by Fiona Murphy
"I'm not a baby!" Eva yells at me as she watches from the open door of her bedroom. "I got you the gag for a reason, daddy. Mom, for the thousandth time, I'm turning nineteen, not nine. You and daddy need time to yourselves. It's your twenty-fifth wedding anniversary for fuck's sake."
"Language, brat, and you helped him. No allowance for six months."
"Daddy!" Eva pouts at Dominic.
Dominic shakes his head, as he kisses her forehead, as if I'm not even here, over his damn shoulder, getting dizzy from the blood rushing to my head. "You're getting your allowance. Be a good girl, your aunt Chloe will check on you. If she tells me you aren't, then it's no allowance."
Eva frowns as she considers her aunt, then smiles at me and waves before slamming the door back into her room. "That little girl has plans." I groan as I smack Dominic hard on his ass as we thump down the stairs.
"Of course she does. This was her idea. I wouldn't expect anything less than a raging party. Mary will be here but we both know she’s as likely to help Eva as stop her.” Mary had become a grandmother to the girls, a huge help in the first years after we brought Carmen and Elisabetta home. Then she was a part of our family we and the girls couldn’t do without. “I have Vincent keeping an eye on not just her but all the girls while we're gone."
"Her idea, what part?"
"Bye, have fun, Mom. I love you." Elisabetta bends down to kiss my cheek, her phone recording the whole damn thing. She better enjoy it now because when I get back, she's losing that damn phone. "Carmen says she loves you and has fun. She had to get to class, I'm running late, as usual. Bye daddy, you're so big and strong. Giulia and Giana didn't think you could carry mom down the stairs, but I knew you wouldn't have a problem. Say hi, for the girls Mom." She gasps, "Mom, that was not nice. It's a good thing you're taking her daddy, she definitely needs a time out."
"Please be good, I'm trusting you can take care of the girls. Whatever Eva has planned, I will find out and all of you will pay for it, whether or not you are there." Dominic pulls our oldest in every way, born three minutes before Carmen and two years before Giulia who was followed by Giana then Eva, into a not so gentle hug.
As Dominic lets her go, I'm pleased to see her frown then take off up the stairs at speed. "I think you scared her enough now. Can I please—ouch, damn it Dominic."
He tosses me not so gently into the back of the car.
"Good morning, Mrs. Sabatini." Everett nods at me from the front seat.
I mutter, good morning, as I wrap the blankets tighter around me. It isn't easy to do with the damn silk tie tight around my wrists. Dominic leans over and buckles my seatbelt around me, copping a feel with a wicked glint in his eye. And I hate that I'm wet from it. God, he can be such an asshole sometimes.
"Please untie me now." It annoys me to no end that I'm pleading with him as he gets in beside me.
Shaking his head, he doesn't even look at me as he pulls out his phone. "Chloe, yeah, we're in the car on the way to the airport right now. I scared them, but I'm not sure if it's enough to make them behave themselves. Keep an eye on yours too. Elisabetta didn't like it when I mentioned you were going to be checking in on them. I'm turning off their debit and credit cards today, but they have cash stashed around the house." Dominic chuckles. "You are evil. Turning off their phones? I don't know about that. Ah, Regina likes the idea. Then again she's pissed at everyone right now so who knows how long that will last? All right, thank you. We owe you. Yeah, yeah, dinner from the club delivered for the next few weeks. Already arranged, just call it in. See you in two weeks."
"I hate you." I sigh as we turn into the small commuter airport and the plane comes into view.
"I love you too, dear wife." Dominic laughs as he gets out of the car.
He slings me over his shoulder again to get me up the stairs and I consider biting his ass, hard. I decide against it because he'll think it's sexy and I'm mad at him and he's not getting any sex for the next two weeks.
"Hello, Mr. Sabatini, Mrs. Sabatini. Refreshments are in the bedroom as requested, sir. If you need anything, let me know." Colin, the cheerful flight attendant waves as Dominic slams the door behind us.
I land on the bed with a thump. I'm barely on the bed before Dominic is on me, I turn my head, refusing to give him my mouth. "I hate you, get off me."
Damn it, he captures my mouth, demanding everything. I don't stand a chance. I never do with him. I give up and into him giving everything he demands, all of me is his, has always been and always will be.
A very long time later, I wake up to Dominic sliding a ring on my right ring finger. It’s beautiful, large round diamonds are separated by platinum leaves all the way around the band. The diamonds are huge, at least a carat each. A gorgeous representation of the engagement ring he gave me all those years ago that had been his grandmothers. I catch his hand, pressing it flat against my heart. "I didn't need a ring. I just need you."
