Contents

Title

Blurb

Rights

Title.

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Acknowledgements

Also by Jessica Gadziala

About the Author

Stalk Her!

N E E D

H I M

L I K E

O X Y G E N

—

Jessica Gadziala

Blurb

Within the ruthless hierarchy of the mafia, Dav and Cinna reign as powerful capos within the same crime family.

Dav, with his gregarious charm and flirtatious disposition, hides a secret darkness that few ever glimpse. Despite his relentless advances, Cinna, strong-willed and fiercely independent, keeps him at arm's length, determined to prove herself an equal in a male-dominated world.

One night, Cinna's resolve is fractured when she is brutally attacked, leaving her shattered. Desperate to maintain her hard-earned respect amongst her family, she seeks out Dav, the only person she feels she can trust, begging for his help and swearing him to secrecy.

As she recovers under his protective care, a slow-building chemistry finally ignites between them, leading to a passionate encounter that leaves them both reeling.

But Cinna's fears push her to erect walls around her heart, leaving Dav behind as she hunts for her assailant.

Yet, destiny keeps drawing them together, and with each dangerous step towards uncovering the truth, their growing feelings become impossible to ignore…

Copyright © 2024 Jessica Gadziala

All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author's intellectual property. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for brief quotations used in a book review.

"This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental."

Cover image credit: Евгения Карпова

“None of this book was written using AI tools. Each word was crafted with human hands.”

N E E D

H I M

L I K E

O X Y G E N

CHAPTER ONE

Cinna

The moon was full, fragmenting through the spiderweb cracks in the windows, casting the room in light that made it hard to find shadows to hide in.

I slumped down the wall, the chill creeping in through the stone, seeping into my bones, making the sweat—or was it blood?—on my skin cool, dragging a shiver out of me.

My breath was coming in ragged gasps.

I couldn’t keep moving.

My lungs were on fire.

I needed a minute, just one, to bring some calm to the chaos in my body.

Even as I sucked in a greedy breath full of dust, exhaust, and the acrid scent of vomit, I heard it.

Heard them.

Footsteps.

Making their way in my direction.

Some part of me, a weak, pathetic part I thought I’d killed off years ago, simply wanted to give into the screaming in my ribs, the pain jackhammering in my skull, the throbbing ache in my arm, and the swirling exhaustion in my head, to slide all the way to the ground, let them find me, and just finish this.

My chin dipped toward my chest, eyes drifting closed, but I clawed my way back toward consciousness.

I had one singular goal here.

Survival.

I couldn’t afford to give in to the pain assaulting me with each movement, with each breath.

I had to keep moving.

Gritting my teeth against the way pain seared up my side as I stood, I turned and started to move again.

My steps were silent after kicking off my boots three rooms, two ripped socks, and two bloody soles ago.

This building, whatever it had once been, was clearly now a hangout spot for kids or junkies, the ground littered with broken beer bottles that sliced into my feet as I kept forcing my way across the room.

I tried not to think about what else might be littering the ground—used condoms, spent needles, piss, or that vomit scent that was getting stronger as I moved across the open space.

There would be time to worry about my injuries and infection later.

Right now, I had to move.

“Come out, come out, wherever you aaaare!” a sing-song voice taunted, making my stomach flip and my adrenaline surge.

There was an eerie silence outside of the building, like the city itself was holding its breath, was waiting to see what happened next.

I hated open floor plans. These big, spacious rooms with nowhere to hide, with nothing to put between you and those who meant you harm.

I crept across the room, my own breath and heartbeat so loud in my ears, I would swear they could hear it, even from a room or two away.

My hand slid instinctively toward my waist, looking for my gun.

The one they’d taken from me already.

Along with my knife.

My mace.

Everything I had to defend myself with.

Now it was just me, my instincts, and my will to survive.

Against three men who wanted me dead.

But not before they made me wish and beg for it first.

I reached outward, hand pressing into the release bar on the door, cringing as it clicked as it pushed inward, praying that my attackers didn’t hear it, didn’t come running.

As it turned out, they didn’t need to run.

Because they were on the other side of the door.

Waiting.

The blow came too swiftly to deflect, a fist straight to the jaw, whipping my head to the side, making me stagger, but not fall.

The next blow, though, landed on my already aching ribs, driving all the air from my lungs, and causing me to crash to the ground, the impact making pain slice through my head, my arm, my side.

“Look at the mighty Cinna now,” a sneering voice taunted as I tried to rise up, getting onto all fours. Before a boot connected with my side, sending me sprawling again, this time on my back. “Hold her down,” he ordered.

Rough hands grabbed me from both sides, pinning my arms and legs to the cold, hard ground, as the ringleader towered over me, the moon casting half his face in shadow, making him look like a villain from a movie.

Not someone I knew.

And that was maybe the scariest part.

“I’m going to enjoy this,” he said, leg rearing back to kick out again, colliding with the ribs on my other side, the pain a white-hot, blinding knife.

I fought the wave of panic as he leaned down, his lips bent in a sick smirk as his hand curled into a fist, the knuckles already broken open from the dozen or so times they had already collided with my face, with my body.

“That’s it,” one of his henchmen cheered as his fist cracked into my jaw, sending my head swinging to the other side as pain ratcheted up my face to pound in my temples. “Make her scream.”

I wouldn’t scream.

They could get my blood.

Break my bones.

But I would never give them the satisfaction of hearing my pain.

“Oh, I think I might make her scream alright,” my attacker said, the wicked gleam in his eyes making my heart lurch in my chest.

This was the risk, wasn’t it?

When you were a woman in a violent, male-dominated field.

When you went out alone at night.

When you dared to have a drink at a bar.

When you trusted the wrong man.

When you were a woman… period.

That these devils in men’s clothing would grab you, hold you down, violate you.

I’d known the risks.

I’d taken my chances.

But knowing of a potential threat, and being held down on a filthy floor by three men who wanted to gang-rape you before finally killing you? It was a whole different thing.

It lit the flame of fury inside me.

Making me think past the pain, past the hopelessness.

My reflexes were quick this time as his fist flew out, turning my head at the exact right second, making it impossible to pull his punch, and sending his fist right into the cement instead of my face.

The roar that escaped him as he reeled back only fed the fire inside of me, giving me the strength to curl my lower half toward one side, striking out with the heel of my foot toward the face of one of the men holding me down, sending him crashing onto his ass.

“The fuck are you doing?” the ringleader growled, clutching his hand to his chest as the second guy struggled to hold me on his own.

They were all bigger than me, stronger, too, even if it hurt my pride to admit it, but I had the animal instinct to survive inside of me.

It allowed me to take another hit to the face without slowing me down as my own fist shot out, missing its mark of the jaw, but colliding instead with a much more tender target.

His throat.

Leaving him choking and gasping as I scrambled up onto all fours, then started to stand.

Only to have my ankles grabbed back hard, pulling them out from under me, leaving me barely enough time to throw out my hands, feeling a screaming pain shoot across my wrist and up my arm as I caught myself.

It was okay.

It was my left hand.

I could still fight.

The man I’d struck in the throat was still struggling to breathe, sitting on his ass several feet away, both hands clutching his neck, his eyes wide with panic as he couldn’t draw in a proper breath.

But there were two hands landing blows.

And, worse yet, a set of boot-clad feet.

Hitting my hip, my stomach, the side of my face.

All there was for what felt like hours, weeks, years, was pain and blood.

I fell, then crawled, clawing my way away from them each time.

The taste of blood filled my mouth as I was suddenly grabbed and whipped onto my back, my head cracking against the ground with enough force to knock my teeth together, to make my vision flash black.

“I want her first,” one of the henchmen said as he crawled toward me, his hand going to his fly.

He struggled with his zipper, giving me just the slightest opening.

“Watch—“ the ringleader tried to warn him.

But it was too late.

I yanked my leg in, then kicked out with everything in me, my foot colliding with his crotch, the pain, I had to imagine, only amplified by his sick, hard desire. He fell backward, both hands clutching his dick as he howled and hissed.

I couldn’t savor the victory as I whipped myself back over onto all fours to push myself up, needing the help of the ground with my weakened ribs, with my muscles and tendons that were starting to feel like they were more ornamental than functional at that point.

“Oh, you don’t get away that easy,” the leader said, his knees coming down on the backs of my thighs, slamming me down onto my face.

And this time, my vision didn’t just flicker.

It went out.

I woke up with my heartbeat hammering, like a hypnic jerk sending adrenaline shooting through me, some baser part of me screaming at my body to survive.

I felt the hands on me then, fingers hooked inside the waistband of my pants and panties, nails digging into skin as he struggled with the tight, uncooperative material of my leather pants.

How long was I out?

Five seconds?

Ten?

The wet, gasping sounds to the side of me said the guy I’d punched in the throat was still struggling. And the low, tortured moans suggested the other was still cradling his dick and balls.

It was just me and the man responsible for all the pain gripping my system.

“Fuck,” he growled, grabbing harder, and yanking hard, the material scratching over my skin.

My gaze scanned around, looking for the closest exit, hoping for one last Hail Mary run for freedom.

Instead, I saw something shining and sharp.

The neck of a glass beer bottle.

Severed and jagged.

Just out of reach, though.

Trying to suck in a breath, I acted like I was trying to wiggle away, a pathetic, girlish fight that had him chuckling and smacking my ass hard.

Distracting him.

So I could scoot closer, my arm stretching out little by little even as I felt cool air on the top of my ass.

His fingers scraped across my butt as he pulled my pants down further.

Now or never.

I reached out, my fingers closing around the cold glass.

Then, with every bit of strength left in me, I flung myself over onto my back, striking out with the sharp edge of the bottle.

The roar of pain let me know I struck… true enough.

I didn’t have time to wait and see.

I mustered what was left of my survival instinct, peeled myself off the ground, and ran.

Each step was agony, the pain ratcheting up my whole body as I rushed out of one door, down a hallway, then, there it was.

The front door.

Outside, the soft sounds of traffic.

Safety.

Gritting my teeth, I rushed forward, flinging open the door, and moving out onto the sidewalk of a side street.

I was disoriented, having come in a different entrance. But I kept moving, refusing to stand still on an abandoned street. When any one, or all three, of my attackers, might be right behind me.

I made my way to the corner, looking for a cab, but having no luck.

Glancing up, I looked at the cross-section signs.

It couldn’t be.

I was that close?

To backup?

To someone who could have helped me avoid the worst of the damage raking across every inch of my body?

Swallowing back the lump in my throat at even needing help, I turned and kept walking, my pace just shy of an old-school zombie trudge, but it was forward motion.

It was the best I could do.

No one ran out behind me as I closed in on it.

A simple apartment building emerging, modern and sterile-looking.

Limping up the steps, promising myself it was just a few hundred more feet, that it was almost over, I slammed the side of my fist into the buttons for the apartments, running it down all of them.

Chances were, someone was waiting on someone. A booty call. A plug. Take out.

Something dangerously close to a sob escaped me as the door clicked.

I grabbed it like the lifeline it was, moving inside and closing the door, knowing I was safe.

Safe.

The idea had my eyes stinging and I blinked back the water as I pulled myself into the elevator, and hit the button for the door.

Almost there.

Then it could be over.

I could stop being so strong.

Stop enduring.

Give into the urge that was begging me to let go, to slip toward unconsciousness. If only to escape the pain.

The chime of the car as it hit the floor felt like it was attached to a megaphone, making my shoulders pull up to my ears as the sound sliced through my skull.

Almost there.

Twenty more steps.

That was the door right there.

Number forty-four.

My favorite number.

Though I would never have told him that.

It suddenly felt even more lucky as I closed in on it.

It took actual effort to raise my arm high enough to stab my finger into the doorbell.

“Keep your panties on,” a voice called from inside. Then, “Unless you’re a gorgeous woman. In which case, feel free to slip right out of th—“

His easy-going, upbeat voice broke off as he slid the chain, then pulled open the door to see me.

There he was.

Dav.

Possibly the only man in the world I could trust with this secret.

“Cinna,” his voice hissed out of him as horror filled his stupidly handsome face as he took me in.

I had no idea what I looked like.

But if my agony was anything to go by, it was not good.

“What—“ he started, his arms reaching out toward me.

I thought, at first, it was simply because he was one of those kinds of people. The touchy-feely ones. Who were always brushing your arm, touching your lower back, picking lint off of your shirt.

I didn’t realize, until I felt myself falling into him, that he saw me teetering and was trying to catch me before I fell.

And as I collided with his frame, it happened.

A deep, soul-crushing sob escaped me.

As if this night hadn’t been humiliating enough.

CHAPTER TWO

Dav

I was just climbing out of the shower, woefully alone for once, when I heard the intercom buzz in the living room.

Reaching out toward the vanity, I flipped my phone over, noting the time.

Two in the morning.

Prime time for an old hookup to decide to drop over and take another tour of my sheets.

Maybe this night wasn’t so depressing after all.

I made quick work of toweling off, then grabbed the pair of black sleep pants, yanking them up my legs where they sat suggestively low on my hips.

I didn’t plan on having them on long anyway.

I was expecting another buzz as I walked out into the common area of the apartment.

Instead, I got a long chime of my own doorbell.

Someone was anxious to see me.

My lips curved up into a playful smile at the idea of someone being that desperate to take me for a ride that they’d sneaked their way into the building.

“Keep your panties on,” I called as I reached for the locks. “Unless you’re a gorgeous woman. In which case, feel free to slip right out of th—“ I trailed off as I pulled open the door.

To a woman, yes.

But not one who wanted my dick.

And, fuck, that wasn’t for lack of trying on my part.

Not that my mind was on sex as I looked at the woman standing there in the doorway.

No.

Not even standing.

She was wavering, barely able to stand on her own feet.

And it was no wonder.

I’d been on countless jobs with Cinna.

I’d seen her get into more fights than I cared to admit, saw her take a punch, get a split lip, get kicked or hit.

But nothing, fucking nothing, came anywhere near what she’d been through tonight.

Hell, if it weren’t for her trademark black leather bomber jacket, I wasn’t even sure I would know it was her.

Her face was bloodied, bruised, and swollen beyond recognition. One eye was closed shut. The other was halfway there and full of blood.

God, the blood.

It was all over her too.

In the bruises and the scratches on her face.

Dripping steadily from her nose and lip.

Trailing from cuts all over her hands.

I stood there in shock for a moment, not sure I was actually seeing things clearly.

Because she looked like she’d been jumped.

Like she’d gotten a beat-down from an entire fucking gang.

But she was a fucking mafia capo.

That wasn’t… possible.

It wasn’t until I saw her sway, pitching forward on her own feet, that I snapped out of my disbelief, reaching out to grab her before she hit the floor, pulling her against me as something even more impossible happened.

A sob escaped her.

Cinna.

A woman I’d seen take a bullet with barely a curse and a flinch.

Someone who stood steely-eyed at her own brother’s funeral.

She didn’t cry.

But as my arms went around her, pulling her into my apartment and kicking the door closed, that was exactly what she did as her legs gave out, taking us both down onto our knees just inside the entryway.

Sobbed.

She fucking sobbed into my chest.

The sound came from some deep well, an almost animalistic sound, and it cracked something open in my chest as I listened to it, unable to do anything but kneel there and try to hold her together as she shattered apart.

I wanted to wrap her up tight, to squeeze her pieces back together, because the Cinna I knew would be mortified to be in pieces, but I was too afraid of actually breaking something with the shape she was in.

By the time the sobs subsided and she pulled against my hold, my chest was wet with tears and blood, mingling together into a pink color as it trailed down my stomach to catch on the waistband of my pants.

“I need to get you to the hospital,” I said.

And those eight words seemed to break through the emotional and physical misery she was in.

Her head whipped up, and I saw her eye unfocus as her head likely spun, then clear as she stared right through me, that cutting glance so familiar and somehow more welcome than the tortured one that had been there a moment before.

“No hospitals.”

“Cinna, baby, you’re… you’re not looking great,” I said, having to swallow back the sick feeling in my throat as I looked at her again, taking in more of the damage than I had a few moments before.

“No,” she said, voice fierce but fucking exhausted. Like she was barely keeping herself conscious.

I could grab her, lift her into my arms, carry her downstairs, and force her.

She was weak enough that I could get away with something that, on a better day for her, would have ended up with me sporting a couple busted ribs, a crooked nose, or a broken dick.

But something held me back.

Maybe it was as simple as knowing it would be a betrayal of the trust she was showing me by showing up at my door in this shape.

She could have gone to Renzo’s, the boss’s, house. Rico. Elian.

But she was there.

At my door.

Sobbing into my chest.

And, somehow, I knew that she wouldn’t have done that with anyone else. Not Renzo, the man who took an angry teenage girl and turned her into the first female mafia capo. Not Rico, who she’d fought side-by-side with. Or even Elian, who had a soft spot for women.

She came to me.

She trusted me with the soft side of her she never showed anyone else.

I couldn’t betray her by forcing her into something she didn’t want.

“I need to clean you up then,” I said, gut twisting at the idea of what that might entail. The kind of pain I’d have to inflict on her in an attempt to heal her.

I was nobody’s nursemaid, but when you worked in a dangerous field where people often got hurt and couldn’t go to the hospital and risk being reported to the cops, you learned a thing or two about battlefield medicine.

Christ, it was insane how many bullets I’d plucked out of people. Myself included.

“Okay,” she said, lower lip quivering.

“Okay,” I agreed, moving to stand.

As she tried to do the same, though, she fell back down with a ragged cry that had that cracking sensation moving through my chest again.

“It’s okay,” I said, voice soft as I bent down. “I’ve got you,” I told her, lifting her as carefully as possible into my arms. “I’ve got you,” I said again as she turned her head into my neck, taking slow, deliberate breaths to try to fight back the pain.

I walked us right back into the bathroom I’d just come out of, the air still a little thick and humid from my shower, despite the fan going.

Walking over, I set her on the closed lid of the toilet as carefully as I could before turning away to go into the linen closet, bringing out my medical kit, and starting to line up things I was going to need.

“Here,” I said after slamming an instant ice pack onto the counter to activate it, holding it out to the most swollen part of her face.

Her hand automatically lifted, but only just enough to hold it in place.

Which told me one thing.

Her ribs were fucked up.

“Are you having any trouble breathing?” I asked, watching her chest for an entirely different reason than I would have just an hour ago.

Wasn’t proud of that, but, fuck, the woman had some great tits.

“It hurts to breathe,” she admitted, voice smaller than I’d ever heard it.

Cinna never sounded small or soft, the things that made women seem more, I dunno, feminine. She was always strong and sure and fierce.

“Does your chest hurt?” I asked, soaking a sterile gauze in saline solution, intent on cleaning some of the blood off of her face, so I could assess the damage better.

“No. My ribs fucking hurt,” she said, and it was so Cinna, that I felt a small bit of anxiety fall away.

“Are you short of breath?” I pressed, moving over toward her and pressing two fingers into her pulse point in her neck, wanting to make sure her heart wasn’t racing.

Chest pain, shortness of breath, racing heart, abnormal breathing, all signs that you punctured a lung with your broken rib.

“No,” she said, but her gaze was down, so it was hard to tell if she was lying.

All the guys claimed that Cinna had the best poker face in our entire organization. They literally wouldn’t play cards with her because of it.

I dunno.

I always found it easy to tell when she was lying, though. But she had to be looking at me with those ridiculously appealing dark eyes.

“Say that again,” I demanded, gently snagging her chin and forcing her face up under the guise of wiping the split in her lip, but my gaze was on hers.

“No,” she said, this time with a little nod, like she knew I was struggling to read her, what with her eyes so fucked up.

“You have to tell me if that changes,” I demanded.

Getting your ass kicked could often look and feel worse than it was.

But it was bleeding in the head and a nicked lung you really had to worry about.

“Did your head get slammed into a wall? The floor?” I asked, swiping as lightly as I could at the filthy scratches across her puffy cheek.

Like she’d fallen on her face on a dirty floor.

“Not bad enough for a concussion, I don’t think,” she said, voice still so much smaller than normal.

“Okay,” I said, though my concern about that wasn’t abated in the least. “What’s going on with your wrist?” I asked, noting the way she was cradling the left one to her chest with her other hand.

“I don’t know. It hurt like a motherfucker,” she admitted. “But now… now it’s kind of numb.”

Numb? Or was she a bit in shock?

This amount of damage, she should be in fucking agony. Every damn inch of her.

I tossed one gauze, then soaked another, wiping the blood from her nose.

“Sorry,” I said as she winced and flinched.

Her face mostly clean, I reached for her forearm, drawing her hand over toward me, noting how swollen it already was.

It had to be broken.

And not getting it set was going to make her a fuckuva lot weaker.

“I’m not going,” she insisted, reading my mind.

