The Promise: Mafia Vows Two

by SR Jones

  “You’re so fucking perfect,” I tell her.

  “Keep hold of the ledge,” I order as I drop my other hand between her folds and pinch her clit at the same time as I roll a nipple hard between my thumb and forefinger.

  She cries out and clenches around me as she comes. I push her over some more, so she’s bent at her waist completely, and with one hand on her lower back, and the other on the wooden ledge, I fuck into her, losing myself completely.

  When I come down, I gather her up, kissing along her damp shoulder, nibbling at her neck and the shell of her ear.

  She turns to me, wraps her arms around me, and kisses me soft and sweet. For now, for a moment, the fire between us is banked, and I look at her with a tenderness normally masked by lust.

  “I love you,” I tell her. The words get easier each time I say them.

  “I love you too,” she replies.

  “I want to make a promise to you,” I tell her. “Come here.” She walks with me to the corner of the room where I open the jewelry box. “See this watch?”

  She nods.

  “It’s a Patek Philippe. My father left it to me. I don’t want it. I don’t want anything of his. I used to think it was somehow cursed. That everything he touched, that any of the men touched in my family, was evil, like them. I know I’m not a good man. I do bad things all the time. But when it comes to you, I think I’m a better man than I could have ever hoped. I’ll never cheat on you. I won’t let you down. I promise. Our marriage started out as fake, but this, our life together, it’s the most real thing I’ve ever had. So this watch? I’m saving it for when we have a son, and I’ll pass it onto him, confident that I broke the curse of our family.”

  “Oh, Damen.” Maya has tears gathering in her eyes, but I’m not done yet.

  “And this ring?” I point to it, and she nods. “This was my mother’s wedding ring. It’s one of the few pieces of her left. I could have given it to you, but again, I didn’t want that. I want us, our marriage, to be a totally clean slate. Instead, we’ll give this ring, together, to our daughter when we have one. Another symbol of how we’ve both overcome the past. I also got this for you.”

  I open the top drawer of the dresser and take out two boxes. “When we went through your mother’s things, you were upset we couldn’t find her wedding and engagement rings. I found out Spiros tried to pawn them. I got them back for you. They’re yours, so I won’t tell you what to do with them, but I figured we could maybe melt your mother’s rings and my mother’s ring down, and make a totally new piece of jewelry from them both to pass onto our daughter, and that way she’ll carry the strength of both our mothers with her.”

  She’s properly crying now, tears running down her cheeks. “What if we don’t have a daughter? Or a son for that matter?”

  “We will; I can feel it. I think we’ll have three or four children.”

  She gives a squeak. “Wow, okay. Not sure I want four, Damen. Two, maybe three. And not yet.”

  “Not yet,” I say with a smile. “I need a few years more of fucking you senseless before we decide to let sleepless nights disturb all of that.”

  “See? Such an animal.”

  “You love it.”

  “I do. And I love your idea. Melting the rings down. Making one piece of awesome jewelry to represent both our mothers. And then this watch, it can be passed down to our son.” She worries at her lip.

  I tip her chin up, forcing her gaze to meet mine. “What is it?”

  “I just worry, what will happen if we can’t have kids? If I can’t?”

  I kiss her forehead. “Maybe I won’t be able to either. We don’t know the future. If we can’t, we’ll adopt. Or, we’ll become the best Aunt and Uncle in the world to Alesso and Stella’s kids because you know those two are going to happen at some point.”

  She giggles. “They so are.”

  “There’s this as well,” I tell her, as I pull out an envelope from the same drawer.

  She takes it, opens it, and gives a gasp of delight. “Paris?”

  “Yeah. We re-did the wedding, so how about we re-do the honeymoon? End of April because I hear Paris in spring is just so Paris.”

  She grins and wraps her arms around me in a hug. She’s still naked, I’m still naked, and if she thought we were done fucking, she’s deluded.

  I take the envelope from her hands and place it back in the drawer before I maneuver her to the bed.

  “Ready for round two, Mrs. Lambrakis?”