His smile is so wicked, I melt against him all over again. "The ring isn't for you, it's to make sure everyone who sees you know you're mine now and forever. Twenty-five years, Mrs. Sabatini, any regrets?"
How does he get more beautiful as every year goes by? I wonder as I run my hand over his cheek. Dominic is still one percent body fat, with muscles on muscles below his silk suits. He isn’t even completely silver yet with a fair amount of inky black among his silver hair. Twenty-five years and there are still moments when all the air leaves my lungs in a whoosh at the sight of him. "One." I sigh into his mouth. His eyes go wide, I giggle. "It's only twenty-five years. I wish it were longer. Thank you for the best twenty-five years of my life."
Rolling me under him, he kisses me soft and sweet. "We still have many years to go. Don't call them the best yet. Now that there is hope one day the girls will grow up and move out, I'm thinking I can make it even better."
"Right, they will never move out, which is all on you. You give them everything they want. Why in the world would they leave home? At least that's what Carmen told me just last week. Which is why I can't believe we won’t be here for Eva's birthday. It's her birthday, we should be with her on her birthday. That's why she's acting out. Deep down, she wishes we were there for it. We go away for a week at least twice every year, since they were five which you talked me into even though I didn't want to. I agreed with you about making time for just us, and we've been doing that. Weekends at a hotel, date nights, this is her birthday, Dominic."
Dominic rolls his eyes. "She's nineteen, Regina. She doesn't want us there for her birthday because she wants girls her age there, which is probably what all of her sneaky behavior is about. If we just gave her a regular party with friends instead of family, she wouldn't be sneaking around the way she is and feeling the need to throw some raging party. It's on us just as much as it's on her."
Oh god, he's right. Aside from a few parties when they were younger and her sixteenth, the last few birthday parties were all with family and at home or the club where only her two best friends were allowed. "Oh god, I suffocated her. I'm a horrible mother."
He sighs, "You are not a horrible mother. It's fine. It will be fine. As long as she doesn't wind up in jail or anything while we're gone. I'm sure whatever she gets up to, we can get her out of it easily enough."
Now I roll my eyes. "Who knows with her? She is much too comfortable playing a mafia princess when it suits her."
The girls figured out their daddy wasn't like other daddies when they were almost in their teens. It caused a year or two of turmoil, anger, frustration, and tears on all sides. Then they gave in to the love they had for their father. We had raised them with the understanding things weren't always black and white, there was far more gray than either color and the world helped them understand too. Seeing the world around them, they grew to trust that what Dominic did he did because he thought it was the right thing.
It helped he was an amazing father and they never once doubted his love. Dominic didn't just give them everything they wanted, he w
as there every day changing diapers, bathing them, dressing them, doing their hair, reading to them at night, and helping them with their homework.
Our girls adored their daddy to the point that sometimes it was hard not to be jealous. They were far more likely to call out for him in the middle of the night than they called for me. It wasn't always fair I had to be the tough guy because Dominic just crumbled when they turned their big eyes on him. I would like to think we have gotten away from me being the bad guy, but it was Dominic they ran to if they needed more money or just one hour later on their curfew. Little did they know they were all under surveillance, by their daddy. From their phone to their computers, to their friends. Dominic might take the need to protect a little overboard as far as they were concerned, I appreciated it though, and would never dream of telling on him.
A growl comes out of him.
"What?" I don't like the look in his eyes.
"Vincent's son has been eying Eva lately. I need to make sure he keeps his boy away from her."
"Hm." Is all I say as I trace my finger along his chin. It's far too late on that end, Eva is in love and there's no talking to her.
"What's that, hm?" He knows me too damn well.
"It's that those are worries we can deal with when we get back to Chicago. Now is about us."
“So true, my dear wife. I stole you away for a reason.” His eyes are full of his love as he bends down to kiss me.
Yes, yes to this and twenty-five more years of all this.
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Tony’s Book will come in May 2021, check here for updates and links once they are live: His: Tony
If this is your first read of the Sabatini Family their books are:
The Dirty Billionaires Series
His Dirty Demands features Cesare and Alicia
His Dirty Promises features Dante and Bethany
His Dirty Bargain features Enzo and Chloe
They are wide and available and you can find them on my website through the link for Tony’s book.
His Dirty Demands
Three billionaire brothers: Cesare, Enzo, and Dante Sabatini have everything except the one thing money can't buy. Three big beautiful women Alicia, Bethany, and Chloe will teach them the ABCs of love. Follow these couples as they negotiate the riskiest deal of all, falling in love.