“Then I’ll wrap it,” I said, going back to the kit to grab an elastic bandage and quickly wrapping it up. “I need to check your ribs,” I reminded her, reaching down to grab her elbows when she tried to stand by herself and failed.

It was a slow process to get her upright, and even so, she hissed and whimpered her way through it.

I reached to slide her jacket off of her shoulders but paused when I saw the tight shirt beneath.

“Love, I think I’m gonna have to cut this off of you.”

“Fine,” she said, gaze down.

And it was then that I noticed how the waistband of her pants was rolled oddly.

Like maybe they’d been… yanked down.

Then hastily pulled back up.

If someone…

“You’re growling,” Cinna said making my gaze shoot up.

“Just getting all worked up at finally getting to see you without your shirt, is all,” I said, both of us knowing I was lying, but neither saying anything about it.

I turned, grabbing the scissors and cutting up her stomach and down her sleeves. The material fell with no assistance by the time I was done. Leaving her in her rolled-waisted leather pants and a simple black bra.

“Oh, fuck,” I said, gaze moving over her midsection. Where bruises—violent, violet purple and blue—were spreading across her ribs.

On both fucking sides.

Like someone had, quite fucking literally, kicked her when she was down.

“Who?”

I wasn’t even aware I’d growled that out loud until she answered me.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It fucking matters,” I said, my gaze sliding to hers as a familiar cold sensation worked its way up my spine, then started to wrap itself around my throat.

“To me, not to you.”

“You’re a capo in the Lombardi crime family,” I reminded her. “It matters to all of us.”

“You can’t tell them,” she said, her voice a high, desperate sound.

“What?” I asked, sure I misunderstood her.

“You can’t tell them.”

“Tell who?”

“Anyone,” she said. And, again, her lower lip was quivering.

“Cinna, they have to kn—“

“No,” she cut me off. “No,” she repeated more firmly.

“Cinna…”

“You can’t,” she said, voice cracking. “Promise me.”

I’d known Cinna for years. Nearing a decade. And she’d never asked me for, well, any fucking thing. She damn sure never asked me to promise her anything. Especially something as serious as lying to our boss.

“We’ll talk about it later,” I said, not wanting to argue about it when she was barely able to stand on her own two feet. “This is gonna suck,” I said, then started to press around her ribs. “How many times were you kicked?” I asked, my spit tasting like battery acid as the question conjured up images of that happening to her.

“Five? Six? I don’t know.”

Motherfuckers.

“Okay,” I said, voice calmer than I felt as I went for more ice packs and elastic bandages. “Just get your arms as out of the way as possible without passing out,” I said, wrapping around her until I ran out of bandage, then slipping an ice pack into each side before adding another layer of bandages.

They helped you not feel like you were going to black out if you turned a little too far or fast, but there was really not a fucking thing to do about bruised or busted ribs that could make them any less horrific.

I had to place an order for several reusable ice packs, so I could cool some while she wore others.

“Is this making it worse?” I asked, fingertip tapping the underwire of her bra. She damn near came out of her fucking skin. “Whoa, okay. Sorry. I… I shouldn’t have touched you without asking,” I said, wincing at her reaction.

The jumping at what was a chaste touch.

The rolled waistband…

“It’s okay,” she said, gaze lowered, embarrassed by her own reaction.

“I’ll ask from now on,” I assured her.

“It’s fine.”

“It’s not fine. Nothing about this is… fine,” I said, my jaw aching from the tension growing along it.

She ignored that.

“It is making it worse,” she admitted.

“What?”

“The wire. It’s… pressing.”

“This is where I would normally make a comment about how unnecessary it is to put these particular kids in carseats,” I said, watching as her lips twitched ever so slightly.

“I’ll take it off of you,” I offered.

I’d fantasized about removing Cinna’s bra more times than I felt comfortable admitting.

Somehow, though, as she turned her back to me, and my hands went to her clasps, there was nothing hot about it at all.

I unfastened the band, then slid the straps off her shoulders. She handled it from there, and I reached for her shoulders, turning her gently as I moved past her, letting her keep her modesty.

“I’ll grab you a top that zippers,” I told her, moving out of the bathroom, closing the door behind me, and taking a slow, deep breath.

Was I really doing this?

Agreeing to keep a pretty big fucking secret from our boss?

The thing was, I knew the answer even before I made it to my closet, grabbing a zip-up hoodie, and making my way back to the bathroom.

Yes.

For Cinna?

Yes, I would do this.

CHAPTER THREE

Cinna

For a man who had been making comments about getting me naked for years, he was surprisingly gentlemanly as he undid my bra, then turned me, so he couldn’t see anything as he moved past me.

I wasn’t exactly a modest woman.

If he saw my tits during this process, so be it.

But there was a strange gooey sensation in my chest as he came back into the bathroom, then carefully slid one of my arms in, and pulled the shirt around me, before slipping in my other arm. Then, finally, he reached around, making sure the sides were settled between my breasts, so nothing was showing.

I could have sworn that before he turned me, his lips pressed into my hair. But, honestly, I had no fucking idea. My entire skull felt like it was throbbing at that point. I was probably just imagining things.

Dav moved in front of me, grabbing the zip, and slipping it up, careful not to brush my skin.

The weird thing was, some part of me was… I don’t know… disappointed.

Which made no fucking sense, since I’d never had any interest in Dav that way. I couldn’t. We were colleagues. And shit was hard enough for a woman in this job. You couldn’t have it getting around that you fucked coworkers. Any respect you sweated and bled for would fly right out the window.

“Hey, Cinna?” he asked, voice uncharacteristically serious as his gaze cut up to mine.

Even with only half of my vision working, I had to admit that he was a pretty place to rest your eyes for a minute or two.

Dav was a little bit too fair to be fully Italian like most of us. His hair was solidly in the brown category, but it was streaked with enough golden strands to make him seem more fair-haired. And his light blue eyes with their thick lashes were undeniably attractive.

And don’t think I didn’t notice the rest of him.

The low-slung pajama pants left very little to the imagination, his broad chest, six-pack, and Adonis belt on full display.

But where I usually found mischief in his eyes as he looked at me, or even, at times, desire, there was something darker there now.

“What?” I asked when he didn’t say anything else.

“Your waistband is rolled,” he said, the implication hanging in the air like a fog we were both struggling to breathe in.

My gaze slid away, surprising myself with my own embarrassment. Even though nothing that happened was because of anything I’d done.

“No,” I said. “If I didn’t grab a bottle neck and strike out, though,” I admitted, taking a deep breath that sliced up my ribs and burned my lungs like something noxious.

“How about I peel the pants off?” he suggested. “Can’t imagine getting the leather off with that busted hand is gonna feel good.”

“Okay,” I agreed, too tired to try to find my pride, to insist I could do it myself.

He was offering.

I was going to let him.

Reaching up under the black and gray zip-up hoodie he gave me, he reached for my button, and this time, his fingers brushed against my skin.

I didn’t anticipate the little sizzle of interest. Not at a time like this. Or, let’s face it, not at all with Dav.

I was just overwrought.

In agony.

Exhausted.

It meant nothing.

Not even as the sensation intensified as he grabbed handfuls of my waistband, carefully avoiding my panties, and started to tug the material down my hips. My thighs. The oddly sensitive sides of my knees.

“I need to check your feet too,” he said as if just realizing I was practically barefoot in my shredded socks.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “I think there’s glass,” I admitted, voice sounding thick with the effort it was taking to keep me upright and conscious.

Dav made a noise in his throat but said nothing as he pressed me back to the toilet then pulled off my pants, squatting down to reach for my thin socks, wincing as he pulled them off. Like my pain was his own.

“Christ, baby,” he said as he settled my ankle on his leg, inspecting my foot. “How the fuck were you standing on these?” he asked as he reached toward the counter for his kit, digging around blindly until he found the tweezers.

“Wasn’t much of a choice,” I said, watching the top of his head as he went to work on my feet.

I was sure there was pain.

But that thing they said about not being able to feel multiple pains at once proved true right then. And my brain was struggling to decide if the pain in my wrist, ribs, head, or face were the one to focus on. It didn’t even clock the sensation of glass being plucked out of my feet.

He worked on one foot. Then the other. Before rushing off to grab a flashlight and double-checking his work.

The next thing I knew, my feet were being plunged into warm, soapy water in a small basin that appeared out of nowhere, making me wonder if maybe I was slipping in and out of consciousness as I sat there.

“Just wrap them up,” I said as he hemmed and hawed on what to do about them once he was done. “I’m gonna need to borrow socks. And maybe slides if you have any.”

“For what?” he asked, looking up, his brows pinched.

“So I can go home,” I said, hearing the way my words were dragging, too tired even to enunciate properly.

“You can’t go home,” he said, shaking his head.

“I’m not going to the fucking hospital,” I snapped, getting absolutely no reaction out of Dav, who was used to my outbursts at this point.

“I wasn’t talking about the hospital. You need someone to keep an eye on you,” he clarified. “You’re staying here tonight.”

He had that edge to his voice that all the guys in this organization did when they were going to dig their heels in about something.

But I didn’t get this far in my life and career by bending to the wishes or demands of the men around me.

“No, I’m not. I’m going home.”

“Yeah?” he asked, head tipping to the side. “And who’s gonna help you wrap those ribs up again after you shower? Pick things up for you so you don’t fucking black out from pain? Feed you?”

“I can take care of myself,” I insisted, even if it was the last goddamn thing in the world I wanted. Just once, once in my hard-ass-fucking-life, it would be nice not to have to be so strong.

“I’m not saying you can’t, Cinna. I’m saying I want to help.”

“Why?”

“Why?” he asked, snorting. “Because you showed up at my doorstep. Beaten to fucking shit. Bleeding. And crying. Cin,” he said, cutting me off when I tried to object. But to what, I had no idea. He was right on all of those points. Even if my ego cringed at the reminder of the last bit. “It’s okay to accept help sometimes. Let me help.”

“I’ll just crash until the morning,” I relented, not entirely sure that I could stay awake even on a cab ride back to my place. Let alone get myself up to my apartment. I just needed some rest. Then I could get back to my place. Hide away while I healed.

“Okay,” he agreed, reaching for gauze and slathering on triple antibiotic ointment, before pressing the pad to my foot, then reaching for a roll of medical tape, and securing it.

The process continued on my other foot until he was satisfied.

“You gonna pitch a fit if I suggest I carry you to bed?” he asked, giving me that boyish grin I somehow knew would make accepting his assistance easier.

“Just this once… no,” I admitted, watching relief move across his stupidly handsome features before he was reaching for me, careful not to jostle me as he pulled me into his arms, then against his chest.

I’d never been carried before.

I wasn’t a dainty woman, all short with bird-like bones. With my usual boots on, I stood pretty close to eye-to-eye with these men in the Lombardi crime family. I had hips and tits and enough muscle to allow me to take care of myself when shit got dicey.

So, no, I wasn’t the kind of woman who men looked at and generally thought to pick up and carry around.

Dav, though, didn’t grunt or wince. And, believe me, I was looking for it, intent on teasing him about it so the moment didn’t feel quite so, I dunno, intimate, as it did.

He just lifted me up like a fucking feather pillow, then walked me out of the bathroom and into the hallway, heading toward the bedroom.

If my head leaned against his shoulder, so what? It didn’t mean anything.

“Wait,” I said as he lowered me onto a king-sized bed with sheets that smelled like him. Leather, tobacco, and just the slightest hint of something sweeter. Like vanilla. It was a scent unique to him, and it always clung to him like a second skin. But in his bed? Fuck, it surrounded me, scented every breath.

“What?” he asked.

“This is your bed.”

“Don’t worry, sweet girl. Your virtue is safe,” he teased. “I’m not sleeping in it with you.”

I should have argued more.

But he was already drawing up the covers.

And the smell and the warmth were too comforting to object to.

So I just… let him tuck me in.

I didn’t even make a snide comment about calling me a ‘sweet girl.’

“Rest, okay?” he asked, his thumb sliding across my chin. “I’ll be one room away if you need anything.”

With that, he left me alone, leaving the door open a crack, so he could hear me if I called.

I was out cold before he even finished cleaning up his kit in the hallway bathroom.

CHAPTER FOUR

Cinna

For just a short, dream-soaked, disconnected moment, there was no agony as I slipped from unconsciousness to awake.

But before my eyes—or eye, in this case, since the other was swollen shut—fluttered open, the pain shot through me.

Each area fought for recognition.

My feet pulsed.

My wrist ached.

My ribs screamed.

My face throbbed.

And my head jackhammered.

I lay there, unable to do anything but try to breathe through it, try to fight back the wave of tears that welled up again as the pain just kept coming in endless waves.

A small, wounded animal sound escaped me as I pressed my good hand to my forehead, like pressure might be able to push some of the pain away.

“It’s gonna be okay,” Dav’s voice said, small, soft, close.

My eye slitted open to find him already beside the bed, his eyes squinted small as he looked at me.

“That good, huh?” I asked, sniffling, realizing I’d been crying without realizing it.

“You’ve looked better, pretty girl,” he said, putting something down on the nightstand, then twisting open a bottle of water. “I found some pain meds. The good shit,” he explained.

By ‘found,’ it, I imagined he sent one of his associates or soldiers out to buy some.

“It’s legit,” he added at my silence. “And it’ll help. Don’t be a hero, Cin.”

“I’m not. Give me two,” I demanded, trying to push up, only to fall back with a humiliating cry of pain.

“Let me,” he said, soft, understanding.

He came closer, putting the bottle of water in my good hand, then reaching under my head to tilt it up enough that I wouldn’t choke.

“Open up,” he demanded, then pressed the pills onto my tongue before taking the bottle from me and tipping it against my lips. “More,” he demanded when I only sipped enough to swallow the pills. “Alright,” he said, gently lowering me down, then capping the bottle and placing it on the nightstand.

“What time is it?” I asked, glancing over toward the window, but he had some thick-ass blackout curtains pulled. Likely due to his nocturnal nature, always catching sleep when the sun was up.

“Six in the morning. You haven’t been asleep long,” he told me. “But those pills should get you another couple of deep hours. Got plenty more. Figure maybe not being conscious much today might be a good move.”

“No objections here,” I said, pressing my hand to my head again, trying to breathe through it, reminding myself that in less than an hour, the pills would be kicking in, and I would feel better.

But no amount of assurances were helping me right in that moment. And no amount of ego could keep the whimpers or tears in.

“Oh, baby,” Dav said, voice soft. “It’s going to get better,” he said, and the mattress was depressing from my other side, his body slipping close to me.

His arm lifted, hovering, aware how half my body was wounded, and not wanting to hurt me.

Eventually, he wrapped it around my hips, fingers digging in, his face in my hair. Just… being there.

And as someone who’d never had anyone to be there for me, his willingness to just be there while I suffered, not asking anything of me or trying to feed me hollow reassurances, only made me fucking cry harder.

“Everything hurts,” I admitted, hating how small and weak my voice sounded, but unable to do anything about it.

“I know,” he said, arm tightening, giving me the closest thing to a hug my body would allow. “I know it does.”

Eyes squeezed shut, I found myself oddly confessional. “I almost didn’t make it.”

“You did, though. That’s all that matters. You made it. One thing I know about you, Cin, you’ll claw your way out with your nails and teeth if that’s all you got. Never met anyone as fucking strong as you.”

“Don’t be nice,” I begged, his words only making my eyes leak harder and my lower lip tremble.

I would never say I was someone who needed reassurances. If anything, I’d worked my ass off to never require external validation. But Dav’s words were doing something to me right then. And I both loved and hated it in equal turns.

“Okay,” he said, and I could feel his lips curve up against my hair. “You’re a really fucking terrible pool player. In case anyone hasn’t reminded you of that lately.”

A sound that was an odd mix of a laugh and a cry escaped me at that.

“And you make coffee way too fucking strong. It’s like drinking sludge.”

“Just because you need a pound of sugar in your coffee doesn’t mean mine isn’t good.”

“I got an immediate ulcer the last time I choked down a cup,” he insisted.

“Your weak stomach has nothing to do with me,” I said, realizing that the tears had disappeared, and my lip was dangerously close to curving up.

“Your knife throwing skills also need work,” he said.

“Those are fighting words,” I said, turning my head on the pillow, not realizing just how close he was until I was facing him, our noses practically brushing.

“Fine. Then as soon as you can move without something hurting, we will have a contest,” he said, cocky in his belief that he’d beat me.

“I’ll wipe the floor with you.”

“And I’ll try to pretend I don’t enjoy the fuck out of that,” he said, giving me that smile that made the corners of his eyes crinkle ever so slightly.

This Dav was easier for me to deal with. The playful, flirtatious one that I’d built up a wall against for years.

I had no defenses to the soft and sweet Dav, the one full of praise and admiration.

“Tell me one of your stories,” I demanded.

“One of my stories?” he asked.

“Right. Like you don’t know what I’m talking about. One of those stories you are always telling a crowd of people at Renzo’s house.”

“Did I ever tell you the story about when I was spending the summer with my aunt and uncle over in Pennsylvania?” he asked.

“No,” I admitted, surprised how excited I was to hear something new about his life. Especially his childhood, which he was almost as closed-lipped about as I was about my own.

“So, we were sixteen, right?” he started, slipping into the magnetic voice and cadence he always had when he was telling a story. “And we were really fucking interested in what was under a girls’ skirt.”

“Ugh,” I grumbled. Of all his stories, the ones that involved his escapades with women had always rubbed me the wrong way for reasons I didn’t care to analyze.

“Hang on with me,” he said. “Anyway, he had this basement that his parents had kind of converted into a bedroom and ‘kid space’ when my cousins became teenagers. Had two bedrooms, a bath, plus a common space with a pool table, video games, the usual shit. Had those external doors too, so we waited until his parents went to bed, then snuck some girls in.

“Turns out, my cousins each had a thing for these sisters. And, well, shit started to get hot and heavy in the common area where I was crashing on the couch. So they took the girls off into the bedrooms. And… shit was getting noisy.

“Then, like a fucking bad teen movie, I heard the creak of footsteps from above. From the parents’ bedroom, through the house, and getting close to the doors.”

“Uh oh.”

“Exactly.”

“What did you do?” I asked, knowing most of his stories featured him as the lead.

“Grabbed my phone, brought up some porn, and broadcast that shit on the main TV. Room filled with a chick getting airtight with a group of others just waiting around for their turn, jerking off. Turned that shit up loud as the door to the basement opened, then went under the covers and pretended I was having a good, late-night fap all to myself.”

“Oh, god,” I grumbled, shaking my head.

“Needless to say, my uncle rushed the fuck back up the stairs. Couldn’t look me in the face the rest of that month,” he admitted. “But my cousins had the best five minutes of their lives that night.”

“Five minutes, huh? What is that? Twice your best time?” I teased.

“What I might lack in sheet time, I more than make up for in my on my knees time.”

Right.

As if the tales of Davide’s fucking skills weren’t practically legendary in Brooklyn. I mean, the tales of his head game were just as widespread, but, yeah, he only joked about it because we both knew the man was, apparently, some sort of sex god.

Not that I cared.

Or had ever wondered about what he was like in bed.

Or what he was packing.

Nope.

My mind definitely never went there.

“Those meds kicking in?” he asked as I tried to ignore the way his fingers were no longer stationary on my hip, but were instead searing a trail down my hip and my outer thigh. It was a whisper of a touch. But I felt every freaking centimeter his fingers traveled.

“Yeah,” I said, the throbbing just slightly more tolerable. Enough that I wasn’t actively crying anymore, at least. Which was a win in my book. I’d cried more in this one night than I had in the past fucking decade. Or maybe ever. I was pretty sure I didn’t even cry much as a baby. My mother would never have responded to my wails anyway.

“Close your eyes,” he suggested, his fingers still working their soothing magic up and down my hip and thigh.

That sounded like a good idea to me, so I let my lashes flutter closed, getting lost in the warmth of him beside me, the feel of his fingers on me, the scent of him all around me.

That, mixed with the meds cutting my pain, and I practically wanted to purr at the comfort I felt enveloped in right then.

I was mostly asleep when I heard Dav’s voice break into the floating bliss I was enveloped in.

“I’m gonna track down each one of the motherfuckers who put their hands on you,” he said, voice a whisper, likely thinking I was out cold. “And I am going to skin them fucking alive for this.”

If you only ever knew Dav at the surface level, you would be apt to roll your eyes at that declaration. No one would blame you. Dav had a lot of, well, surface. A lot of joviality and bravado, this extroverted shell that appeared so open and lighthearted.

But those of us who’d been in the trenches with Davide knew that all that surface was just there to hide the depths inside of him.

A well that was fed endlessly with darkness and violence.

I had no idea what had happened in Dav’s past to create the kind of rage and bloodlust you could find inside him at times.