  “Always, Mr. Lambrakis.”

  Closing my eyes, I kiss my her and let myself fall into the heaven that is my wife.

  EPILOGUE: PART TWO

  Alesso

  Wandering into the room that’s now a library, one made purely for Maya’s benefit, but with a games table and a drinks bar in the corner for the boys, I yawn and look around.

  It’s been a boring weekend. The weather turned mid-week, and it is raining. There hasn’t been any action on the work front for a few weeks, and whilst I’m enjoying the lull, I get the sense this is the calm before the storm. After the wedding day, when Spiros showed up and loitered outside the venue, Damen, Markos, and I discussed what we should do about the threat from him and Yannis. For now, we’re biding our time. Damen is looking into them, watching them, and so far, he’s only found some low-level shit they’re involved with. Spiros is using his Cretan connections to bring some drugs into his old social circle, and Yannis is helping. We don’t give a fuck about shit like that. We do give a fuck those two bastards are working together, which we don’t like one little bit.

  So, we watch, and we wait, and we work on the management side of things more deeply. While I enjoy being more involved in the high-level strategy stuff, I can’t deny I miss the more hands-on work we did as enforcers and security.

  Does that make me sick? Maybe.

  I believe Damen would feel the same, but these days he seems to get his adrenalin fix from arguing with, and making up with, Maya. Those two will probably be bickering into old age, but damn they’ve got chemistry. You could probably light the house on the sparks between them.

  My mind drifts to Stella. Beautiful, poised, good girl, Stella, and all the depraved and dirty things I want to do to her.

  She thinks she wants me, but she doesn’t. I know her kind. Stella probably wants a nice meal out, wine, pleasant conversation about interesting topics, like the latest play or the last great book she read. If she wants to get edgy, she might venture into talking about politics.

  Her idea of kink would probably be wearing pink fluffy handcuffs.

  My idea of vanilla would be ripping her panties off, stuffing them in her mouth, and tying her to my bed while I fuck her senseless.

  We don’t match.

  Doesn’t stop me from wanting her. There’s something almost regal, haughty, about her. An untouchable air that makes her alluring in a you can’t have this way. It’s natural too, not practiced. Not fake.

  If Maya is fire, Stella is cool, calm ice. A dark-haired Grace Kelly to Maya’s red-haired Monroe.

  I want to melt her. See what ticks underneath her calm surface. She’s not as poised as her manners would indicate. I’ve seen her at times when no one else is looking, taking an extra deep breath in, or nibbling on a nail. I think under her calm exterior, she’s scared. Of what, I don’t know. I want to find out. I want to find out other things too.

  What will she be like in bed? I want to find out if she’s fucked many men and what she likes. What makes her lose her cool and scream.

  I can’t.

  If I go there and fuck it up, and I would, it will alter things between Maya and me, and possibly me and Damen. No one needs that drama. We aren’t in high school now, all dating each other’s best friends and all the falling outs that kind of juvenile shit entails. We’re grown fucking adults, and one of us has to act like it.

  Doesn’t stop me from wanting to touch her, though. To feel her silky, dark hair slip through my fingers as I tilt her head th
e way I want it, right before I kiss her.

  Only last week, I had her between my legs as I held her arms out straight, showing her how to aim the gun she was using for target practice. We’ve been working our way up to something I think will be big enough and powerful enough to keep her safe, but small enough to fit into a purse.

  She’d felt like heaven between my thighs, and it had been the biggest high of my week.

  God, I’m so bored. There’s been no action for weeks and weeks, which is good. I don’t want any danger to threaten Maya ever again, but if only Stamatis would send us on a gig where we have to teach some loose-lipped dick a lesson. I got into this life to save my family; I stayed to save myself. I can no more sit at a desk day in and day out, than most people could do my job.

  I need some action.

  So bored, I’m considering going out and finding someone to screw, I head to the drink cabinet. I might have a brandy or two, and then cross the road to the bar on the beach. The beachfront isn’t open yet as it is still too early in the season, but it’s a Saturday night and the inside area will be busy. Thrumming with bodies, people wanting to find some sin and sex to take their minds off the mundanity of life. People like me.

