the five of us, I had to get this question?
Like a tractor beam, my eyes met Lexi’s across the table. “First anniversary.”
“Correct!”
Miraculously, she was able to find the humor in the situation and laughed. Then I laughed. What else was there to do in light of our fucked up situation?
Each side went through another series of questions before it eventually came back to Lexi. “Where is Jack Daniels whiskey made? Kentucky, Texas, or Tennessee?”
Another question about alcohol. Someone’s definitely planting these cards. Only this time, I was pretty sure Lexi wouldn’t get it right.
She gave me that same confident grin from before as our gazes collided. I wanted to give her a hint, wanted her to get it right, but I refrained.
“Kentucky.”
I shook my head.
“Incorrect. Tennessee.”
Her face dropped. “But I thought—”
“The Bourbon Trail is in Kentucky, legs,” I told her in a cajoling tone. “And there are a lot of distilleries there, including mine. But Jack Daniels started out in Tennessee.”
The fact that she had actually been listening that day I’d talked about the Bourbon Trail had my cock swelling something fierce.
Not here.
Not in the middle of this damn bar, in front of my brothers and sister.
The frown line between her eyebrows—something I noticed only appeared whenever she was upset—smoothed out at my words.
Booze and Bullets (Brooklyn Brothers #3) Page 11