I just knew it existed.

And when he was saying dark things like that, he wasn’t just saying things. He meant every last word.

Normally, I would bristle at the idea that a man, any man, would suggest that I needed him to fight my battles for me.

Somehow, though, as I drifted off to sleep, all I could think was how nice it would be for someone else to pick up my fight for me for a change.

CHAPTER FIVE

Dav

I stayed there in the bed until her eyelids started to twitch as she drifted into the depths of REM before slowly untangling myself from Cinna and making my way out of the room.

I hadn’t slept.

I’d been too worried about her, constantly opening the door to check and make sure she was still breathing, not trusting that she didn’t have some kind of brain injury.

It was pure paranoia on my part, but I couldn’t reason with my anxiety until I finally heard her whimpering, letting me know she was awake.

I’d had the pills for hours at that point.

If you had a roll of cash and someone willing to go out and find a dealer, you could have just about any kind of pain medication you wanted. The clean shit. Nothing laced in it.

My men had probably cleaned out three dealers to get as many pills as I now had sitting in a plastic bag in a kitchen drawer. But I wanted to make sure I had enough to keep Cinna comfortable. I knew from looking at her that she was gonna feel worse before she started to get better.

She’d still been a little in shock, still recovering from the adrenaline, before she fell asleep.

Once all that subsided, the pain was going to be insufferable.

In the kitchen, I put a pot of coffee on before reaching for my phone and adding a bunch of shit to my cart. Things to keep dressing her wounds and replace what I’d taken out of my medical kit. A shitton of ice packs. Over-the-counter meds that would help with swelling. A few brace options for her wrist. An assortment of panties.

I didn’t bother with more clothes, since her life would be much easier if she just kept going without pants and wearing button or zip-ups until her wrist healed.

I didn’t say it to her yet, because even hurt and emotional, Cinna was Cinna. And she wasn’t going to hear reason. But I wasn’t going to let her go home when she woke up. I wasn’t going to let her go home… period.

She needed somewhere to rest and recover. She needed someone around to help her with things. Like wrapping her ribs and wrist. Like cleaning up her feet, as needed. Cutting up her food. Getting her things. Even washing her hair.

She hadn’t really wrapped her head around just how injured she was. And maybe that was because she hadn’t even looked at herself yet.

I had a feeling that keeping her dosed consistently for the next two or three days might be the best bet. Get her through the worst of the pain. She’d still be sore. And her ribs and wrist would still be killing her, but all the other pains would have subsided by then.

Each time she woke up whimpering, desperate for me to press the pills into her mouth and hold up the water for her to rinse them down with.

I caught cat naps between those doses, waking up with my heartbeat punching against my ribcage, worried she might have stubbornly snuck out when my eyes were closed.

But she was always right there, lounging in my bed. Like I’d imagined countless times before. More, even, than she would imagine with all my rampant flirting.

In her eyes, I was just a dog in general. And I guess she wasn’t exactly wrong about that either. I damn sure enjoyed more than my fair share of women. So the flirting I did with her was just an extension of that. Casual, not serious.

But if there was ever something I was serious about, it was how much I was into Cinna.

In a physical way, sure. She was drop dead fucking gorgeous. I’d spent more than a few moments in the shower thinking about her long, silky hair wrapped around my hand as I fucked her from behind, or gliding across my thighs as she went down on me. And I was pretty sure if this woman existed in ancient times where they did that kind of shit, monuments would be built to honor the woman’s breasts.

It was more than that, though.

Cinna had been a capo for nearly as long as I had. I got to watch her grow from a young, angry girl, hungry to prove herself just as capable as—if not more than—her male counterparts, into the fearless capo she had become.

I’d seen her kick the asses of men twice her size. Intimidate bosses with decades of seniority on her. Out-strategize the best criminals in the area.

She was a fucking marvel.

And, me? Yeah, I’d been doing some marveling at her.

But I had to respect her steadfast determination not to sleep with any of us. I couldn’t pretend to understand what it was like to be a woman in a male-dominated field, how much rampant sexism she’d had to deal with to finally get the respect she had now.

Even now, though, there was shit she had to deal with that none of us men ever would.

My mind flashed back to the rolled waistband of her pants. Because someone tried to, after already beating the shit out of her, make her suffer one final indignity.

My phone rang on the coffee table, making me knife up and reach to silence it, wincing, waiting to hear Cinna stirring.

“Yeah?” I answered, sliding the answer button blindly.

“That’s how you answer the phone?” Renzo, the boss of the Lombardi crime family, my and Cinna’s boss, asked.

“When I got something warm and pretty in my bed waiting for me, yeah,” I said, forcing a lightness into my tone that I didn’t feel.

“It’s two in the fucking afternoon,” Renzo scoffed, but there was a chuckle in his voice.

“Right. Like you don’t want to be curled up under the sheets with Lore right now,” I shot back.

“That’s fair,” he agreed. “You heard from Cinna?” he asked.

“Cinna?” I asked as I caught motion at the corner of my vision.

And there she was, her body popping with stiffness as she leaned to the side to favor her screaming ribs.

“Yeah, you know, tall, pretty, two tons of attitude in a one-ton bucket,” Renzo said, making my lips curve up.

“You left out her killer rack,” I said, getting Cinna’s attempt at an eye roll at that.

“Not all of us think solely with our dicks, Dav.”

“No, man. Haven’t seen her. You expecting her for something?” I asked.

“Not in particular. She’s been working on something she’s been evasive as fuck about. Just wanted to make sure she’s good.”

“I’m sure you know Cinna. She can take care of herself,” I said, patting the couch next to me.

There was a short pause, but she eventually moved across the floor to lower down, trying her best to hold in a hiss of pain as she did so.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Just got a feeling about something going down,” he admitted.

Renzo had killer instincts. It was likely how he managed to stand on his own against all four of the other crime families in the city when they saw us as enemies before he finally united us all through his marriage to his wife, Lore Costa.

“There’s always something going down,” I reasoned, getting off the couch to grab a few of the ice packs out of the freezer. Bringing them back, I handed them to Cinna, who started pressing them against her ribs and face.

“Yeah. Would feel better if she’d at least return a text,” he said.

“She was probably working late. Might be the only person who outworks you,” I reminded him. “Probably trying to get some sleep.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “Well, let me know if you hear from her.”

“See Cinna, tell her to contact Daddy. Got it,” I said, getting another eye roll out of Cinna.

“Go on back to your warm and pretty,” Renzo said, ending the call.

There was a beat, Cinna likely choking on the words a few times before she finally forced them out.

“Thank you.”

“No big,” I said, shrugging it off. “But we gotta find your phone,” I added. “You need to at least text to check in with him.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, but gave me nothing else.

“Is there a reason you’re not telling me where your shit might be?”

“In an empty warehouse a few blocks away,” she admitted. “But what are the chances that they would have left my phone if they found it?”

“I’ll go check it out. If it’s not there, we can call, get it bricked, and get you a new one.”

“I can—“

“Keep your perfect ass planted on the couch while I go and find your phone? Yes, you can do that. And maybe, while you’re at it, you can try to get some food down too. All those meds on an empty stomach are just asking for your stomach to cramp up.”

“I think my jaw hurts too much to chew on anything.”

“Exactly why I got ice cream, mashed potatoes, and yogurt,” I said. “Pick one and choke it down.”

“Your bedside manner needs work,” she said as I made my way toward the fridge.

“Got a feeling being nice won’t get me the results I want with you,” I said, opening the door.

“Yogurt,” she decided. “I don’t know what warehouse it was,” she told me. “It had been abandoned for a long time. Full of beer bottles, garbage, old condoms. Looks like a hangout spot for kids or addicts who are looking for a private place to shoot up.”

There weren’t a ton of empty warehouses around. It shouldn’t be too hard to find the one she’d been attacked in.

“You shouldn’t go alone,” she said, a strange edge in her voice I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard from her before.

“Cinna, my sweet girl, are you worried about me?” I asked, a smile playing with my lips as I handed her the yogurt and a spoon.

“I don’t want to be responsible for all the local escorts being without a job,” she said, tone saccharine sweet.

“Cinna, baby, what about me makes you think I would need to pay for it?” I asked as I reached out to tuck some of her hair behind her ear.

Was that a little shiver I felt move through her at the barely-there touch?

The way her gaze immediately cut away let me think it was.

That was… interesting.

“Fine. Go get yourself killed going out alone,” she said, shrugging a shoulder.

“I’ll be extra careful just for you,” I promised her as I went to grab some more of the pain pills, leaving them with a bottle of water on the coffee table. “You’re not due yet, but I dunno how long I’m going to be, so I’m leaving them with you. Is there anything else you want me to look for?” I asked.

“My boots.”

“The flat ones or the ones with the chunky heel?” I asked.

“You know what kinds of boots I have?” she asked, pausing as she slipped some yogurt between her lips.

“Maybe if you had more than two pairs of shoes, I wouldn’t,” I told her as I slipped into my shoes before reaching into the closet to grab a gun.

“This is where I would normally say something about how if you died tomorrow, the person who would miss you the most is your personal shopper, but my head hurts too much to be witty.”

Her anxious gaze slid from me as I donned my coat to the door and back again.

She didn’t want me to leave.

But I think it had more to do with not wanting to be alone when she was in such a vulnerable condition than worrying about me going to the warehouse in the middle of the day with people all around.

I went back into the closet, finding another gun, and bringing it over to place it on the coffee table in front of her.

“I will be an hour, max,” I assured her.

“Whatever. Take your time,” she said, but she visibly relaxed at having the gun nearby.

“An hour,” I told her before turning and making my way out.

It wasn’t hard to find the building.

Especially when she left a trail of breadcrumbs all through it.

A can of mace, kicked in a corner.

A knife, the blade still flicked open, then discarded in a shuffle, judging by the human-sized area on the ground that had been wiped clean of dust and grime.

Then, finally, her boots.

The one with heels.

She must have had a gun. I’d never seen her without one. But, clearly, they must have gotten it from her at some point. Because there was no way anyone could have done that level of damage to her if she’d had a weapon on her.

She was quick, accurate, and ruthless with them.

I didn’t end up finding her phone, figuring she was probably right about them taking it.

So I stopped to buy her an unlocked one at the store before making my way back to the apartment.

I should have knocked.

But I didn’t realize how freaked out she would be until I opened the door, catching her off-guard, and finding her sitting off the edge of the couch, the gun aimed right at me, and her hand shaking so violently that if I was someone there to attack her, there was no way she would get a good shot off.

“Got your boots,” I said, trying not to embarrass her. “And your mace. And knife. But no luck on the phone. So now you get to sit and program this thing for the next few hours,” I told her, bringing the box over.

I took the gun out of her hand, replacing it with the box.

“Thanks.”

“Is that two thank-yous in one day? Pace yourself. You might pull a muscle,” I teased, watching as she shot me the ghost of a smile.

“Once I get this up and running, I’ll get going—“

“Back to bed. Where you are going to take another nice pain med nap.”

I expected resistance.

And I guess it was proof of how much this attack had shaken her when all she did was nod.

“Right.”

CHAPTER SIX

Cinna

“I say this with a lot of love and only a small bit of disgust,” Dav said two days later, standing in the doorway of the bedroom after taking away my partially eaten tray of soft foods, “you need a bath. Or a shower. Generally speaking, water and soap need to run over you.”

Wrinkling my nose at the comment, I took a whiff of myself. And, yeah, I had that stagnant sweat smell, but I wasn’t ripe or anything.

“I’m all for rotting in bed for days on end. But you brought a lot of ick in that bed with you that you still need to wash off.”

At that, even through the way the pain meds blanketed my brain, making it hard for too many worried thoughts to sink in, the memories came flooding back.

The warehouse. The footsteps. The taunting words. The pain.

“I will help you wash your hair,” Dav went on, pulling me out of the memories that threatened to pull me under and keep me there, choking on the fear and desperation.

“I don’t need help,” I insisted, even as I winced and hissed my way through swinging my legs off of the side of the bed and moving to stand. I was drenched with sweat just from the effort.

“Sure sure. But when you try to raise your hands over your head and start howling in pain, I will be in to help you wash your hair, you stubborn ass.”

I’d always thought of Dav as, well, a kind of selfish man. He definitely sought out the fun, frivolous things in life.

But I had to admit that he’d been completely unselfish since I’d shown up at his door. Bringing me meds around the clock, forcing me to eat so my stomach didn’t hurt, keeping ice packs cold for when I needed them, and changing bandages. And having a good attitude during it all. Even when I was, well, a raging bitch.

“I’ll grab you a new shirt and towels,” he told me as I made frustratingly slow progress toward the bathroom.

Dav’s caretaking skills were top-tier.

My patient skills, though, needed work.

I was out of my mind at how slowly my body was recovering. My eye was still almost completely swollen shut. The bruises seemed to get worse by the day instead of better. Everything was still swollen. The only wounds doing better were the cuts on my feet. Likely because I’d been off of them pretty much all the time.

I didn’t want to even talk about my wrist and ribs. At this rate, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to move without pain for months.

And I needed to get the hell back out there, find these pricks, and make them pay for this.

I needed my crew to know I was still around and in charge.

Sure, I’d covered my ass by lying to the boss and telling him I was fine, just working on shit behind the scenes. And I was keeping tabs on everyone under me via text. But that wasn’t how I ran things. Eventually, people were going to wonder why they hadn’t seen me, why I wasn’t out on the streets like usual.

I had to heal and get back out there.

Maybe the first step to feeling more human was taking a shower.

“Need any help?” Dav asked, placing the towels on the rack and the shirt and panties on the sink counter.

Panties he’d clearly bought me, I might add.

There was a whole pile of them on the dresser in the bedroom, tags still attached. And we were not going to talk about the strange little thrill that moved through me at realizing he’d been the one to pick them out. Especially when he’d chosen simple, not fussy ones. A part of me thought that, given the chance, he’d buy something ridiculous like silk or lace or all strappy for no good reason.

He’d picked out what he thought I would like, not what he liked.

You had to appreciate that.

“The day I need your help taking off my shirt and underwear is the day you can just take me out back and shoot me,” I grumbled.

“I have to admit, I like the idea of taking your panties off for the first time in a much more mutually exciting way,” he said, giving me that damn playboy grin.

“That’s never going to happen.”

“Sure sure,” he agreed, heading toward the door. “I’ll be a couple feet away when you realize you’re being a stubborn-ass and need help with your hair,” he said. “Though, if you need help scrubbing any other are—“

“Out,” I snapped, but there wasn’t much bite to the word.

Alone, I stripped, removed my wrist brace, and moved into the shower niche, just letting the water run over me for a while, finding some relief in the sensation.

Until, of course, I reached for the bottle of body wash. That smelled just like Davide when he would sneak into my room right after his shower, shirtless, hair wet, still glistening a bit.

Just slathering it on conjured a bunch of mental images that I had no business thinking of on a good day, let alone when I was badly beaten.

But there was no denying the way my skin started to warm and my core ached in the painful knot of desire as the scent filled the air of the shower around me as well.

I pretended to ignore it as I washed the grime from the attack and days of lazing in bed off of my skin, catching sight of bruises I hadn’t even known existed until then. Up my arms, down my legs, over my hip and stomach. I saw more purple and blue than I did my actual skin tone as I looked myself over.

Finished with that, I reached for the bottle of shampoo… then nearly blacked out when my hands lifted past my chest.

The string of curses I let out was enough to make my fellow mafia capos blush.

“Ready to admit defeat yet?” Dev called from outside of the door. “Or are you intent on making this harder on yourself than absolutely necessary?”

“Fine,” I grumbled, reaching a hand to drape across my breasts.

I wasn’t overly modest. He was going to see my full ass. But with all of the comments about my boobs over the years, I felt weird letting him see them in this sort of context.

Not that there would ever be any other sort of context. There wouldn’t be.

“And by ‘fine,’ I assume you mean Hey, Dav, thanks for helping me not look like a swamp creature,” he said as he moved into the bathroom.

To his credit, he didn’t ogle me.

He moved toward the shower niche, glanced at the removable shower wand, hemming and hawing something.

“What are you doing?” I asked when he reached to yank off his shirt.

Because him being all close and shirtless with his hands on me was totally not going to help this situation.

“The water will run up my arms and soak me,” he explained. “Besides, now we’re more equal,” he said, waving down at himself.

Did my gaze follow?

Yes, yes it did.

What can I say? Dav took care of himself. I didn’t know what other workouts he fit into his busy schedule of bedroom cardio, but it was all working to his benefit.

I mean you could sink a finger in those abdominal muscles. Run your tongue…

Nope.

Not going there.

“What?” I asked at his raised brow look, wondering if I’d been caught eye-banging him.

“Unless you want water and soap in your eyes, you’re gonna need to tilt your head back for me,” he explained.

Right.

Duh.

Being naked with a half-clothed Dav was doing something to my brain.

Or maybe I had sustained some sort of head injury after all.

Because I’d never struggled this hard to stop thinking about getting hot and sweaty with the man before.

I tilted my head back, letting him soak it through again before placing the wand back in the cradle, positioning it so it sprayed across my back, keeping me from catching a chill as he lathered up the shampoo and reached for my scalp.

The second his fingers started to rub at my scalp, a shiver racked its way through my system, making his hands freeze.

“Cold?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” I insisted, even as my belly did somersaults and my heartbeat kicked into overdrive.

What the hell was going on?

I’d been fully naked, getting hot and heavy with men before, and never felt anywhere near as attuned to my body as I was right then, so overwhelmed with sensations.

My skin felt flushed and overly sensitive. My breasts heavy and nipples tensing into points.

Then, well, all the aching and heat in my core. That primal part of me wishing he would run his hand down my stomach, slip it between my thighs, and sink his fingers inside of me.

“Feel good?” he asked, making my eyes snap open as I realized with no small amount of mortification that I’d let out a little moan.

“What? No,” I said, attempting an eye roll for emphasis. “I think you hit a bruise,” I was quick to add. To lie.

“A bruise,” he repeated. “Right. Maybe I should be gentler,” he said. And, damn him, those gentler fingers felt even better.

Desire was a live wire through my body right then, little sparks threatening to set off an entire wildfire.

Then the man had to go and cup his hand over my forehead to keep soap from getting in my eyes when he rinsed.

“What am I, a toddler?” I grumbled to hide the way my chest felt all gooey at the gesture.

“Definitely not,” he said, his voice a bit deeper than usual, making another shiver move through me, this time on the inside. “Not done,” he said when I started to move away.

“It’s clean,” I insisted, knowing I needed to put some space between us as quickly as possible.

“Right. You’re gonna tell me you got all this hair and you don’t use a conditioner?”

“It’s fine.”

“If you want to be cursing me out in pain as I rake a brush through your tangled hair, then sure.”

“You’re not brushing my hair.”

“Okay,” he agreed.

“Okay?” I asked, squinting at him.

“Yeah. Should I set up the appointment at the salon now for when, two weeks from now, your hair is so knotty you have to cut it all off?”

“You’re annoying.”

“Because I’m right,” he shot back.

“I wouldn’t go that far,” I said, but I stepped back, letting him slather on the conditioner before rinsing it off.

He cut the water, then carefully squeezed as much water out of my hair as possible.

Just when I thought he was finally going to step away, was going to give me a chance to breathe and get myself together again, though, his hand slid downward, teasing over my ribs, sending another jolt of need through me.

“This looks so much worse,” he said, his voice a velvet caress over my skin as his fingers traced the bruises.

“It feels about the same,” I admitted, glancing down to watch his fingers move over my skin.

And not at all thinking about how easily they could just slip inward and down a bit more and…

“You want me to re-wrap them?” he asked.

“Yeah. I didn’t realize how much that was helping until I took the wraps off.”

“And what about drying off?”

“What about it?” I asked, body tensing, knowing where this was going. And not knowing if I was strong enough to turn the offer down.

“Why don’t you try to reach for your legs?” he suggested.

“Fuck,” I whimpered, arm shooting out to grab him as the pain ricocheted up my side as soon as I even attempted to bend. “Okay,” I said, gasping for breath as the pain kept washing over me. “Yeah.”

“Was the insistence on doing everything the hard way something that came preprogrammed, or did you add that in along the way?” he teased as he reached for a towel, carefully drying my hair enough that it wouldn’t drip all down me, before starting to rub the towel over my shoulders.

It wasn’t until he draped the towel over my whole front, and his hands were moving over my chest that I realized that the arm I’d reached out to grab him with was the one I’d had draped over my breasts.

Leaving me completely exposed.

Before I could fully come to terms with that, though, his hands were moving over the towel, covering my breasts, then sliding under.

Drying, sure, that was all he was doing.

But my body didn’t seem to get the memo as the need clawed at my core, making me press my thighs together to ease the ache.