  These days, though, the casual encounters have lost their thrill. It’s so … easy. No challenge, no chase. With Stella there’s a challenge because everything about her screams she’s not the kind of girl for me. Her parents would send her to a nunnery if they knew a man like me wanted her.

  For a moment, I let my mind drift into a daydream of me with Stella, not just screwing her, but with her, and I can picture the horror on her parent’s face every time they visit.

  It comes to a screeching halt when I remind myself, I don’t do relationships. Maybe I should give it a go? It can’t be that boring because Damen loves it, and so does Andrius, and the thought of heading to that bar and screwing some nameless woman holds little appeal.

  Pouring the brandy, I swirl it in the glass, and pause to tilt my head when I hear raised voices.

  Maya.

  She sounds stressed. God, I wonder what Damen’s done now.

  I’m glad he moved their bedroom across the house so at least I won’t have to listen to their enthusiastic making-up. Hopefully though, I’ll be doing some Olympic-level screwing myself later.

  The door to the library flies open and Maya storms in, but one look at her, and I realize this is no normal row; she’s upset—not angry.

  “I need those answers like yesterday,” Damen grouses to someone on the phone, before hanging up.

  “What’s going on?” I ask with a sinking sensation. Jesus, I hope to fuck this isn’t some shitty karmic crisis unfolding in return for me being bored with the good life. At least, not if it’s a threat to Maya because fate surely can’t take my boredom out on that girl; she’s been through enough.

  “What’s wrong?” I push.

  Maya turns to me, her green eyes dark and wet with unshed tears. Maya’s a crier. And a laugher. And a lover. She’s a heart on her sleeve kind of a person, so I try not to be too concerned.

  “You know the party on the yacht? The one Stella went to? The one she should have been home from hours ago? Well, no one’s heard from her.”

  “What? What party?” Something cold lodges in my chest. It’s so icy it takes my breath away, and it’s not a feeling I’m used to.

  Anger? No. Not that. Fear … yes, that’s it. A new and distinctly uncomfortable emotion for me these days. I used to feel it in the early days in the forces, but mostly these days I’m numb to it. Not much scares me after all. Dying doesn’t scare me. Pain does, I suppose. Suffering, of any kind scares me, but if I go out, it will probably be in a blaze of glory so no lingering pain. Anyway, most of my enemies, our enemies, aren’t close to being as deadly as we are.

  Now, though, now I feel fear for someone else.

  “What fucking party?”

  “Mind your mouth,” Damen snaps.

  “Sorry, Maya. Can someone please explain to me what’s going on?”

  Maya spills the whole story. How Stella has been stringing this corrupt politician along for weeks now, as she wants to get into his world, his inner circle, because she’d heard he’s dodgy. She got invited onto a party on his yacht, and her friend Alistair was going with her. It was a brunch thing, a few hours out on the ocean, weather permitting, then back to dock for around three. Except Alistair, who stayed at Stella’s last night was sick today, and couldn’t go with her. She went alone.

  “Sick how?” I ask, immediately suspicious.

  “Literally, sickness and diarrhea. Something he ate, or a virus.” Damen shrugs.

  “Or something someone gave him to make him ill so he couldn’t attend this supposed party.”

  “Oh, God,” Maya says. “I told her not to do this.”

  “Calm down,” Damen says. “I hacked Stella’s shit and found out who the politician is; he’s not high level.”

  “Who?” I demand, livid that Damen clearly knew about this days ago and never told me.

  He sighs, probably realizing what is running through my mind. “Chris Pachis.”

  I haven’t heard of him, but then again, I’m not interested in politics, particularly.

  “I’m looking into him as we speak, running a program that’s getting into his online life. There are no ties to crime, or anything hugely dodgy, but there is some low-level financial fraud. The only odd thing is that some of his stuff is super encrypted.”

  “You’re one of the best,” I tell Damen. “Surely you can hack it, right?”