It's hard to believe when I get the call: an offer to work for one of the Sabatini brothers. Cesare and Dante head a real estate firm that buys, sells, and owns some of the most spectacular real estate in Chicago. Dante Sabatini is the youngest of the brothers, and even though he's an arrogant manwhore he doesn't come close to the a$$hole level of the oldest Sabatini, Cesare. While I work for Dante, Cesare is in the office across the hall—and too close for comfort.. Even if I weren't a virgin, I'm very aware getting involved with Cesare Sabatini would be a complete disaster.
Until the moment I find out Cesare is having the same problem. The insanely gorgeous billionaire wants me? I'm a plus-size woman who has become numb to insults I have heard about my weight. I'm far from numb at the idea of throwing caution to the wind and giving in to the dirty demands Cesare whispered in my ear
Then I do something I never thought I would do. I steal twenty-five thousand dollars. I'm borrowing it, I'll put it right back.
When Cesare finds out, he demands twenty-five days and nights of my body in return for the money. Only all too quickly twenty-five days isn't enough—I want forever. But what does Cesare want?
This is the first in a standalone series. No cliffhanger ending.
His Dirty Promises
Dante Sabatini. Billionaire, manwhore extraordinaire—and my new next-door neighbor. Two years ago, my sister married his brother. Over the years I’ve heard all about him and seen his pictures everywhere, yet between me away in school and Dante’s hectic... ahem, “social life,” we keep missing each other. Until the day I move in across the hall from him. Nothing could have prepared me for Dante Sabatini in person. He’s more gorgeous than a photo could do justice—and more of an a$$hole than I thought was humanly possible.
Oh yeah, and he wants me. Me? Plus size, virgin, twenty-four to his thirty-five, nobody to the models and actresses he’s been with. Seriously? Only the jerk refuses to take me up on my begging to learn everything I can under his expert tutelage. We’re family now, and there’s too much at stake when we crash and burn he insists.
This guy is giving me whiplash and driving me crazy. We’re only five hundred feet from each other, but we’re separated by so much more. All I want is some fun, no promises or hand-holding necessary. Once I get what I want, will we be able to survive everything that comes our way... or will we crash and burn, hurting the people we love the most as we do?
His Dirty Bargain
My biological clock has been pounding, any minute now I'm going to hit buy on the sperm that's been sitting in my online cart for the last six months.... any minute. I want to be a single mom. The last five years without a man have been the best years of my life. Except, I do want kids, six if I had my way. But if I’m doing it alone I can’t really afford more than one.
At least what I need I can get off a website. I had no idea men had biological clocks too, Enzo Sabatini proved otherwise. The control-freak billionaire married a gold-digging womb to get the children he wanted, and not surprisingly it blew up in his face. With the ink barely dry on his divorce that lasted longer than his marriage, I'm tasked with finding him a new place to live. I can't believe it's really heat I see in his eyes when he looks at me. I'm nothing like his usual women, plus size compared to size zero
Shock is an understatement when I see the ring. I can barely process his insane proposal of me getting the dream house and the multifamily property I want in exchange for at least ten years and two kids. Wait, what? What kind of effing proposal is that? It's not a marriage proposal it's a bargain, one with limits and terms and signed off by lawyers. I don't care how hot he is he's lost his mind.
So why do I say, not yet instead of no? Is this going to be the biggest mistake of my life, or is there any way we can find a happy ever after from this dirty bargain?
His Fake Fiancée
Ivan Volkov is a wickedly intelligent, ruthless, and devastatingly gorgeous billionaire with a sexy British accent. He also owns the company I work for. The plan was simple: get his attention to show him I was the one behind all my boss's awesome proposals that have been making the company hundreds of millions of dollars for the last three years. I'm the one who should be in the big office making a six-figure salary.
It worked. I definitely have Ivan's attention. He'll put me in the big office with a six-figure salary—once he's done with me. He needs a personal assistant until he can find a replacement. It won't be long, he assures me, no more than a few weeks.
Close proximity to Ivan Volkov for a few weeks? Sure, I don't need my dignity. I wasn't using it anyway. No matter how many times I tell myself to stop staring at him with lust, I can't.
Volkov turns down the offer I never even made; he saw me staring, he's used to it by now. An unrepentant user of woman, all he wants is for them to satisfy his need, then be on their way. He can get that satisfaction from any woman. The money I make him isn't worth losing when he's done with me.
Until the moment he needs more: a shield from a woman who won't take no for an answer. He will do anything to protect his little sister from having her wedding ruined, even faking an engagement with me. Brilliant tactician that he is, he comes up with the answer to both of his problems. For the next three weeks we can satisfy the lust we both feel, while at the same time making it clear he isn't available.
But before long what's between us feels all too real. Can this lead to forever, or will the billionaire choose money over love?
This is the first standalone in a series about fake relationships. This does not end in a cliffhanger.
ic: The Sabatini Family