The sensation was gone too soon, though, and the disappointment was palpable as he moved the towel down my stomach instead.

His gaze cut to mine, and I couldn’t help but wonder if my desire was etched on my face, if he could see what this was doing to me or not.

He moved to my back, making his body press closer, close enough to feel the heat of him as my nipples pebbled up tighter now that the water wasn’t warming me anymore.

The towel wrapped around my waist, and he used it to pull me out of the shower niche, my feet meeting the cushy bath mat.

Then, his gaze still holding mine, he lowered down as he dried my thighs.

Until he was on his knees.

Looking up at me.

This time, there was no way I could claim that the whimper that escaped me was anything but what it was.

Because I never could have known exactly how much I would like seeing him on his knees in front of me, his gaze holding mine as his face leveled with my sex that was throbbing for his attention.

A rumbling sound moved through Dav as his fingertips whispered up my calves.

“Trust me,” he said, voice thick again, “can’t think about anything right now but burying my face in your sweet pussy.” As if to prove his point, his lips pressed a little kiss to the triangle above my sex. But then he was getting back to his feet. “But you’re not stable enough to be standing for that.”

I had to get a hold of myself.

“Keep dreaming, Dav,” I said, hoping my voice wasn’t giving me away as much as his was.

“Think I might not be the only one dreaming anymore,” he said, and then the words were moving through me, wrapping around my heart and tightening.

“You think too highly of yourself,” I said as he reached for the simple black panties.

“That so?” he asked as he lowered down again, waiting for me to slip a foot into the leg hole. Then the other, before slipping the panties up my thighs. But pausing.

His gaze slipped to mine, and I saw the intention just a second before I felt his fingers between my thighs, sliding over me. Finding the proof he was seeking.

“What’s this then?” he asked, fingers teasing over my wet cleft.

“I just got out of the shower,” I reminded him even as my breath caught and my heartbeat became a frantic bass beat in my chest.

“Hmm,” he said. His heated gaze held mine as his fingers slid back down, then pressed inside of me, making a surprised gasp escape me as my hand grabbed his arm. “What about this?” he asked, voice still holding a challenge.

Try to deny it when my fingers are all inside your wet pussy.

“Dav…” I whimpered, too far gone to care how needy I sounded.

“Okay,” he said, voice soft as his free hand went around my waist, pulling me against him as his fingers started to slide inside of me.

“You know how many times I thought about my fingers inside of you?” he asked, getting a low whimper from me in response. “No fantasy comes close to this,” he added. “Feel how wet you are for me? How tight you are squeezing me?”

His fingers started to drive me up, and my labored breathing had my ribs aching. But I couldn’t seem to make myself care as his fingers turned inside of me, crooking and stroking against my top wall as his palm flattened against me, engaging my clit.

I gave into the need to lean into him, to bury my face in his neck, to surround myself with him. Like I’d been telling myself for years that I didn’t want.

Just this once, I was going to let myself have exactly what I wanted. Without obsessing over the outcome.

Dav’s head tilted, resting on the top of mine as he continued to work me. Making my legs wobble and my breath go quick and shallow.

Up this close, there was no denying his own desire as it pressed against me. As long and thick as I’d fantasized about in weak moments alone in my own bed.

Sensing the direction of my thoughts, Dav’s fingers moved a little faster.

“You have no idea how badly I want you right now,” he said, voice deep. “How much I wish my cock was buried right here,” he told me, using his fingers to emphasize his point, “right now.”

Another small, needy whimper escaped me as my walls tightened around his fingers, clearly desperate for that as well.

“But not yet,” he said. “Right now, I want to feel you tremble under my touch, to hear you moan my name.”

As if on cue, a low moan escaped me as his fingers and palm worked me just right at the same moment.

Listening to my response, Dav continued that exact movement and pace until I was trembling as hard as he wanted, until my moans were filling the air around us, until he was pushing me right to that edge.

“That’s it,” he said. “Just like that. Come for me,” he demanded. “I want to hear you cry out my name.”

Another stroke of his fingers had me pushed over that edge, free falling into the orgasm that had me crying out, choking out his name as I struggled to find my breath while I crashed over and over again.

It took all of, I don’t know, two-point-five seconds after the post-orgasm fog evaporated for me to realize how epically I had just fucked things up by allowing that to happen.

“And there she goes,” Dav said, voice tighter than usual.

I wanted to ask what that meant, what had put so much defeat in his voice. That desire was exactly why I wasn’t going to let myself ask, though.

His fingers slid out of me, and he waited for my gaze to find his before he stepped back to slip his fingers into his mouth, tasting me.

The low rumbling sound he made then damn near had me begging him to take me right then and there, all my pain be damned.

But his fingers slid out of his mouth, and he moved away from me, leaving me to yank my panties the rest of the way up with my one good hand.

I wanted to drape my arm across myself again, to create a physical boundary because of the confusion I felt surrounding my emotions right then.

But I couldn’t let Davide know he’d gotten to me.

I let my arms hang by my sides as he came back to me, his gaze on mine, his hands holding a fresh roll of elastic bandages.

“Arms up, love,” he said, and my heart swooped and soared at that word, at the gentle way he’d said it.

But I couldn’t have that.

So I broke those wings mid-flight, and lifted my arms in such a way to get them out of the way and hide my chest as he wrapped me up tightly, a sensation that made the pain worse for a while, but as soon as he was done, helped it ease to a tolerable ache.

The shirt came next, and I was thankful for another layer of protection against both our desires.

My gaze lowered as he reached to zip up the oversized sweatshirt, and I could still see the thick, hard outline of him beneath his pants.

I was surprised how strong the urge was to reach out, to stroke the length of him, to slip under the waistband of his pants to feel his velvety skin and the thickness of him in my palm.

But that was exactly why I stepped back as soon as my zipper was in place.

“Do you have that other brace?” I asked, proud of how unaffected my voice sounded when I was anything but that.

“Sure,” he said, and I felt his gaze on my profile for a long moment before he moved out of the room to fetch it.

Alone, I moved in front of the mirror, looking at the punching bag of a face I was sporting.

“Get it together,” I whispered.

Because whether I liked it or not, for the time being, I really needed to be here. I needed the help he was eager to give.

And I needed to not let anything like that happen again.

He came back with the new brace, slipping it carefully on as I tried not to curse too much as he jostled my aching wrist.

“Go on and sit on the couch,” he said. “I have to get the brush and detangling solution. And toss the sheets in the dryer. I’ll probably still beat your slow ass out there,” he teased.

It was right then I knew it was going to be okay, that he wasn’t going to harp on it, make me feel weird about it.

Why would he?

Fingering women was probably as casual to him as shaking someone’s hand.

There was no explanation for the way that thought sent a pang through my chest.

Nope.

No rational explanation at all…

CHAPTER SEVEN

Dav

It took every ounce of self-control I’d built up over the years to let her walk out of the bathroom, inching her way toward the living room.

As soon as I was alone, I reached into my pants, freeing my cock and giving in to the need that had become actual pain as I finally got to see her, touch her, taste her in the ways I’d been imagining for so long.

It was a hollow sort of release, though, leaving me antsy and unsatisfied since what I really wanted was the woman flicking through the channels on the TV in my living room.

On a frustrated sigh, I switched the bedding to the dryer, then gathered the brush and detangler before making my way back out to the living room, standing behind Cinna as she picked at yogurt and watched some reality show about home renovations.

“Didn’t have you pegged for a DIYer,” I said, wanting to break the chilled silence that had grown between us as I carefully brushed the knots out of her hair.

To that, she snorted, the edges of her lips tipped up. “I’ve never even painted the walls in my apartment,” she admitted. “I don’t even have a dining table,” she added. “But I like seeing other people, you know, make a home.”

There was something pointed in her words.

Like maybe she didn’t see her apartment as a home.

I guess that made sense, since she likely never spent more than five or six hours a day there, just long enough to catch some sleep and shower before heading back out to work.

“How come I’ve never been invited to your place?” I asked, wincing as I worked at a particularly big tangle.

“No one’s ever been to my place,” she admitted, shrugging. “You don’t need to be gentle with me, by the way. I can take it.”

“Your ability to handle the pain isn’t really the point, love,” I told her, redoubling my efforts to make sure I didn’t so much as pull at her scalp.

“Stop calling me that,” she said a moment later, voice low.

“Why?” I asked, running the brush through her knot-free strands, satisfied that I’d gotten them all. “Because you don’t like it?” I added. Then, leaning down near her ear, “Or because you like it too much?”

With that, I turned and walked away from her, busying myself with answering some texts from my soldiers and associates.

I wasn’t a workaholic like Cinna, but being a capo came with responsibilities that you really couldn’t shirk, lest your men get the idea that they don’t have to answer to you anymore.

Across the room, Cinna was doing the same, typing away with one hand, getting more and more frustrated by each passing moment as she took twice as long to answer as usual.

She was a terrible patient.

She had no patience with her own body, wanting things to work like they were supposed to, injuries be damned. Which was exactly why she tried to use the fingers of her braced wrist, only to break off on a groan, cradling the wrist to her chest for a moment.

And her frustration made her prickly and snippy at times.

Most men would likely get sick of it really fast. The thing was, though, I was used to the prickly and snippy and borderline nasty sides of Cinna. What I hadn’t really ever gotten to see before, though, were the sides of her I was seeing in between her bursts of anger.

The softer, the sweeter.

The parts of her that I’d been insisting for years to her and anyone else around I knew existed. Getting nothing but eye rolls and head shakes from them.

The thing was, I understood her in ways she couldn’t even wrap her head around yet.

While she’d never told me her story, I knew how a rough childhood made you really fucking good at playing at personas, at putting on masks to hide what was truly underneath.

For me, it was the jovial and easy-going. A light people—especially women—leaned into.

But I knew what was hiding beneath. A darkness that ran deep, a penchant for violence and pain I had little control over when it showed up.

That was how I knew that this face Cinna wore for the world—cold and hard and compulsively independent—hid the exact opposite underneath. Warm and soft and desperate to be taken care of.

Maybe it was that true darkness inside of me that sought out the light in her. The hard longing for soft. My strength begging for someone to look after, to unburden.

“What?” Cinna snapped, making me realize I’d been staring at her again.

“Your eye looks a little better,” I declared for something to say. Because there was no way to tell a woman like Cinna—so closed off and repressed—that I had a feeling there was something, I don’t know, kismet between us.

“It’s almost worse that it’s partially open,” she admitted, tossing her phone onto the coffee table, giving up on texting for the moment. “It’s messing with my vision.”

“We could get you an eye patch.”

“So you can make endless pirate jokes?” she asked, smirking. “I don’t think so. Ugh,” she grumbled when her phone started to ring. “They’re like children,” she mumbled to herself, snatching up her phone and bringing it to her ear. “What now?” she said by way of greeting, making me shake my head.

I couldn’t imagine working for Cinna. Her men must piss their pants at the idea of coming to her and telling her that they’d fucked up something.

“Jesus Christ,” she sighed, tapping her fingers on her leg.

Cinna was a pacer when she was on the phone. She was always on the move, never sitting still. She must have been going half crazy that her ribs were keeping her ass on the couch right then.

“Yeah, fine. Go help him out. But let him get a little scared first,” she said. “He’s never gonna fucking learn if he doesn’t almost die a time or two,” she declared.

“Soldier acting up?” I asked when she hung up.

“I’m starting to regret being nice and letting him climb up from associate just because he’s the brother of one of my most dependable men.”

“We all had to get our young and stupid out,” I said. At her raised brow, mine scrunched. “So that wasn’t you that I saw walk into the restaurant run by the Yakuza and start yelling at the first fucking lieutenant that he better get his operation off of your turf before you cut off his balls, bronze them, and wear them as earrings?”

“I still get random deliveries of Chinese food I didn’t order,” she admitted. “It’s probably poisoned.”

“He probably wants to fuck you.”

“He’s eighty if he’s a day,” she said, wrinkling up her nose.

“They’ve got pills to keep things working. Come on, you don’t want to be a first lieutenant’s wife?”

“I don’t want to be anyone’s wife,” she said, and there was no logical explanation for the pang those words caused me.

“He’s married anyway,” I said, turning to make a pot of coffee. “So, you’d have to be his mistress.”

“Don’t you have to, you know, work?” Cinna asked as I brought her a cup of coffee. Black, like she claimed to like it, but I couldn’t help but wonder if that was something she’d taught herself to avoid having the men around her comment on a ‘girly’ drink.

“I’m not quite as dedicated as you are,” I told her. “Sorry this is not the toxic sludge you usually drink, but it will have to do.”

“My coffee is not that strong,” she insisted in an exasperated way that suggested more than a few people had complained about it.

“I could use it to fuel my car,” I shot back, getting a little laugh out of her. It was a rare sound. But, fuck, was it worth it when you did get to hear it.

“This isn’t bad,” she declared after taking a sip. “I needed it. The meds are making me want to crawl right back into bed.”

“Which is exactly where you can go after I make the bed. You need to take it easy to recover. What?” I asked at the narrowed look she shot me.

“I didn’t peg you for someone who makes their own bed,” she admitted.

“That’s fair,” I agreed. “I do have a cleaning lady who does… all the things,” I said, waving toward my clean apartment. “But I can’t call her up each time I need to strip the bed, if you know what I’m saying.”

“Gross,” she said, face scrunching up. “Though I guess it’s refreshing that you actually do clean them after your… extracurriculars. Or, you know, at all. I once knew a guy who had towels on his bare mattress. Towels,” she said, shuddering.

“You’ve got to raise your standards there, killer.”

“I wasn’t fucking him!” she said, mouth falling open in outrage. “I was actually there to bust a kneecap. But I would assume that at some point, he would try to bring a woman home to that. Gross.”

“Most of the women I’ve brought home have marveled at the fact that I have a headboard,” I admitted. “The bar is on the floor. What?” I asked as she looked at me, something odd in her gaze.

“I don’t have a headboard,” she admitted.

“So your head is just raw-dogging the wall when you’re getting fucked? You know, continuous brain damage might explain your surly personality,” I teased.

“Dick,” she said, but she was smiling. “But I thought I told you… no one comes to my apartment.”

I assumed she meant just guys from our organization. I didn’t think she meant… all men.

“Not even pretty girls in slinky lingerie?” I asked.

“I am forever going to regret telling you I banged a woman when I was fresh out of high school, aren’t I?”

“And I will be forever grateful to have that information,” I admitted.

“Typical guy,” she said, shaking her head at me. “And it was once,” she added. “Just to see if it was for me or not. Turns out, no matter what the homophobes try to say, it’s really not a choice.”

“Didn’t like eating pussy, Cin?” I asked, tilting my head to watch her. “I want to die buried between a gorgeous woman’s thighs.”

If I hadn’t been looking so closely, I might have missed the way desire burned in her eyes. Because it was gone before you could even blink. But it had been there.

No matter how much she was trying to act otherwise, Cinna wanted me as much as I wanted her.

With her recovering in my place for the foreseeable future, I couldn’t help but wonder how long it would take before the powder keg of our mutual desire finally exploded.

And what might be left in the wreckage.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Cinna

My face healed first. The swelling lessened with each passing day, my eye opened up, and while there were still bruises smattered across my skin, I looked like myself again.

My wrist hurt like a bitch when I had to take off the brace, but when it was on, I slowly began to be able to use my hand in small ways. Pulling up the covers in bed, shooting off texts, or picking up light items.

It was the goddamn ribs that threatened to never get better.

Even when I thought they might be getting better, I would do something like turn too fast or raise my arm too high, and I’d feel like I was about to black out from the pain.

Still, I eased down and then off of the pain meds, not wanting to have a dependency to deal with when all of this was said and done.

Besides, the pain was… helpful in other ways.

Namely keeping me from doing something world-shatteringly stupid like climbing Davide like a tree the way my body had been begging me to do almost since I arrived in his apartment.

Objectively, it was time to go home.

I didn’t need Dav to bring me meds because I couldn’t get them for myself. Or to get me food. I was even managing to wash my own hair now. Though that was out of my steadfast determination not to be naked around him again because, quite frankly, I didn’t trust myself.

I didn’t understand my lack of self-control around him all of a sudden. I’d never been someone who struggled to control their baser instincts. Sex was, you know, fine. But it wasn’t like I was walking around thinking about it all of the time, eye-fucking hot men I came across on the street, waking up tangled in sheets from vivid dreams about them.

Not even Dav.

Until now.

I woke up with the tendrils of desire still clinging to me. And it only intensified. When I would come out and catch him fresh out of the shower, a towel draped scandalously low on his hips. When he got himself all dressed with that familiar tobacco, leather, and vanilla scent clinging to him from his cologne.

God, it was bad enough that I even found myself freezing mid-stride when I came out of the bedroom at night to find him sleeping on the couch wearing nothing but his thin, low-slung sleep pants.

We weren’t even going to talk about the way need clawed at me when, on one of those trips, I came out to find him having similarly happy dreams, his hard length pressing against the material of his pajama pants.

Or how the only way I’d been able to tolerate it had been to go back into the bedroom, slide my hand between my thighs, and try to sate the hunger with an orgasm.

It did no good, though.

It wasn’t just about the sex, just the pleasure.

It was about Dav.

And that, well, was dangerous.

Hence why I needed to get my ass back home.

But week three ticked by, and I still found myself crashing at his place, walking around like it belonged to me too. Doing laundry. Making coffee. Stealing his extra razor. Ordering things delivered to his address.

We were playing house.

And a part of me was terrified that it would come to a point where I wouldn’t just want to play anymore.

“Spill something?” Dav asked, coming out as he slid in cufflinks, finding me staring at the couch.

“No. I’m taking the couch tonight,” I told him.

I didn’t feel guilty sleeping in his bed when I was a walking bruise. But it was time to let the man get a decent night of rest in his own bed. And I figured it was a step toward going back to my place.

Even if the idea of that filled me with dread in a way that both confused and terrified me.

Confused because, well, I never spent any time there anyway, save for sleeping and showering.

Terrified because the fear was starting to take root and grow. Like the time I’d drawn a gun on Dav when he’d been coming home, a knee-jerk reaction. Because I was afraid of being attacked again.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’d never welcomed being attacked. But I’d always accepted that it was a part of my work, that it was the life I chose. And I’d never been fearful of it.

It was not good that this attack was having this lasting of an impact.

I needed to force myself back out there on the streets, into the thick of things. Get my confidence back.

“Absolutely not,” Dav said as he made his way into the kitchen.

I wasn’t going to argue with the man. I was just going to do it. Clearly, he was on his way out. By the time he got back, I would be on the couch.

“Where are you heading?” I asked, glancing at the clock, then having an immediate stab of irrational jealousy at noting how late it was. Was he going on a date?

“Renzo’s,” he explained.

The boss of the Lombardi family had a pretty open door policy at his place. All his capos came to hang out, to eat, drink, play pool, catch up with one another, and maybe talk a little business.

We didn’t gather there as much as we used to since Renzo married Lore, but everyone was still invited over on a regular basis.

And, normally, I would be there.

At least just to show my face.

Were people going to talk when I wasn’t there?

I could probably fake it now. Get some of that makeup that hides tattoos, slather it on my face to cover the bruises, and just move more carefully, so no one saw that I was favoring my ribs.

“I’ll mention that I ran into you,” Dav said as if reading my mind. “That you were in the middle of something. They don’t need to know it’s sitting on your lovely ass and recovering.”

“I can’t ask you to lie to Renzo for me.”

“It’s not a lie. It’s an omission.”

“Which is still a lie,” I reasoned.

“Okay. You want me to tell him you’ve been crashing in my bed for a few weeks, covered in bruises, and barely able to move?” he asked, watching me shift my feet. “Exactly. So an omission it is.”

The intercom buzzed, making my whole body jolt, the adrenaline snapping through my veins.

“I’ll be eating at Renzo’s, so I ordered you dinner,” he explained, reaching in his wallet for a tip.

“I’ve been managing to feed myself for many years now, you know,” I told him, even as that gooey sensation in my chest started again.

“And now I get the pleasure of doing it,” he said as he went to the door, then disappeared into the hallway for a moment. “Eat. Get some sleep. I’ll try to be quiet when I get home,” he said as he placed the bags and a tray of drinks on the island.

With that, he was gone, leaving me to check out the bags, finding that he not only got me a coffee from the place I liked, but the lemon-lime soda I preferred, a big serving of fettuccini Alfredo with chicken and broccoli, and a slice of cheesecake.

That gooey sensation only intensified as I pulled each item out, realizing that I’d never known a man who knew how I took my coffee, let alone what dinners I liked, and what kind of dessert tended to call for me in the middle of the night.

I mean, this man had even had the delivery guy pick up a can of whipped cream because I’d mentioned once that I liked to use that as a topping on my cheesecake.