  “Maybe, but even I’m struggling, and I’ve been at it a few days. I’ve got a kid who is a million times better than me looking into it. Might take some time, though.”

  I want to punch his lights out for not telling me about this. I can’t, though, because I need him right now, but when I get Stella back, when the dust settles, Damen and I will be having serious words.

  “It’s what? Seven pm.” Maya checks her phone. “So, they might just be a little late returning to dock. Partying too hard or something. I mean, there’s loads of celebs on the yacht with her. My ex-neighbor, Aggatha, is one of them.”

  “You got her number?” I ask.

  She nods. “Yes. It’s in my phone. I’ve not called her in forever, though.”

  “Call, and put it on speaker.”

  She does as I say, and after three rings it picks up. “Yassas?” Aggatha uses the formal Greek for hello.

  “Hey, it’s me, Maya.”

  “Oh, Maya. Hello. How are you?”

  The politeness is so fucking phony, I don’t even stop to think. Alarm bells blaring, I take the phone out of Maya’s hands and speak. “Aggatha, you don’t know me, but if you don’t answer my next question honestly, I’m about to become your worst nightmare, and I promise you, I’m way scarier than whoever might have you over a barrel right now.”

  “Excuse me?” She puts a lot of imperiousness into her tone, but her voice is wobbling.

  “Did you go on a party today, on a yacht perchance? A certain politico’s yacht?”

  “I did, but the party never happened.”

  “What?” Maya interrupts. “Why?”

  “I don’t know. All I know is it was cancelled soon after we arrived. I have to go now.”

  “Wait,” Maya interjects. “You know my friend, Stella, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was she there?”

  “I don’t … I don’t think so, no. I don’t recall, but I don’t think so.”

  Lie. I can fucking taste it on the air. For an actress she’s shitty at this stuff. “Okay, you have five seconds to revise that lie of an answer. After which, you’ll be getting a visit and no amount of locks on your doors, or police cruisers in the street outside, will keep you safe from me.”

  “Oh God, you’re one of them, aren’t you?”

  “If by them, you mean very dangerous people who will fuck you up if you don’t start to be honest, yes I am
.”

  “I mean, the men who were guarding Maya and her mother. Mafia,” she whispers the word. “Like him, that bastard Yannis.”

  “Yannis, what’s he got to do with this?” Damen asks.

  “I’m sorry, Maya,” she starts to sob. “He threatened me, made me do it. Said it was one small favor, and then he swore he’d leave me alone for good.”

  “What did you do, Aggatha? Tell us and we promise, we won’t hurt you.” Damen’s deep voice is soothing, rich like chocolate.

  Like hell we won’t hurt her. If she’s caused Stella to be put in harm’s way, I won’t be responsible for my actions. I knew this day would come, the day Yannis would rear his ugly fucking head again, but I never imagined it would involve Stella.

  “I had to go to the y-y-yacht, and w-w-when Stella arrived, I was to pretend I was partying on there. Then me and the other people, who in reality were all Yannis’ staff, would leave as soon as she was on board and … and ... and s-s-s-secured. Your friend is out there on the ocean with Pachis and Yannis. All alone.”

  “Do you know where they plan on taking her?” Damen asks, his voice less controlled now.

  “No, but I know the Pappas family have a home on a tiny rocky island, about an hour’s sailing away.”

  “You’ve been very helpful, Aggatha, thank you.”

  Damen hangs up, and his face is fury incarnate. I know why. He’s not only worried for Stella, but for his wife, who has faced more losses and stress in a few months than most face in a lifetime. Part of this is his fault, though, for sitting on this, and thinking looking slowly through this bastard’s life was enough. He should have come to me, the damn control freak.

  “We’ll get her back, baby. I promise,” he says to Maya.

  “No,” I interject, not wanting him with me on this for two reasons; one of which is I’ll want to shoot him in the face. “You can’t leave Maya. Yannis’ involvement in this means there’s a renewed threat. You need to be here, for your wife, and for Stamatis and this organization. You stay here with Markos and man things here, and let me take Cole and one of the Spetsnaz guys.”