I took my food to the coffee table, eating while watching someone turn their garage into, I shit you not, a giant craft room.

And I didn’t, not for one moment, wish that Dav was sitting there beside me, grumbling about paint and wallpaper choices, or wondering how the hell two public school teachers could afford a hundred-thousand-dollar renovation.

When I was done, I made up the couch and lowered myself onto it, pleased when the movement created more of an ache than the stabbing pain I’d been dealing with in my ribs for weeks.

Did my paranoia have me placing the gun Dav gave me on the coffee table? Yes, yes, it did. I may have also stashed my mace in between the cushions and my knife under the pillow.

Then, to the sounds of drilling and sawing on the TV, I drifted off to sleep.

Which was probably why, at first, I thought it was a dream. Just another in a long line of sweet moments that led to sweaty bodies entangled in one another in bed.

It was the only explanation for how Dav had managed not only to come into the apartment, but reach down and slide his arms under my body before he even woke me up fully.

By the time I realized it wasn’t a dream, I was already being lifted into Dav’s arms and cradled to his chest.

My senses filled with him.

Tobacco, leather, and vanilla surrounded me, dizzying in its intensity.

The heat of him warmed my chilled skin.

I settled into the strength of his arms, the breadth of his chest.

Sure, I was still a bit hazy from sleep, but I felt oddly drunk on all things him at that moment.

“What are you doing?” I asked, managing to think through the desire starting to overtake me.

“Taking you to bed,” he murmured, his voice a soft caress teasing across overly sensitive skin.

“Okay,” I agreed, snuggling in, every part of me deciding that Dav taking me to bed was the best idea in the world.

CHAPTER NINE

Dav

Renzo’s place was pretty packed by the time I got there, the music in full swing, everyone already holding plates and drinks.

I immediately sank into the crowd, getting my own food and eating, so I didn’t stick out too much.

Even as I fell into conversations with men and women I hadn’t seen or spoken to in weeks, though, all I could seem to do was think about Cinna.

In my apartment.

In my bed.

She almost looked completely back to normal these days. Her bruising had gone from coalescing, violent shades of mulberry and indigo to bright yellow and green with just a hint of something darker in the center. The swelling was completely gone, leaving her ridiculously gorgeous face with no lasting damage.

Really, it was just her wrist and her ribs holding her back at this point.

Well, that and her own trepidation.

We hadn’t talked about it. Any time I tried to bring up the attack and the people responsible for it, she clammed up, tensed, rushed to change the topic.

The thing was, something was different with Cinna because of that attack, because of those bastards and what they’d done to her.

For the first time in her career, it seemed like the violence had not only impacted her physically, but mentally as well.

She tried to hide it.

And maybe no one else but me would have picked up on it.

But she was jumpy.

I’d once seen this woman not even flinch when a bottle flew at the wall beside her head and shattered.

Now? She nearly jumped out of her fucking skin when the intercom buzzed or there was a knock at the door. Hell, once a damn pigeon landed on the sill outside of the window, and she jerked so fast and hard that she’d jarred her ribs enough to bring tears to her eyes.

This attack had changed her.

I imagined that was the only real reason she was still in my apartment rather than back at her own. She wasn’t mentally ready to leave yet.

I mean, sure, her ribs were still bothering her. But not enough that she couldn’t go back to most of her daily life duties without an issue.

She just wasn’t emotionally ready to go yet.

Not that I was complaining.

Clearly, since all I could fucking think about was her even when I was supposed to be enjoying my time with all my fellow capos and my boss.

“Looking for someone?” I asked as Rico’s gaze slid over the crowd, brows furrowed.

“Where the fuck is Cinna?” he asked, making my stomach tense. Not just lying to the boss then, it seemed.

“I saw her on my way here,” I told him, the partial lie slipping easily from between my lips. “Looked like she was in the middle of something.” At this point, that was likely eating the dinner I’d picked up for her. “Dunno if she’s gonna be here tonight.”

“Oh,” Rico said, face tangled in confusion, but his shoulders relaxed a bit.

“Why?” I asked.

“Just heard one of her soldiers talking earlier, saying they hadn’t seen her in weeks.”

“Hadn’t they heard from her at least?” I asked.

“I mean, yeah.”

“You know Cinna,” I said, shrugging. “She’s always busy.”

“True,” Rico agreed.

“Or maybe she found herself a personal life,” I said, getting a chuckle out of Rico.

“That’ll be the day,” he said.

“Hey, we never thought Renzo would slow down either,” I reasoned, jerking my chin toward our boss, who was leaning against the bar, watching his wife talking to Elian, her clear favorite of all the capos, a man who’d championed for Renzo to understand what a prize he had in his wife.

I liked Lore. Everyone did. She just… wasn’t my type. Soft and sweet and timid. A mafia princess raised in a sheltered life thanks to her father and five mafia capo brothers. But I could see that she was exactly what Renzo needed. Someone to come home to. A reason not to work himself to the bone.

“Gonna go say hi to the boss,” I told Rico, moving in that direction.

I was a solid ten feet away still, though, when someone came charging through the crush of people, making a beeline for the pool table, and snatching up the eight ball, turning, aiming, and sending the fucking thing sailing through the air, missing Renzo’s head by two inches, and crashing into the bar behind him, a bottle of liquor smashing with the impact.

“Jesus Christ, Saff,” Renzo said, brows pinched.

The man didn’t even flinch.

“You had no right to do that,” Saff snapped, charging toward him.

All five-feet-three-inches of fury.

When it came to mafia bosses, Renzo Lombardi was probably the most progressive out there. Because he not only tolerated, but encouraged, the idea of female capos in his organization.

I think a lot of us thought Cinna was a one-off back in the day. Because she was so tough and badass. Because everyone who ever met her knew she was meant for a life like this.

But, slowly over the years, he added more and more female soldiers and capos.

Saff was one of those.

Looking at her, you wouldn’t think she was every bit as tough—if not more so—as Cinna. She was short and thin with thick thighs and almost comically small feet. I was pretty sure the woman could shop in the children’s section still.

She had a pretty, deceptively sweet-looking heart-shaped face with big light brown eyes that almost hinted a bit grayish in the right light, a delicate nose with a ring, very defined cupid’s bow lips, and a smattering of subtle freckles over her nose and cheeks.

Her long hair was usually down, but tonight she had the dark blue wavy strands pulled up in a ponytail, the resulting effect making her look even younger than she was.

The real difference between Saff and Cinna, though, had nothing to do with looks.

Where Cinna was calm and collected with anger that ran cold, Saff was pure chaos whose anger ran hot enough to burn up everyone around her.

Like throwing a pool ball at a fucking mafia boss.

“Seeing as this is my family, Saff, yeah, I did have the right,” Renzo said, voice patient. Because, quite frankly, he’d been dealing with Saff’s explosions for years.

“I had it handled,” she raged, moving toward him, her heeled boots clicking on the floor as she went. They were a solid five inches, and they just barely made her average height.

“I never said you didn’t.”

That took some of the wind out of her sails. But this was Saff. She wasn’t going to let it go that easily.

“Then why the fuck would you step in?” she asked. “Would you have done that if this was Rico’s job? Or Elian? Davide?”

“This isn’t a sexist thing, Saff. You know better than that,” Renzo said, shaking his head.

“Would you have taken this from Cinna then?” she asked.

“I dunno. Maybe. You’re different people, Saff. Different strengths.”

“Bullshit. You don’t have the same respect for me as you do for her.”

“You haven’t been made as long as she has,” Renzo reasoned. “You have been a good capo so far, Saff. A great earner. But a lot of the people here, Cinna included,” he said, then scanned the crowd to look for her before looking back at Saff. “I might trust them with this job more than you because they’ve got a longer track record.”

“How the fuck can I get a track record if you take jobs from me?”

“Job. One job. This isn’t the end of the fucking world, babe. This is just a big deal. You were smart in bringing it in. But I want someone more seasoned to seal the deal. It’s not about you. It’s about the money. And if you had gotten your head out of your own ass for two minutes, you would have seen that before storming in here.”

Saff’s jaw was still granite, her eyes still burning, but the flames were flickering out.

Yeah, she ran hot.

But she burned out quickly.

“You need to learn to trust me too,” she said, voice low enough that most of the people in the apartment couldn’t hear her.

“I do trust you. And, with some more time, I won’t even think of stepping in and taking a job from you. You just gotta put the years in, babe. Just like everyone else. Now, you want a drink?” he asked. “Hopefully not tequila, ‘cause you ruined that.”

You had to respect Renzo’s ability not to get his feathers ruffled when one of his own crew came at him. He was a hard boss, sometimes even ruthless, but he didn’t exactly want everyone kowtowing to him.

He wanted an organization full of people who didn’t need to be babysat. Which meant everyone had an attitude, a lot of ego, and big fucking balls. He understood that those things were what made a good capo, so he didn’t get bent out of shape when someone copped an attitude with him.

“Vodka,” she said, and Renzo nodded before moving behind the bar, grabbing the bottle of vodka, and pouring it into a glass, squeezing a lime into it, then handing it to Saff as Elian came by with a dustpan and broom to deal with the glass.

“This doesn’t mean I’m not still mad at you,” Saff said, taking a sip.

“I can live with that,” Renzo said, lips twitching. “Dav, where the fuck you been?”

“Davide?” Saff scoffed. “Trapped under a pile of women, most likely. God knows you’re not working,” she added with a little smile.

“Keep being a little shit and I might be motivated to steal your next few jobs out from under you.”

“I dare you,” she said, narrowing her eyes at me.

“What are you gonna do, bite my ankles?”

Renzo was right about Saff being green. Not that it was her fault. She was barely old enough to drink. Which was probably why she had such a big brother/little sister relationship with many of the other capos. Myself included.

And as much as she might throw attitude around about it, I got a feeling that she secretly liked it, since she had no actual family of her own.

“Just been busy,” I told Renzo. Which was true. I’d been busy taking care of Cinna. “Did I miss one of these?” I asked.

“No, no. Just mean in general. Haven’t seen you around much. You, Cinna, everyone seems busy as fuck without giving me much info on what jobs you’re up to.”

“I’m looking to expand a bit,” I told him. It was true. It just wasn’t something I was actively working on. “A few low-level guys got pinched on charges unrelated to the family. Simple assault over someone running their mouth at a bar. Want them replaced. Can’t have people that sloppy in my crew.”

“Good. Any idea what Cin is working on?” he asked, making my gut clench. I’d hoped that I would only have to mention Cinna once. And here we were for the third time.

“Just know she’s busy as fuck. Barely spared me a word when I passed her,” I told him. Again, not lying. I had passed her in the hall in the middle of the night and she’d shot me tired eyes and kept along her way to go ‘busy herself’ by icing her ribs.

“Oh, didn’t know you’d seen her,” he said.

“A few times,” I said, nodding.

“Oh,” Renzo said, shoulders relaxing. I wondered if someone on Cinna’s crew was running their mouth about not seeing her. “Right. Good. She’s always distracted when she’s busy,” he agreed.

Someone called him over then, saving me from more evasions.

But when my gaze slid back to Saff, I saw her watching me with penetrative eyes, her head tilted to the side.

“You’re… lying about something,” she said, making my heart seize in my chest. “But I can’t figure out what.”

“Now what would I have to lie about, kid?” I asked, trying to rile her, so she let it drop. Of all people, I didn’t think it would be Saff who would be suspicious.

“I don’t—“ she started, but cut off as something behind me caught her gaze.

Turning, I found one of Renzo’s soldiers walking in.

Coal was a kid who’d been working for someone who was trying to take over the family after Renzo’s wedding. A guy who’d been strapped to a chair and beaten, but he hadn’t broken. He’d impressed Renzo enough to offer him a job.

Since then, he’d been hungry to prove his worth.

Clearly, he was coming back from doing some sort of work for the family, because his face was bruised, his lip split, and his nose was still caked with dried blood.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen him without blood or bruises on him,” Saff said, shaking her head as Coal made a beeline for Renzo who had his arm draped around his wife’s waist. “I’m gonna go eavesdrop,” she said, then walked off, saving me from having to try to convince her I wasn’t lying about anything when I kind of was.

I made a round, saying a quick hello to the other capos, just so no one would question where I’d been lately.

Then I made my way quietly out, hoping no one but the guard at the door noticed.

Normally, I was one of the last to leave, never the kind to walk away from a good time.

I tried to tell myself it was just to save myself from more evasions and lies.

The problem was, though, that I knew the truth.

Wanting to leave had nothing to do with the party.

And everything to do with the woman at home in my bed.

Or, as it turned out, stubbornly camped out on my couch.

I really should have anticipated that.

But she wasn’t going to get her way.

Walking over, I carefully placed the gun out of reach, fished the knife out from under her pillow, and picked up the mace from where it had fallen on the floor before finally peeling back her blanket and sliding my arms under her body.

I expected her to pitch a fit when she realized I was holding her. I didn’t anticipate the way she softened into me. Like she wanted to be there.

Exactly where I wanted her too.

It was too short of a walk to the bedroom, no matter how much I slowed my pace. And before long I was lowering her down onto the mattress.

But before I could turn and walk away, I found my wrist snagged in her hand.

I turned back, finding her watching me with something in her eyes that had my chest feeling tight.

“Stay.”

CHAPTER TEN

Cinna

Did I actually just say that out loud?

Sure, I’d been thinking that.

But I didn’t actually want him to stay.

Right?

The thing was, as I watched his head tip to the side, a question in his eyes, I knew I did.

I wanted him to stay.

I wanted a whole lot more than that.

And maybe, just this once, I could actually get what I truly wanted in life. Even if it only lasted one night. Because tomorrow, I was going to leave. Then try to pretend all of this didn’t happen.

So tonight? Tonight I was going to give in to what had been growing between us for literally years.

“Yeah?” he asked, his voice a soft caress.

“Yeah,” I agreed, releasing his wrist, leaving it in his hands.

He stepped back, and my heart sank for one short, agonizing second, before I saw him reach toward his wrists, removing his cufflinks, and leaving them on the nightstand.

Next was his watch.

His jacket.

Anticipation sizzled across my nerve endings as he tugged the hem of his shirt out of his slacks, then worked at his buttons.

I watched the sliver of skin grow wider as each button opened, as the motions spread the material wider.

Then, with one quick motion, the shirt was gone.

I was helpless but to let my gaze slide over him, watching the way his muscles twitched as he moved.

I followed the movement of his hands as he reached for his belt, working it free, then sliding it from the loops with a whooshing noise that had no right to be as sexy as it was.

His hands moved to his button and zip, pausing, until my gaze slid up to his face, finding him watching me with heavy-lidded eyes.

“See something you like, love?” he asked, his words making a shiver course through me.

I was pushing myself up then, struggling a bit with only one good hand, and ribs that were still aching, but I managed to get to a seated position, then slid my legs off the edge of the bed, leaving me sitting with my head at a suggestive position.

“Show me more,” I demanded, hearing a thickness in my own voice as the desire began to spread through me.

That rumble moved through him, and I watched as his hands pushed the button through, then slid down the zipper.

His slacks fell down, pooling at his legs, forgotten by both of us, as he stood there in nothing but a pair of black boxer briefs that were doing next to nothing to hide the proof of his desire.

My hand lifted, my fingertip teasing down the length of him, making his breath hiss out, and his abdominal muscles go taut.

“I can’t…” I said, lifting my braced hand.

His own hands moved down, grabbing the waistband of his boxers and slowly pulling them down until they pooled with his pants.

For the first time, he was the one naked with me fully clothed. Something about that sent a thrill through me.

But then, well, my gaze slid to his hard length, and all other thoughts flew out of my head.

I wasn’t even aware that the whimper I felt inside had escaped me until a low chuckle moved through Dav.

“Thinking about how I’m gonna feel buried inside your tight pussy?” he asked, making my sex flutter. “Been thinking of fucking nothing else for weeks,” he admitted.

My good hand lifted, wrapping around his cock, and sliding down his length to hold him at the base.

“Fuck,” Dav groaned, his cock twitching even as I leaned forward, teasing my tongue around his head, tasting his desire, and feeling his hand slam down on my shoulder, fingers digging in, as I continued to explore him.

I teased my tongue down the underside of his length, then replaced my tongue with my lips, sucking upward, then taking him in between my lips, working him until my hand was in my way.

“Fuck, baby,” Dav hissed. “You can take my cock so deep.”

I whimpered around him as my sex clenched hard, the pressure on my lower stomach becoming painful.

“Been thinking about having my cock in your mouth for years,” he admitted, his hand sliding to the back of my neck as I moved back up, then down. “None of those fantasies stacked up to how good you feel fucking me with your mouth,” he said as I worked him harder and faster. “As much as I want to come down your throat, though, baby,” he started, suddenly grabbing a handful of my hair, tugging until the pain spread across my scalp, forcing me to move up until his cock slid from between my lips with a pop. “I need to be inside of you more,” he finished, his thumb teasing across my swollen lower lip.

He moved forward a step, his leg wedging between mine. His hands went out, grabbing me around the hips, and pressing me further back.

He followed me up onto the mattress as I moved to lie flat, looking up at him, my belly going liquid at the molten desire in his eyes.

“Fuck, baby,” he said, his fingers teasing the sides of my knees, then up my thighs. “Love how you’re looking at me right now. The way you fucking tremble when I touch you,” he went on as his fingers whispered over the tops of my thighs, making a shiver rack my system. “How wet you already are for me,” he said as his fingers teased up my inner thighs to press into the material of my panties, finding me already drenched for him.

“Dav,” I whimpered, letting my thighs fall open for him, inviting more.

But his hand moved away, sliding across the waistband of my panties instead, over my hip, then back to the center and up.

His fingers snagged the pull of my zipper, moving it downward, then reaching to spread the material to the sides, exposing me.

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he murmured as his fingers teased down the center of my chest, over my belly, across my hips. Then back up, over my ribs, grazing the sides of my breasts, then finally moving to cover them with his hands, squeezing.

I arched up into the sensation as desire shot from his touch to between my thighs.

That rumble moved through him and he was suddenly moving down toward me, his face nestling between my breasts, his hair tickling over my heated skin before his hand moved away, and his lips replaced it, his tongue circling around my nipple until it was twisted into an aching point. Only then did he suck it into his mouth, making white-hot pleasure course through me, dragging out a ragged moan as my hips rose against him instinctively, writhing, trying to get relief from the need building between.

The sweet torment seemed to go on forever, his tongue, lips, and teeth making me squirm and whimper. Before, finally, he moved across my chest, starting the process all over again.

“Dav, please,” I moaned, fingers slipping into his hair, yanking.

“Please what?” he asked, resting his chin between my breasts, and looking up at me with heavy-lidded eyes, the ghost of a smirk toying with his lips. “Please slip off your panties, and bury my face between your thighs and taste you like I’ve been craving to do?”

“Yes.”

“Mmhmm,” he murmured against my skin as his lips pressed a kiss to the spot his chin had been resting a moment before.

But then he was moving a path upward instead of down, pressing kisses across my chest, tracing my collarbone with his tongue, the column of my neck.

My head tilted, inviting more even as my body screamed for relief from the clawing need in my core.

His teeth snagged my earlobe before his lips moved down my jaw, a whisper-soft, sweet sort of attention I wasn’t used to. And some part of me wanted to grab him, to push him downward, to shrink away from this new sort of intimacy.

But then his lips were sealing over mine, silencing any protest I might have forced out.

He was soft and sweet for a moment, expecting, what? Hesitance on my part? Or worried he might hurt me?

My legs came up around his hips, heels digging into his ass, pulling him flush against me, our centers aligning, and the pressure of his cock against my cleft had moans escaping both of us.

It was then that some of the control he had over himself snapped, making him kiss me harder, hungrier, his lips bruising into mine, his tongue moving inside to claim mine as his hips ground down into me as my hips writhed up against him.

I didn’t even care about foreplay right then. I wanted him to reach down, to yank my underwear out of the way, and to feel him sink inside me, know what it felt like to feel him pressing deep, stretching me to make me his.

As if sensing the direction of my thoughts, though, Dav pulled against my hold, his lips and tongue moving down the other side of my jaw, down my neck, over my clavicle, then down between my breasts, over my belly.

Goosebumps pebbled up on my skin as he kissed across the waistband of my panties before, suddenly, his lips were moving between my thighs, sucking my clit into his mouth through the material, making a ragged sound escape me as my whole body jolted in the mix of surprise and pleasure.

Dav made an approving sound that vibrated against me as he continued to work me with his tongue, the material creating a different kind of friction and frustration that had my hands in his hair, holding him against me as my hips rocked up into the sensation, begging for more.

His hand moved up, finally snagging the material of my panties, pulling downward as I arched up, so he could free it, desperate to feel him without the barrier.

Dav sat back, carefully pushing my knees in toward my chest so he could pull the material off of my ankles.

When it was discarded to the side of the bed, his fingers drifted up my legs to grab my knees, pulling them apart, then spreading me wide on the mattress for him.

“Look how fucking perfect you are,” he said, fingers drifting across my inner thighs. “Your pussy is dripping for me,” he added, making a strange, throaty sound escape me as he just continued to stare, a hunger in his gaze that pulled at something primal inside of me.

“Dav, please,” I whimpered again as his hand shifted inward, one fingertip teasing across the edge of one of my lips, then down the other, creating a molten-hot need in my core.

I’d never been so fully… explored before, had someone seem like they were trying to get to know every inch of me.

He watched intently as his finger shifted inward, sliding up my slick cleft, then teasing a circle around, but not quite touching, my clit. Then as he moved back downward, the tip of his finger slipped inside of me, my walls clenching around it, making that rumble move through him again.

“Please, what, love? Please eat this sweet pussy until you’re screaming and crying and begging for my cock?”

“Yes,” I moaned.

He shot me a soft look that had me worrying he was going to torture me again.

But then he was down on his stomach, and his face was between my thighs again, this time with nothing between us.

His tongue slid up my cleft and circled my clit like his fingers had done a moment before. But, finally, his lips closed around the sensitive spot, sucking me into his mouth so hard that I saw white, and I was sure I was going to come right then and there.

But his lips released, easing me away from the edge, and his tongue started to work me instead as his finger slipped further inside of me, thrusting lazily as his mouth feasted on me.

The entire world fell away then.

All that existed was his lips and tongue and fingers as he worked me with expert precision, as he drove me up ruthlessly.

My hips writhed and my thighs shook as he got me closer and closer.

“That’s it,” he groaned, emphasizing each word with a flick of his tongue, “come in my mouth.”

A pained sound escaped me at his words as my breath got more and more ragged, my back arching painfully as he pushed me right to that edge, then shoved me over, leaving me falling, then crashing into the orgasm.

My cries filled the room as my thighs clamped around the sides of his face as he kept working me with his tongue, as his finger thrust faster inside of me, dragging it out until I collapsed back onto the mattress, shaky and whimpering and desperately trying to slow my frantic breathing.

Dav’s tongue moved away, sensing I was too sensitive right that second for more, but his finger stayed inside of me, and as soon as I pulled in a deep breath, another finger joined it, making a whimper escape me.

“Greedy pussy,” he said as he moved to sit on his ankles, watching as he fucked me with his fingers. Slowly at first, then more demanding with each passing second as my hips started to rock with him, as the need grew again, somehow even more desperate than before.

“Dav…”

“I’ll never get sick of hearing you beg for my cock, Cin,” he said, using his free hand to start to work himself in lazy strokes as his gaze oscillated from my face to between my thighs, watching what he was doing to me, thinking of himself inside of me instead of his fingers. “You’re going to feel so good squeezing me as I stretch you,” he said, making my walls tighten again, another little whimper escaping me.

“Dav, now,” I pleaded, rocking against his fingers, desperate for an end to the ache.

That rumble moved through him again as his finger slid out of me, lifting, and sinking into his mouth, tasting me again.

“Here,” he said, reaching for my hand, pressing it between my thighs. “Work this sweet pussy for me for a minute,” he said.

I did just that as he reached out to the side, digging in his nightstand for the stash of condoms I’d found there on my first day, finding one, then making quick work of protecting us as his gaze kept slipping toward where my hand was between my thigh, teasing my clit.

“Fuck,” he said, exhaling hard. “You’re so fucking sexy, Cin,” he said, reaching for my hand, lifting it, and sucking my fingers into his mouth, cleaning them off, before slipping his fingers between mine as he leaned forward, coming down over me, his hand pinning mine to the mattress as his weight pressed down on me.

His hips shifted, and his hard length was pressed against my clit.

My legs rose, wrapping around him, holding him tight as I rocked against him, my breathing getting faster and more shallow.

His lips sealed against mine again, harder, hungrier, close to losing control.

I wanted him too.

I wanted him as pulled apart at the edges as I felt.

His lips pulled from mine, his eyes almost closed they were so heavy as he looked down at me.

He pulled against my hold, getting a grumble that had his lips curving up for a second as he repositioned, and, finally, the head of his cock pressed against me.

Pausing.

Then surging inside of me. Taking me with one long, deep thrust.

The sound that escaped me was half moan, half shock, as he stretched me, as he pressed so deep there was a slight ache that had no right to feel good. But did regardless.

“Oh, fuck,” Dav groaned, pausing as he was settled deep. “You’re so fucking tight.” The words only made my walls close around him more, dragging a growl out of him.

His forehead pressed to mine as he sucked in a steadying breath. It must not have helped, though, as his cock ground deeper, creating that delicious little pinch again.

“I don’t want to hurt your ribs,” he said, voice almost pained from holding himself back.

“They don’t hurt,” I said. It wasn’t technically a lie. Right now, the only pain I felt was the aching need for release. “Please fuck me.”

That rumble moved through him, vibrating into me.

And then whatever control he had snapped as he pulled back, almost leaving me, then slammed deep again, hard enough to jolt my whole body.

Maybe it should have hurt, maybe it would later, but I didn’t care.

All that mattered was the feel of him inside of me, the way his control was shredding with each thrust, making him harder, rougher.

Something inside of me loved this side of him. The same part of me that was drawn to his darkness and violence also loved this hard, almost savage side of him as he fucked me.

“Fuck, yes, just like that,” he groaned as I tightened around him, almost making it hard for him to move. “Squeeze my cock.”

As if my body had been waiting for the demand, the orgasm coursed through me, making me cry out and writhe as the waves crashed through me over and over before finally releasing me.

As desperate as he seemed for it, though, he hadn’t come with me. His cock was rock-hard inside of me as I came back down.

As I sucked in a breath, he pulled away, sitting on his knees, and yanking up my legs, then starting to fuck me again.

Harder, somehow, than before, his gaze holding mine captive as his fingers bruised into my thighs.

“Tell me your perfect fucking pussy is mine,” he demanded, his thrusts so savage that the backs of my thighs ached from his body slamming against them.

“It’s yours,” I gasped. Because, in that moment, it was. I was. Wholly. More completely than I’d ever been anyone’s before.

The growl that escaped him made my belly go liquid as my walls tightened, as he drove me closer and closer to that edge again.

“Show me,” he demanded, voice rough. “Come for me again.”

And just like that, I did, vision going white as the pleasure shot through me, stealing my breath and my voice, leaving me shaking and gasping for a breath that didn’t come as I was pulled under the waves again and again.

“Fuck,” he groaned, taking me to the hilt, and fucking me deep as he fell apart with me. “Fuck, Cinna,” he groaned, every muscle in his body tense, his head thrown back as he came while buried inside of me.

Nothing, nothing had ever felt that right.

And that, well, that was fucking terrifying.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Dav

I’m pretty sure I blacked out for a second there, buried deep inside of her, coming with her pussy still squeezing me with her orgasm.

Her whole body was trembling with aftershocks as I finally pulled in a few deep breaths, bringing some calm back into the chaos of my body.

I’d been too fucking rough.

In general.

I didn’t fuck women like that. With that dark side of me. With that borderline savagery.

But I especially shouldn’t have been so rough with her. Not when her ribs, despite what she’d insisted, were still sore.

“That was too hard,” I said, my fingers drifting up to feather over her ribs, the bruises still smattering her skin. Not healed on the outside, let alone inside.

“No,” she said, shaking her head as she took long, deep breaths, likely embarrassed by her trembling. But, fuck, did I like it.

There was something about seeing a woman like Cinna lose all control that pulled at something in me.

So I sat there, watching, feeling the way she reacted to me until, eventually, the aftershocks subsided, and her breathing evened out.

Only then did I slide away from her, turning away to deal with the condom, before turning back, finding her already up by the pillows, trying to pull the covers over her, wanting to put something between us.

Because I hadn’t been the only one stripped raw during that. I’d seen a side of Cinna that I was pretty sure she’d never shown anyone before.

There was no way the Cinna everyone else knew would be so soft, would beg any man for anything.

But she’d given that to me.

Just like I’d given a part of myself to her that I never shared before.

I got that feeling of vulnerability more than she could have known. But, unlike her, I wanted to lean into it. I wanted more of it. While she worked to build back up those walls she felt safest behind.

I knew better than to come at her with a sledgehammer.

This was not the wall you could slam through.

I had to pick it apart brick by brick.

So I flicked the covers over us.

“Did anyone ask about me?” she asked, ready to change the dynamic, to bring others in between us.

“Yeah. Rico and Renzo,” I agreed. “And… I don’t know how close you are with her, but you might want to reach out to the kid.”

“Saff?” she asked, frowning at me. “Why?”

“She was looking at me weird when I was talking to Renzo about you. Then she said I was lying about something once he walked away. Think the only thing stopping her from prying was Coal coming in all beat to shit.”

“Again?” she asked, shaking her head.

“You remember those days,” I said, shrugging. “Just so you know, I’d mentioned you in passing a few times. Didn’t mention it was in my hallway. Said you seemed busy.”

“Okay,” she said, nodding. “I know you don’t like lying to the family,” she said.

“Extenuating circumstances.”

“Anything going on with anyone that I should know about?”

“Renzo took a job away from Saff. She almost took his head off with a pool ball over it tonight.”

“Why would he do that?”

“I haven’t been in the know about shit lately,” I admitted. “But there was a job she brought in that he thought she wasn’t ready to close.”

“I kind of understand trying to hit him then,” she said.

“It wasn’t about being a girl,” I said.

“Of course it wasn’t,” she said, brows scrunched as she looked at me. “Renzo isn’t like that. But I wonder sometimes if it is just because she’s younger and newer, or if some of it has to do with how tiny she is. Sometimes, without meaning to, I think a lot of the guys treat her like a baby sister and not a grown-ass woman who could probably kick their asses if she felt like it.”

“That’s… fair,” I agreed. “I’m probably guilty of that too. Think it’s different with her because she’s younger, but we’re also older.”

When Cinna came up, we were closer in age. I wasn’t looking at her through a more seasoned gaze like I was with Saff.

“Figure maybe the dynamic we all have with you is similar to what Coal and Cage and the other younger guys will feel about Saff.”

“That makes sense. I mean, I’m even guilty of it,” Cinna admitted. “She had me as backup on a deal she was working on, and I remember thinking that if shit went down, I was going to push her behind me.”

“That protective instinct is a bitch,” I agreed. “But I imagine it’s stronger in a lot of us because we never had someone to protect us.”

I felt her gaze cut to my profile, studying me, trying to read more deeply.

But, no.

This was give and take.

If I offered up too much, she wouldn’t feel the need to do the same.

“And she resents it because she never had it either,” Cinna said.

“So what I’m hearing is… we’re all fucked up,” I said, shooting her a smile.

“I’m pretty sure normal, well-adjusted people don’t end up being mafia capos for a living.”

That was the damn truth.

At least for our generation.

Men like Renzo, when they started having kids, would raise them the way we all deserved, but didn’t get.

“Dav,” Cinna called, voice small.

“Yeah?”

“Can you hand me the aspirin?” she asked, pointing toward the nightstand at my side. “And if you can do it without the commentary, that’d be great,” she added when I opened my mouth to say something about how I knew I’d been too rough.

“Gotta get you something to take it with,” I said, climbing out of the bed, tossing her the bottle, and making my way out into the kitchen to grab her a bottle of water.

Honestly, a part of me thought she might follow me, try to go back to sleep on the couch again. But when I walked back, she was still in bed, though she’d zipped up her shirt and inched further to the other side of the mattress.

“Thanks,” she said when I uncapped it for her before passing it.

I climbed back in, slid down, and waited for her to do the same.

A part of me hoped she might turn to me, might curl into me, let me run my hands over her like she’d allowed me to do when she’d been hurting, when she’d been craving something soft after all the hard.

But she moved flat, likely favoring her ribs, leaving the space between us.

It was only maybe a foot.

But as the moments ticked past, it might as well have been a fucking canyon.

Eventually, her slow breathing told me she’d fallen back to sleep. I lay awake for another hour before, finally, I drifted off as well.

__

I thought it was a dream at first.

The brush of hair on my chest.

The soft curve of a body pressed against me.

Lips on my neck.

A hand drifting down my chest, sneaking under the sheet, moving lower.

It wasn’t until teeth bit the lobe of my ear that the haze of sleep pulled back and made me realize this wasn’t a dream.

Well, in a way, it was.

But it was real too.

Cinna’s skin felt feverish against me. Like her own desire was burning her up from the inside out, and now she wanted me to get caught up in the flames as well as her hand slid over my stomach, making the muscles twitch as her fingers pressed between them, tracing them, mapping me with her touch.

My cock thickened as she teased a finger into the line of my Adonis belt. So close. Then across my stomach to trace the other one.

Seeming to sense I was awake, she reached down, pushing the covers away, leaving no question about my own need as she slid her body over mine. Her lips teased over my neck as she moved to straddle me, then slowly pushed back to sit up and look down at me.

My hands lifted, sliding up her thighs to land on her hips as my hungry gaze took her in.

“That’s a good fucking view,” I said as she shifted down slightly so my cock was pressing against her pussy, finding her already fucking drenched for me. “Thought your ribs hurt,” I said as my fingers slid up her side to move over them, feeling the little shiver that moved through her at the barely-there touch.

“Nothing hurts right now,” she said, planting one hand on my stomach to steady herself as she rocked her cleft against my cock, her eyes sliding closed as she let out a little whimper of pleasure, making my cock twitch.

She looked fucking beautiful just like this. Her head thrown back, her long dark hair spilling over her shoulders and chest, her breasts rising and falling with her rapid breath, moving with her body as she rocked against me, driving herself up.

My hands kept exploring. Over her stomach, up her sides, then closing over her breasts, making her head lower, her eyes fluttering open to look at me with a heavy-lidded gaze as I squeezed, rolled, twisted, feeling her writhing against me harder and faster with each new touch.

My cock was drenched with her desire, and it was taking every ounce of self-control I had not to shift her back slightly, and surge inside of her just like this, to feel her tight, wet walls close around me.

Instead, I reached out to the nightstand, fishing out a condom, and breaking it open.

Cinna slid away, giving me space to protect us then fist my cock for her.

“Are you going to ride my cock?” I asked, watching the flames lick higher in her eyes as she lifted up, positioning herself over me, pausing for an agonizing moment, then lowering down, taking me in. “Fuck,” I groaned, feeling her walls close around me inch by inch. “You feel so fucking good.”

Her answering whimper was another jolt of desire through my system as she kept taking me.

“You’re so fucking big,” she whimpered as she paused.

“You can take me,” I assured her, my hands going to her hips. I’d been balls-deep in her not long before. It was the angle that was giving her the feeling like she couldn’t. “See?” I asked, inching my hips upward, pressing deeper, getting a low, deep moan out of her. “Good?” I asked, a satisfied smile tugging at my lips.

“More,” she demanded.

And, fuck, I could give her that.

I dug my hands into her hips, pulling her downward as I thrust up, making her take me to the hilt, getting a surprised gasp.

“Too much?” I asked, holding still.

“Yes,” she admitted, but her walls clenched tight around me. “But I like it,” she added, doing a little roll with her hips.

Then another.

And another.

As she found her rhythm, I started to rock myself up into her over and over, getting sweet little mewling sounds out of her for a few moments before she was riding me harder, faster, and her whimpers became loud moans, filling the room.

“You take my cock so good,” I murmured, watching her tits bounce as she rode me, her movements getting more and more frantic with each passing moment as she got closer and closer until, with a strangled cry, she came, her pussy clenching around me over and over as she fell forward into me, her face in my neck, her body trembling through her release.

I wrapped an arm around her lower back, fucking her through it, then driving her up again, her whimpers against the skin of my neck, her breasts crushed to my chest, trapped against me, helpless to do anything but let me take her there, the second orgasm stronger than the first, making her whole body jolt hard as she cried out against my neck.

“Don’t come,” she demanded, voice breathless. “Not yet,” she added, voice softer as her lips planted soft little kisses up my jaw.

I froze inside of her, knowing I needed to slow down if I was going to be able to follow her orders.

She was being all soft and sweet, and I wanted to know where she was going with this.

I didn’t have Cinna pegged for gentle little kisses. I was pretty sure she didn’t even have herself pegged as a woman who did that kind of thing.

We were both in uncharted territory with it together.

All I knew was I was all too fucking happy to let her experiment and explore with me as I felt her warm breath on the shell of my ear before she snagged the lobe with her teeth before making her way back down my jaw then, finally, pressing her lips to mine.

There was no hunger in her kiss right then.

It was something intimate and a little uncertain, soft and sweet. A kiss that was for the sake of itself, not to lead anywhere.

I don’t think I’d ever made out with someone as long as I was with Cinna, my arms sliding up and down her back, sifting through her hair, as my lips felt almost fucking tingly from the kiss.

It was physical, yes, my desire still a live wire through my body, my cock still straining and aching deep inside of her.

But it was something more than that.

Almost like I could feel her sinking into me, little by little, with each passing moment. Until my damn chest felt full of her.

Almost as the thought crossed my mind, like she maybe felt it too, her lips pulled back, her eyes opening, watching me as she did a slow rock with her hips.

We both sucked in deep breaths in unison, something feeling, I don’t know, different. More intense.

Cinna’s dark gaze held mine as she took me in deep again, but just as slowly, something building between us that was more than orgasms, more than I could put into words.

Like the thoughts were passing across my eyes and into hers, her lids fluttered closed, cutting them off, and her lips sealed to mine again as she continued to move with those achingly slow, deep strokes.

My hands kept sliding over her, feeling like I couldn’t get enough even as she drove us toward that cliff at a glacial pace that seemed to only intensify the sensations until we were both tensing, both right at that edge, teetering.

And then she fell, her body trembling, her walls clenching my cock, her cries against my lips.

She took me with her, a slow, explosive sort of orgasm that seemed to go on and on for both of us.

At the end of it, though, I couldn’t quite explain the strange, sad sensation that moved through me as she slid off of me, as I discarded the condom, then rolled toward her, finding her already curled up facing me, eyes closed.

It wasn’t until I woke up alone that I understood.

The sadness?

It was because she’d been saying goodbye.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Cinna

Nerves jangled in my bones as I sat in the back of the cab, ignoring the way the driver kept shooting me concerned glances in the rearview, likely worried about my smattering of bruises I hadn’t bothered to cover up yet, deciding I would get the makeup delivered to my apartment when I got there.

I wanted to stay at Dav’s.

And that was the exact reason I needed to leave.

The cab plowed over a pothole, jostling my whole body, reminding me with a slight ache between my thighs, of one of the reasons I had to go.

I didn’t regret it.

That wasn’t the right way to put it.

Because I was pretty sure my one night with Davide would be what I used as fantasy material for the rest of my life.

It wasn’t the physical act that was the problem.

It was the way it did something to me that was decidedly not physical.

I wouldn’t even pretend to understand the way I almost felt like he was inside me, even now, halfway across Brooklyn. Like he’d become a part of me without being aware that was even a possibility.

There was a strange, heavy feeling on my chest as we drove further and further away from the apartment that had been my home for almost a month. From the man who’d gone from a colleague, to a friend, to… something more.

It was the something more that scared me enough, as I lay in the bed beside him, watching him breathe in his sleep, desire pooling in my core.

It was that same something more that had me kissing him like he was going off to war, like I would never get to do so again.

Because I knew, in that moment, that I wouldn’t. Couldn’t.

That one night was all we were going to have.

No matter how much my body objected to that.

Seeing as Dav was, well, every bit as good in bed as he thought he was. As the rumors said. Better, even.

I mean, fuck, if that was how sex was supposed to be, I’d been missing out my whole life.

Sure, I’d had orgasms with men before. But nothing that felt like it overtook my whole body. Like it fucking rocked my soul in the process.

Ugh, I needed to stop thinking about it.

Even just the memory was making my stomach cramp with need as I passed the cabbie a tip, then opened the door and climbed out onto the sidewalk out front of my building.

I made a specific choice in where I lived. Namely, one of the rougher areas of Brooklyn. First, it was where I was raised. But, second, fellow criminals were always on the lookout for people who didn’t belong. It was like having a built-in security system. Barely a day went by that someone didn’t catch my eye, and shoot me a description of someone, asking if they were someone there for me or not. So I always knew when someone was snooping who shouldn’t have been

Of course, there was also not a lot of honor amongst most criminals. So I also understood that the local crew that was selling party drugs on the corner would sell me out in a heartbeat if the payout was big enough.

Still, at least they were aware of their surroundings, noticed shit that the average person wouldn’t.

“The fuck you been, ma?” one of said party drug dealers, Drake, asked, inclining his chin to me, head tipping to the side when he took in my face. “Someone got a taste of you?”

“They paid in blood,” I said, shrugging it off. “And what are you talking about? I’m always around,” I lied. Smoothly, seamlessly. You didn’t get to be as high up in the criminal world as I was without being able to wear a good poker face.

“Haven’t seen you is all.”

“Been busy,” I said.

“Know that feeling,” he agreed, then someone whistled for him, so he gave me a nod and walked off.

Alone, I made my way up to the door, sliding in my key with suspiciously shaky hands.

My mace was in my jacket pocket.

My knife in my pants.

And the gun I’d borrowed from Dav was sitting heavy in a borrowed holster at my waist.

They should have been reassuring.

But I’d had weapons on me when I’d been attacked the last time. It hadn’t done any good.

I sucked in a deep breath, beating back those thoughts, knowing how dangerous they were.

The only reason I’d gotten this far in my life and career was that I didn’t overthink. I acted in the moment. I trusted my gut and my skills. I didn’t worry shit to death and create scenarios in my head that were never going to come to pass. And I never believed anyone could take me out.

Delusional? Obviously.

But it had been keeping me from letting paranoia or fear get the better of me.

Clearly, that was going to be something I needed to work on now as I slid into the elevator, heart punching against my ribcage, imagining someone rushing in last minute, trapping me in there, and shit getting bad fast while I froze or just wasn’t strong enough.

I shook that off as I walked out onto my floor, nodding my head to the teenager who lived at the end of the hall, sitting with his back to the wall, his headphones over his ears, rocking out, and trying to drown out the sounds of his parents going at it yet again.

I felt for the kid. Could relate to him more than he could realize. Once in a while, when I noticed him out there for long periods of time, I’d invite him into my place to share some food with me. He didn’t talk much. And neither did I. But there was an understanding between us that made it unnecessary. Maybe, one day, if he didn’t do the smart thing, work hard in school and escape the neighborhood via a good education, I would offer him a job, let him work his way up.

I went to slide my key in my lock, but the pressure pushed my not only unlocked, but unlatched, door open.

Panic surged through my system as my hand went automatically for the gun, pulling it out without caring who might see me, then pushing the door fully open.

Now, my apartment wasn’t much to write home about. And, in fact, after spending almost a month at Dav’s nice place, it seemed even more stark than usual. The thing was, though, when you didn’t have much, it was easy to keep shit tidy.

But my place looked like a hurricane had blown through. Everything was out of place, knocked over, turned upside down.

Mother fuckers.

My jaw went to granite as I moved inside, my back hugging the wall as I took a turn through my living room, checking in my coat closet, then moving across the small galley kitchen, and across to the hallway.

I ducked into the bathroom first, checking in the linen closet, even though there were shelves in there, and yanking back the shower curtain.

Nothing.

That just left my bedroom.

The door was cracked, but I kicked it open, the sound of it cracking off the wall making my stomach clench as I stepped in, checking the closet.

“What—“ a voice started, cutting off as I whirled on the sound, gun raised, arms shaky.

To find the damn kid from the hall there, headphones around his neck, his brows raised.

“Whoa.”

“Jesus Christ. Don’t sneak up on someone like that,” I snapped, not caring how snarly I sounded. I was too freaked out to care. “Hey, get over here,” I demanded.

“Why?” he asked, but he was already moving toward me.

“Check under the bed for me,” I said, handing him the gun. “I can’t get down there,” I explained.

To my surprise, he took the gun and got on his knees, head nearly touching the carpet as he looked under the simple metal bed frame.

My ribs hurt more than I was willing to admit to myself. Courtesy, I was sure, of the borderline brutal way Dav had fucked me the night before.

I wasn’t complaining, though.

I’d always been drawn to Davide’s dark side.

That had just been a facet of it I didn’t know existed but was happy to be a part of.

But just for that one night.

Never again.

“Nothin’,” the kid said, getting back to his feet and handing me back my gun. “Someone broke in, huh?” he asked.

“I guess you didn’t see who.”

“Nah. But I go to school and shit,” he said, shrugging.

“How old are you?” I asked.

“Fifteen,” he said, puffing up his puny, skinny little kid chest as I tried not to smile.

He’d probably grow up to be good looking. He had good bone structure and dark green eyes. But he was so damn scrawny that he looked like a strong wind might blow him over. The baggy clothes hanging off of him weren’t exactly helping either.

“You have a name?” I asked.

“My friends call me Spike,” he claimed, chin lifting.

“No, they don’t,” I snorted. “Give me an actual name, kid.”

“Joel.”

“Alright, Joel. I’m gonna make you an offer,” I said, moving back out into the living area to close the door to the hallway, but not before doing a paranoid sweep of it first.

“I’m listening.”

“You sit your ass in that hallway, what? Pretty much from the minute you get home until two or three in the morning?”

“About that,” he agreed.

“If I give you my number, can I pay you to keep an eye on my place, and text me if you ever see someone coming to my door?”

“How much we talking?”

“More than you got now,” I said, but I was smiling. What can I say? I liked rough-around-the-edges people with a little bit of greed and hunger for more. Reminded me a lot of myself when I was young. “Two-fifty a week,” I offered.

“Done,” he agreed.

“But you gotta not get caught watching,” I told him, reaching for my wallet that had been sitting full at Dav’s house for weeks since he insisted on paying for everything. I had money stashed in my apartment that I needed to look for. But not with eyes watching.

“I’m always minding my own business,” he said, shrugging. “‘Cept I ain’t,” he admitted.

“Good. Because descriptions would be appreciated, but don’t make it obvious,” I said.

“Not my business, but seems like you could get cameras,” he said.

“The fuck kind of businessman are you, trying to lose the job I just gave you?” I asked, handing him the money. “Cameras are good, but I prefer eyes. Once they go downstairs, you can look out a window and let me know where they go. Cameras can’t.”

“I could lie. Camera’s can’t.”

“You’re a little shit,” I said, but I was giving him a smile. “I’m gonna have a couple deliveries coming over the next few hours. No need to text me if you see that today.”

“Got it,” he said, nodding as he went to the door, discreetly tucking the cash away.

“Hey, kid,” I called.

“Yeah.”

“Use some of that money to get yourself some food. You look like you’re gonna fall through your own ass.”

To that, I got a small smile as he moved out into the hall.

I waited until I was sure he had his music bumping again before I rushed to the door and slid the locks, minutes passing before I felt like I could take a full breath again.

I needed to calm down.

Some part of me had been expecting this.

Of course after I got away, they were going to want to track me down, finish what they started. The first place they’d look was my apartment.

Maybe it was tossed just because they were pissed when I didn’t show up.

But there was the potential that they’d been looking for something, so I went around my apartment, checking my hiding spots, finding my official documents, stashes of cash, and even my fake IDs and shit I paid a shitton of money for.

Nothing, as far as I could tell, was missing.

I tucked more cash into my wallet before finally taking a second to sit down and order the makeup I was going to need. Along with several new locks for the door. Motion alarms for the windows. And a few cameras small enough to hide just about anywhere.

I set my apartment back to rights as I waited for my deliveries, then installed the new locks. Three more on my main door. But also two on my bedroom. And an extra on my bathroom.

Outside of my bedroom, I had a fire escape. Sure, it was broken off near the bottom, but I’d always kind of liked that feature. It meant no one could use it to climb up and spy on any of us, or break into our places. But we could still use it in case of an emergency. Sure, the drop would hurt. Maybe even break a bone. But you’d survive.

As for the locks on the bathroom, well, that was just because the idea of being in there, naked, alone, and very vulnerable made my skin prickle and my stomach cramp.

Even after I had the locks installed, going in and taking off my clothes as I waited for the water to warm up was more nerve-racking than it had any right to be.

But I couldn’t let the fear take over my life.

So I forced myself into the shower, and let the spray wash away the scent of Dav all over me, pretending like losing that last little part of him didn’t make my chest ache in an alarming, unfamiliar way.

And if the gun sat right on the ledge of the tub the whole time, well, so be it.

Finished with that, I tried my hand at mixing the makeups until I finally had the right shade, then followed the instructions I found online, and dabbing lavender and green color correctors on the right bruise shades before applying some concealer, and, finally, the foundation.

My entire face felt like it couldn’t breathe. But no matter how bright a light I shined on my face, I couldn’t see the bruises anymore.

That was all that mattered.

Well, that, and doing a halfway decent job of wrapping up my ribs, so they didn’t smart when I was walking around.

Because it was time to get back to my life.

And, more so than that, my job.

See my men.

Make sure everyone knew I was still around, still in charge, still willing to knock some heads together if someone was fucking up.

As for the other shit, the stuff involving my attack, and the revenge I owed some pieces of shit for that?

Yeah, I planned to deal with that too.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Dav

She’d erased herself from my apartment before she’d left. And, honestly, that was almost as bad as her absence. At least if I’d found traces of her somewhere—hair ties on the coffee table, her toothbrush or deodorant in the bathroom, even one piece of forgotten clothing—it wouldn’t feel like the last month had never happened.

But she’d taken absolutely everything. Granted, she hadn’t had much to begin with. And she’d clearly left in the outfit she’d been wearing when she’d shown up all beaten and bloody.

Still, fuck, I hadn’t anticipated the way her cold farewell would gut me.

Enough so that now, three full weeks later, I still felt like someone kicked me in the stomach when I thought about it.

I’m embarrassed to admit that I even found myself over in her neighborhood a time or two, doing shit that any one of my fucking associates or soldiers could handle, just on the offshoot that I might come across her in a way that wouldn’t make her feel like I was trying to push my way into her life.

But no luck.

I knew she was around.

The guys talked about seeing her all the time, about how she never seemed to be sleeping anymore, about how she claimed she ‘twisted’ her wrist when she’d tripped and tried to catch herself. Like Cinna was some clumsy lead in a fucking romantic comedy.

I mean, I was glad she was still wearing the brace, though. I figured her stubborn ass would have taken it off the second she got home.

I couldn’t stop from wondering about her ribs. Were they better? Had I screwed up their progress by fucking her too hard?

“Did I lose you?” Elian asked, making me jolt back to the moment, finding him looking at me, brows scrunched.

“For a second, yeah,” I admitted, since there was no way to claim I’d been paying attention. “What were you saying?”

“I was asking if you’d heard anything about the Russians making some big moves lately,” he said.

We weren’t the only organized crime in the city. The Italian mafia might be, you know, the most notorious. All those flashy movies about us. All the documentaries where some washed-up cops and prosecutors claimed they’d chased us all out of the city. Someone was always running their mouth about the Cosa Nostra.

But we were just one example.

You had the Japanese Yakuza. The Chinese Triad. The Irish mob. Eastern European crews. And, of course, the Russian Bratva.

We’d been dealing with a pesky Irish crew for a while in our area. It was something Renzo was always keeping an eye on, always checking the pulse of.

But so far, the Russians seemed to stay off of our turf.

“No, I haven’t heard anything,” I admitted. “But I haven’t been doing much listening either,” I added. “They still doing the massage parlor shit?” I asked, thinking of the buildings with their innocent-looking spa pictures on the windows. But if you looked at their website, it was full of “massage therapists” who all looked like they could be contestants on some Russian beauty pageant.

As a whole, I had no problem with the world’s oldest profession, with modern day variations of sex work. You know, where women are in control and shit is safe. I just didn’t like the predatory shit with abusive pimps that beat and drugged up their girls.

I had no idea what kind of operation the Bratva ran, since they were every bit—if not more so—tight-lipped as the mafia was about their dealings.

But if they were getting bigger and more powerful around here, I could only hope that they weren’t doing all the harmful shit.

“What kind of moves?” I asked. “Into other lines of work?”

“That’s the thing. I can’t get a read on it. And Renzo wants me to look into it. But if I start sticking my nose in their business…”

“They’ll be quick to cut it off for you,” I finished.

“Exactly,” he agreed, nodding to the guy behind the counter, who was bringing over some of the order he’d placed before we’d gotten there. He’d probably bought the place out of chicken, meatball, and eggplant parm hot subs.

It was the first get-together at Renzo’s since the last one I’d been to, lying to everyone I was supposed to be honest with. For a woman who wanted nothing to do with me.

The fucked up part of it was, though, the main reason I wanted to go was to see her.

“Can I get you anything else?” a woman asked, appearing out of nowhere behind the counter, flashing a megawatt smile at me.

“That’s it,” I said, taking one of the boxes as Elian passed the cash to the man, then grabbed the other. “What?” I asked, feeling Elian’s gaze on my profile as we moved out onto the street.

“That woman was eye-fucking you, and you didn’t even notice, let alone get her number,” he said, brows scrunched.

I’d barely even clocked her existence, to be honest.

“We have to get the food to Renzo’s place while it’s still hot,” I said, shrugging it off.

“I once saw you jump out of a moving cab to talk to a woman sitting in an outdoor cafe.”

She’d been a fun weekend.

I likely still had her number somewhere.

And what I should have been doing was finding it, calling her, and getting lost in another woman.

Somehow, though, the idea held absolutely no appeal.

I don’t think I’d ever in my adult life gone this long without spending a night with a woman. Maybe that explained how restless and unfocused I’d been.

“Just wasn’t interested,” I said. “She wasn’t my type.”

“First, she was beautiful,” Elian said, rolling his eyes. “Second, woman is your type.”

He wasn’t wrong about that. All shapes, sizes, ages, I wasn’t picky. I’d always been more drawn to energy than just looks anyway.

“Are you… seeing someone?” Elian asked as I started walking, hoping he would take the hint and let it drop.

“Me?” I asked, shooting him a raised brow.

“I know. I normally wouldn’t even consider asking you that,” he said. “But something is… off. Even thought so at the last gathering.”

“I’m not seeing anyone,” I said, glad when we got to Renzo’s building, knowing there would be others inside to talk to who wouldn’t be asking me questions I didn’t want to answer.

My gaze scanned the crowd as we moved into the apartment, telling myself I was just getting a feel for who was around, but I knew I was looking for Cinna.

But she wasn’t there.

Not as the music started and most of the food was eaten. Not even when it seemed every other capo had arrived.

Panic was something that slithered up my spine, then wrapped around my throat, tightening with each passing moment.

Had something else happened to her?

Had she gone after these fucks and gotten hurt again?

Or worse?

All because my fucking pride wouldn’t let me reach out first, wouldn’t allow me to show up at her place and check on her?

I was twenty minutes deep in berating myself when suddenly the door opened, and there she was.

Just seeing her was a punch to the gut, my gaze helpless but to scan over her. First, looking to make sure she was okay. Second, of course, just to linger, my mind flashing with memories of her under me, of her over me.

She was dressed like she usually was—black jeans that hugged her curves, her scuffed black boots, the ones without the heels, and some sort of simple black shirt under her bomber jacket.

Unlike me, her gaze didn’t move around the crowd. And I couldn’t help but wonder if it was because she didn’t want to see me, didn’t want to lock eyes, to be forced to make her way over toward me, to try to force our way through a conversation that didn’t give us away.

She shrugged off her jacket, hanging it on the overflowing rack by the door, before making a beeline for the bar.

“I’ll be back. Need a refill,” I said to the small circle I was standing in. None of whom I’d been paying attention to, so they wouldn’t even miss me when I didn’t show back up.

“Lore, you magnificent creature,” I said, moving in at her side as she also made her way to the bar. “Can I make you something to drink?” I asked, knowing our boss’s wife liked her drinks fruity enough to mask the taste of the alcohol.

“Sure,” she said, shooting me a smile as I moved behind the bar where Cinna was finishing a big pour of whiskey.

Which was how I saw them at first because her hand was wrapped around the bottle.

Her knuckles were all busted up.

I mean, it wasn’t rare to see a capo with some minor injuries on them. We still got our hands dirty when a situation called for it. Even Renzo himself partook in violence on occasion, even though he could easily outsource that. But hers were particularly gnarly. Like she’d been working someone over for a long time.

“Someone dare to call you pretty again?” I asked, glancing down at her hand pointedly, but trying to keep things light.

I wished the light was better in the apartment. I wanted to inspect her face, to see if she was covering up any other injuries with makeup.

“Oh, geez. Do you need some first aid supplies?” Lore asked as she noticed her knuckles as Cinna raised her glass to drink.

“I cleaned them earlier,” Cinna said, and it was fucking pathetic how I felt myself lean toward the sound of her voice.

“Oh, good,” Lore said as I finished making her drink. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages,” she went on. “I texted you,” she added, the tone a bit pointed for someone as shy as Lore.

The two women were as polar opposite as you could get. Where the boss’s wife was all sweet, unsure of herself, and shy, Cinna was all hardness and confidence, and I’d never seen her struggle to assert herself. But, somehow, at the beginning of Lore and Renzo’s marriage, she and Cinna had formed a sort of older-sister, younger-sister bond.

That was clearly strained recently.

It was one thing for Cinna to be avoiding me. It felt like a complete other for her to pull away from Lore.

“You did. Sorry. I’ve been… busy,” Cinna said. “We can get coffee this week,” she added.

“I promise I won’t make you order for me,” Lore said, liking her coffee sweet and full of shit that Cinna would find embarrassing to order.

“Sure you will,” Cinna said, this time shooting her friend a small smile.

“Are the girls having a meeting?” Saff asked, moving up between the other two women.

“Yep. Just the girls,” I agreed, getting an eye roll from Saff.

“Did you like the book?” Lore asked Saff, making my brows raise. That was something I didn’t know about the young, fiery capo. She liked to read?

“Look, Lore,” Saff started, sucking in a breath. “While I appreciated all of the many vivid sex scenes,” she went on, making Lore’s cheeks go scarlet, “it needed a lot more violence. I mean, I’m sorry, these are warring clans doing constant battle, and no one got beheaded? Get real.”

Lore let out a tinkering little laugh. “Well, I will keep an eye out for books with a lot more torture for you.”

“That’s all I’m asking,” Saff agreed. “I mean, if the main characters still want to have many detailed sexcapades, maybe while covered in the blood of their enemies… oh, who are you raising a brow at?” Saff asked, looking at me. “Like you’re not the biggest whore in this room.”

I wanted to look at Cinna when Saff said that, but I didn’t dare. Not when Saff was clearly a lot better at reading me than she had any right to be.

“I heard he ignored a beautiful woman flirting with him at the pizza place tonight,” Lore said, excited to be privy to some gossip.

Fucking Elian.

He and the boss’s wife were close.

“You?” Saff asked, eyes going wide.

“We had to get the food back here,” I said, waving it off.

“Um, didn’t I hear a story about you being three hours late to an important meeting because you were banging two women in an alley?” Saff asked.

Christ.

The last thing I wanted right that moment was to be talking about the women in my past with Cinna standing right there. Not that she didn’t already know. But I don’t know, it felt different now.

The problem was, I leaned into those stories when someone brought them up. That was what people expected of me. So I couldn’t just shrug it off.

“It was the back of a van in an alley,” I clarified.

But as soon as I started speaking, Cinna turned and wandered off.

Some part of me wanted to believe it was because she didn’t want to hear me talk about other women. The other part, though, was worried she didn’t want to hear my voice at all.

I was trapped there with Saff and Lore for a while. Maybe that was for the best. It kept me from following after Cinna like a lost fucking puppy.

But when I saw her pull her phone out of her pocket and dip into Renzo’s office for some quiet, I went ahead and excused myself from the women who were in a debate about some TV show, the two of them disagreeing about the love interest, Lore loving them, and Saff insisting that the heroine belonged with someone as equally as badass as she was… like the villain of the show.

They didn’t even know I’d left.

I tried not to look suspicious as I made a beeline for the office, pushing the door the rest of the way open, then closing and locking it before Cinna could even look up from her phone and notice me.

I moved in on her, grabbing her phone, setting it on the desk, then reaching behind her to grab a handful of her hair at the base of her neck, angling her head up at me.

Up this close, there was no way for her to hide the way her eyes blazed.

“What are you doing?” she said, trying for snippy, but her voice already sounded thick with desire.

My lips crashed on hers in response, hard and hungry and as desperate as I’d been feeling for weeks, thanks to her.

My teeth nipped her lower lip, dragging a low moan out of her as I backed her up until she slammed into the wall.

My free hand moved out, pressing between her thighs.

“There are people ten feet away,” she insisted, breathless, needy.

“Then you’ll have to be quiet,” I said, sealing my lips over hers again.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Cinna

“Just go,” I snapped, cutting the zip ties off of the wrists of a man I’d bound to a chair a few hours before, intent on getting some fucking answers.

Three weeks.

Three weeks without a fucking lead.

Three weeks of looking over my shoulder, of jumping at shadows, of changing my routes and routine.

Of not being able to sleep.

Though, to be fair, that was only partially my attacker’s fault. The lion’s share of that problem had to do with a certain mafia capo, his wicked mouth, his perfect cock, and the way he could so effortlessly bring me to world-shatteringly intense orgasms.

While fear kept me from falling asleep for a while, it was the sex dreams that woke me up, sweaty and aching for touch.

That I couldn’t have.

Not ever again.

I wouldn’t lie. The desire was so strong that I’d considered going out, finding some other man, and taking him to bed just to get some relief.

But something held me back.

Something I chose not to consider.

So I just lied to myself and said I was too busy with work to be wasting my time in bed.

“I’m… I’m… I’m sorry, Cinna,” the man, Tobias, sniveled, wiping his shirt sleeve under his nose, making the material come away red.

He was. Sorry. And from the looks of him, he would be for a while. But, to be fair, he didn’t have much to be sorry for, save for being a complete fucking idiot.

He was the culmination of three weeks of unending work on my part. Chasing down flimsy leads to figure out who my attackers were.

This particular lead was about one of my attackers, my damn stolen phone, and Tobias, a local guy known for being able to hack into them.

But no amount of pounding on Tobias could wedge free a memory that just wasn’t there. My attacker was one of dozens, nothing notable about him, since all the phones Tobias worked on were stolen.

Still, would it kill the moron to have a security camera or keep some sort of records?

I made a quick stop at the convenience store, getting some antiseptic to clean my knuckles before finally making my way to Renzo’s.

My stomach wrenched into tighter knots with each passing step.

Because there was no way I wasn’t going to run into the star of all my sweaty dreams tonight. After weeks of being careful not to step foot in his usual hangouts.

I was being an idiot.

I was cursing myself the whole ride up to Renzo’s apartment.

I needed to get myself together.

In lieu of that, I’d get myself a drink or two to dull the nagging voice inside my head. But not so many drinks that I got flirty and stupid.

It was packed. The get-togethers always were. Especially these days when they weren’t as frequent, now that Renzo had a wife he wanted to spend most of his free time with. So when there was a hangout, everyone felt the need to show up and reconnect.

I spotted him almost immediately.

I swear the man practically had a homing beacon on him, calling for me to notice him even in a room full of people.

Seeing him, nodding at something someone was saying to him, made my sex clench hard.

On a grumble, I whipped off my jacket, hanging it with the others, then made my way toward the bar, needing something to take the edge off.

But, of course, he had to follow.

If there was one thing you knew about Dav, it was that the man was a dog with a bone when it came to women he wanted to fuck.

Even if, it seemed, he’d already fucked you.

But then Saff made a comment that reminded me exactly of what a hound he was with women.

I didn’t look at him.

I couldn’t.

There was too much of a risk of giving away the weeks of need inside of me.

So I did the only thing I could.

I walked away.

No one had been talking to me anyway.

I made some rounds, catching up with Renzo, Elian, Rico, and that new kid, Coal, that I was kind of salty about not getting to have in my own crew.

I was just about to slip out when a series of texts came through, making me slip into Renzo’s office to be able to think straight over the music and clash of conversation.

I should have known Dav would take it as an opportunity to corner me.

But his lips were on me before I could even come up with some nasty thing to say to make him forget all about that final night in his apartment.

And the second he was touching me, every bit of determination I had to stay away from him evaporated.

When his hand pressed between my thighs, every bit of longing for the past several weeks came charging back. Then doubled.

A chorus of laughter pulled me out of it for a second.

“There are people ten feet away,” I insisted.

“Then you’ll have to be quiet,” he said, his lips sealing over mine again, damming up any further objection. Not that I had any left in me.

I wanted this too much to fight it.

His fingers pressed harder against the material of my jeans, but the pressure did little to ease the growing ache between, making me grumble against his lips.

I felt his mouth curve into a smile against mine as his hand shifted up, working my button and zipper free, then slipping beneath both my pants and panties, teasing up my bare skin.

I swear I nearly came the second his finger brushed over my clit. That was how needy I was.

His fingers slipped downward, sliding inside of me, his lips muffling my moan as his palm pressed against my clit.

I rocked shamelessly against him, trying to get relief from the pressure in my core.

“Fucking drenched for me,” Dav said, his lips ripping from mine to press into my neck.

“Dav,” I whimpered, hand sliding down his chest to cup his hard length, my walls clenching at the idea of having him inside of me again.

“Not yet,” he said. “You’re going to come on my fingers, then my mouth, and then my cock.”

His lips claimed mine again as his fingers turned, crooked, and started to stroke across my g-spot, driving me up faster, pushing me to that edge, then sending me over.

The pleasure was still soaring through me as he dropped to his knees, yanking my pants out of the way as his fingers started to fuck me again.

Anticipation shot through me as he looked up at me, hunger in his gorgeous eyes, before he ducked his head, and his mouth was on me.

My head slammed back against the wall as my hands sank into his hair, holding him against me in case he got any ideas of pulling away.

But if there was one thing you could say about Dav, it was that he genuinely seemed to enjoy the hell out of going down on a woman.

My moans were answered with little rumbling sounds against me, vibrating into my clit, intensifying the sensations as he continued to work me with his tongue, his lips, and his fingers.

I felt like I was still recovering from one orgasm, and he was sending me hurtling toward another one at a breakneck pace, my chest feeling tight, my moans getting louder, less controlled.

Feeling me tightening, getting close, Dav’s lips closed around my clit and sucked, making me choke on a gasp as the climax crashed through me, the waves pulling me under over and over as he sucked my clit in little strobes, as his fingers worked my g-spot, intensifying it, dragging it out, until I was nothing but a trembling mess, gasping for breath, with my nails digging into his shoulders just to help keep myself on my feet.

Dav lapped up my release before he made his way to his feet, a satisfied little smirk on his lips.

I couldn’t even be mad about it. He’d earned that damn look.

“So sweet when you come,” he told me, face in my neck as his hard cock pressed against my stomach.

My sex clenched hard in response, craving the feel of him, despite the mind-numbing orgasms he’d already given me.

It wasn’t enough.

It would never be enough.

Not until he was deep inside of me again like I’d been remembering and fantasizing about.

My hand moved out, working his belt free, then his button and zipper, before reaching inside to free his cock, wrapping my hand around his thick length, feeling the way his body jerked in pleasure.

I worked him with my hand for a moment, loving the way his body tensed, how his breathing got shallow and uneven, the way he let out little groans.

“If you’re not careful, I’m going to come in your hand instead of in your pussy,” he said, nipping my earlobe, sending another thrill through me.

My free hand moved out, digging in his back pocket. Looking for his wallet. But I may have grabbed his ass a little in the process, and a little chuckle escaped him at that.

He took the wallet from me, fishing out the condom, then brushing my hand away, so he could slide on the protection.

Then he was reaching for me, turning me away from him.

His hand grabbed my shoulder as the other held his cock, sliding it between my lips, getting himself wet, then sliding back, and pressing.

Teasing, really.

Making me press back, writhe, whimper.

To no avail.

“Fuck me, Dav,” I begged, voice airy and desperate.

His cock pressed inward, just a bit, then back out.

I knew what game he was playing.

But I was too needy to give a fuck about my pride.

“Please.”

He surged inside me, taking me to the base in one hard thrust. If it weren’t for his hand on my shoulder, he would have sent me face-first into the wall.

“Fuck,” Dav hissed, pausing deep. “Fuck,” he added, voice softer, as his hand massaged my ass cheek. “I’ve missed your perfect fucking pussy, Cinna,” he said as he pulled back, then surged back in. And again. And again. Not as hard. Just slow and deep, making me take every thick inch of him each time.

It wasn’t long, though, before the need grew to a fever pitch in me, making me slam back into his thrusts.

Harder.

Faster.

When the orgasm coursed through me, intensified by the fullness of him, his hand slapped over my mouth, muffling my loud cries as the pulsations of pleasure racked my system.

But when I came back down, I found him still rock-hard inside of me.

“Been waiting weeks, love,” he said, using the hand over my mouth to pull my back against his chest as he slowly started to rock into me again, smaller, gentler motions. “I’m not done with you yet.”

His lips pressed into my neck, a sweet trail of kisses that made my belly flip-flop and that swooping sensation soaring through my chest.

One of his hands was around my hips, the other slid across my chest, holding me against him as he continued his gentle, unhurried strokes into me.

He was holding onto me like something precious, like he never wanted to let go.

It should have freaked me out, made me feel trapped, had me fighting to get away.

But I sank back into him, my head falling back onto his shoulder, eyes drifting closed, just letting myself have this moment, letting myself be held, letting him move inside of me in that soft, sweet way.

And as he drove me up slowly, I felt him again.

Seeping into my chest, spreading, filling me up.

“You feel so good, Cin,” he groaned in my ear as I tightened, as the pressure built, this deep clenching sensation before, almost in slow motion, the orgasm crested in slow, intense throbs of pleasure that had my legs shaking and a choked sob escaping me. “Just let go,” he murmured into my ear. “I’ve got you.”

Just for that moment, he did.

And I let him.

By the time the orgasm finally eased, I felt dampness in my eyes, so I squeezed them tight against, terrified the saltwater might break free and trail down my cheeks, evidence of the intensity of the feelings surging through me in that moment.

Fear, the likes of which I didn’t truly understand but felt the need to fight against, had me moving backward.

Dav obliged, walking us backward until he dropped his ass onto Renzo’s couch with me on his lap.

The only thing I could think to do was change the feeling of that moment. To reclaim this as something more primal, less emotional.

So I reached down, grabbing his knees to steady myself, and started to fuck him.

Hard.

Fast.

Desperate.

Familiar.

Physical.

Uncomplicated.

“Fuck, Cinna, I love how you ride my cock,” Dav groaned, his voice tight, his hands slipping under my shirt to grab my tits. “Fuck, that’s it,” he hissed as my moans grew, as my walls tightened. “Come around my cock, baby.”

And just like that, I did.

Hard.

Almost brutal.

Better, much better, I told myself, than the slow, deep, intense orgasm that made me tingly and emotional.

This time, Dav came with me, holding my hips against his lap, buried deep, as he hissed out my name as he climaxed.

His hands started to massage me after, always wanting to touch me.

And some part of me wanted to let him, wanted to lean back and feel his hands roam over me, stake a claim to me.

That was exactly why, though, I had to pull away.

I got to my feet, yanking my panties and pants back into place, and fumbling with my button and zipper before walking away to fetch my phone off of the desk.

“Thanks for the orgasms,” I said, tone a lot more flippant than I felt. “I hope you enjoyed it. Because it’s never going to happen again.”

I rushed to the door without looking back, scared that if I did, some part of me would run toward him, tell him that I didn’t mean it, that I didn’t understand what was going on, that I couldn’t stop thinking about him and wanting him, that I could feel him, even now, in my chest, that I never wanted to not feel him there.

But those were all things I could never say.

So I unlocked the door, disappeared into the crowd, then made my way to the hallway before he could catch up with me.

I was safely in the elevator car, the doors closing, making my heart fly up into my throat.

It’s worry, I insisted to myself, not hope.

But it wasn’t a man’s hand.

And a second later, there was Saff, moving into the car with me when I really, really wanted to be alone.

We said nothing as we rode the floors down.

And she was the first to move toward the doors when they slid open, stopping there, turning to me, pinning me with those intense eyes of hers, her head cocked to the side.

“You know,” she said, tone odd, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone take a ride on Davide’s disco stick and look like they’re about to cry after,” she said, making my stomach clench hard. “Weird, huh?” she asked.

But then she turned and walked away.

Leaving me frozen in place.

My secret was out.

And I was terrified about the fallout.

After a lifetime of working my ass off to prove my worth, to stand alongside the men, and all I would be in the coming week was a fucking punchline.

Great.

That was just fucking great.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Dav

It had been a week since the party at Renzo’s place.

And I was a fucking wreck.

There was no other way to put it.

I wasn’t sleeping because I was lying awake thinking about the night in my bed, the night in Renzo’s office, trying to figure out where things had clearly gone wrong in each instance for her to walk away like she’d done.

Like it meant nothing at all.

Normally, I would be thrilled about that.

Nothing ruined some good, mutually satisfying fun like someone pulling the whole “So, what are we?” thing.

Sex, for my entire goddamn life, had been uncomplicated.

Until now, it seemed.

Because there was nothing simple about what it felt like was going on between myself and Cinna.

A cynical part of me wanted to claim it was simply because she was also a colleague and friend. That it was just the confusion of all those lines getting blurry.

The other part, though, knew it was more than that. I mean, yeah, it factored in. Because I was pretty sure if I’d fucked Cinna back when we first met, I wouldn’t be feeling as mixed up as I was about it right now. Getting to know her as a person absolutely was the biggest factor in this.

Because I just genuinely… liked the woman.

Respected her.

Enjoyed her company.

Add in the physical shit, and yeah, things were complicated and confusing and I had no fucking idea what to do with the tornado of thoughts constantly twisting and turning in my head.

All I knew was that, for a brief moment in that office, Cinna felt it too.

It was why she’d taken control, why she’d fucked me hard and rough. It was why she’d made sure she was the one to blow it off and walk away.

Because if there was anything Cinna hated, it was feeling out of control. Of anything, sure. But I imagined it was doubly so about her own feelings.

And there was no doubt in my mind that as she leaned back against me and let me hold her, that for one glorious moment, she’d been all caught up in her feelings.

About me.

About us.

About whatever the fuck was growing between us.

Cinna was great with anything that required hardness and brute force. If you wanted someone to have your back, to plow her way through anything and anyone, she was your girl.

But she’d never been good with soft.

I think the only time I’d ever seen her show even a hint of that was when she’d first become friends with Lore, when she’d gone toe-to-toe with the boss about his treatment of her.

Even then, though, her concern had been forceful.

Because she’d been protecting the softness in Lore. She hadn’t wanted to see Lore turn hard like life had forced her to become.

I knew, though, that underneath that outer shell of hers, there was hidden tenderness that I wanted her to trust me with.

She just wasn’t there yet.

And I had to learn to be patient.

No matter how frustrated I was feeling. Sexually and otherwise.

“We waiting for something?” I asked Rico as we stood outside of a local butcher shop that, apparently, hadn’t paid the family what it owed us in six weeks.

Two capos, frankly, felt like overkill, but Rico kept glancing around like he was waiting for someone else.

“Guess not,” he said, tucking his phone away, and reaching to unlatch the band on his holster before making short work of the lock, and making his way inside.

I followed, staying several feet behind him to keep an eye on the empty front room in case someone came rushing out.

It was a big space with the temperature set to chilly thanks to all the refrigeration cases around, boasting different cuts of meat.

Rico nodded toward the door to the back, and we both made our way in that direction, hearing the sound of male voices and the distinct scent of cigar smoke swirled outward toward us.

I pulled my gun as Rico did his, not knowing how many men might be back there. Or if they had weapons. We had to at least imagine there were knives lying around, given their profession.

“Interrupting some—“ Rico started, but his words trailed off, his body tensing, making me move in closer, wanting to see what he was seeing.

I don’t know what I’d been expecting.

But it wasn’t the scene in front of us.

Namely, the trio of men standing around smoking while a third man dangled from a meat hook by the handcuffs that were digging into his wrists, the blood already dripping down his arms. Plastic wrap, the kind they likely used to wrap the meat in the styrofoam trays, was wrapped around his face, covering his mouth, keeping his eyes forced open wide, and crushing his nose enough that breathing must have been difficult.

“The fuck?” Rico snapped, raising his gun, aiming at the guy who ran the shop while I shifted my gun between the other two.

This was not supposed to be one of our partners. This was just a local business that paid us for protection. What the fuck were they doing with a man strung up in their back room?

“How the fuck did you—“ one of them started.

“Think I’m the one asking questions here,” Rico said.

“We don’t answer to you anymore,” the youngest said, puffing out his chest.

“Shut the fuck up,” the owner, likely his father, snapped, glaring at the guy.

“Oh, no?” Rico asked, a chill seeping into his words. “Who the fuck you answering to then?”

There was a reason Rico was Renzo’s right-hand-man, despite most of us coming up together and having the same level of experience.

Rico was a family man, through-and-through. Any real or perceived threat to our organization was treated as a personal attack. He lived, ate, and breathed this life.

More than that, he was always collected, even when he was pissed off. He didn’t have a dark side that rose up like I did, making him unpredictable. He wasn’t as empathetic as Elian could be. Or even have the chip on his shoulder that Cinna did.

All in all, he was as well-adjusted as you could get for a fucking lifelong criminal.

“Don’t gotta tell you shit,” the owner said, gaze hard.

Whoever they were linked up with now, they thought they stood a chance against our family. Which was either unbelievably naïve, or we had a big, unknown threat on our hands.

It wouldn’t be the first time. Someone was always putting pressure on us, thinking the mob wasn’t the powerhouse it used to be. Or just ballsy enough to believe they could take us.

It had been a while, though, since someone came out of left field on us.

“Oh, I believe you’re gonna fucking tell me everything I want to know,” Rico said, tone deceptively calm, even though we were outnumbered. “Maybe while I have you strapped up on the meat hook. But I won’t put you up there by your wrists,” he added, making one of the guys I was watching blanche.

“You don’t know who you’re fucking with,” the owner said, trying to come off as unfazed, but sweat was beading in his hairline as Rico reached for a cigar in the ashtray, and snuffed it out.

“The fuck is this? You fancy yourself mobsters now?” he asked, speaking mostly to himself. “Now, I think the problem here is, Gary, that you don’t know who you are fucking with. Or how much I will enjoy grabbing one of these boys of yours, strapping him to a chair, and start clipping off some digits. That don’t work, could use one of these nice knives of yours to carve them open, and start pulling out organs.”

“You’re not going to do shit,” one of the boys said, the one with the puffed chest, making Rico’s gaze cut to him, brow raised.

The father, though, took the opportunity to rush to the side, grabbing a cleaver, and charging.

Just as the back door flew open, and Cinna moved into the space, gun raised, and aimed.

Then, into the small space, a bullet rang out just a half of a second before the father howled as he fell to his knees, hands going to his calf as the cleaver clattered to the ground several feet away.

“About fucking time,” Rico said, unbothered by the almost attack, his tone calm even as the younger kid cried out for his father, and the older one glowered at us.

“Don’t even think about it,” another voice joined the fold, making me glance over to see Coal standing there, gun aimed at the older kid. Who was trying to reach for a knife lying on a table a few feet at his side. “Who’s the poor schmuck?” he asked, nodding his chin toward the man still dangling, bleeding, and struggling to breathe.

“How about you get these fucks incapacitated, so we can figure that out?” Rico asked as Cinna was already wrenching the father’s arms up, and slapping on zip ties that she pulled tight enough to make him cry out even as his bullet wound kept bleeding through his pant leg.

Coal tucked his gun away, going for the bolder kid first, kicking the backs of his knees until he hit the ground, then struggling for a moment to hold him still so Cinna could slip on the zip ties.

He was still working on the slowly crying younger son when the back door opened again, and this time, Renzo himself moved in.

His gaze moved around the space, then landed on Cinna. “You were right to call,” he said.

“I got here before you, asshole,” Cinna said, voice devoid of ill will, as she looked at Rico. “Clocked it not being good, and called in reinforcements.”

Even as she said it, more bodies started flowing in through the back door. A bunch of Renzo’s soldiers, who started moving around, gathering the men, and taking the one down from the hook.

“Guess you thought you could fuck with me, huh?” Renzo asked, looming over the father as he hissed and whimpered in pain.

I stepped back, tucking my gun away now that Renzo and his crew were here to take over.

I found my gaze seeking Cinna, watching as she cut the duct tape Coal was unraveling to put over the mouth of the older kid who felt the need to tell us all the ways he was going to make us pay, despite being incapacitated.

She was as capable as ever, moving with a catlike sort of grace even as she moved from duct tape duty to helping a couple of Renzo’s soldiers pull the guy down from the meat hook.

“Toss that one in the freezer,” Renzo said, nodding toward the difficult son. “The other in the walk-in fridge. We will deal with them later.”

With that, everyone started to follow their orders until the only person left in the kitchen with us was the guy who was being unwrapped as he sucked in greedy, frantic breaths.

It was then that Cinna’s hand went into her pocket, fishing out her phone, and bringing it to her ear.

“What? Slow down. Right now? Okay. I’m coming.”

It seemed I was the only person who noticed the call, or even the way Cinna ducked out the back door without a word. In a rush to be… somewhere. Where something was clearly going down.

“Boss,” I called, waiting for Renzo to turn to me.

“Yeah?”

“Mind if I bounce?” I asked. “Seems like you got enough hands here.”

“Yeah. Go on. No reason for all of us to have a long night. Stay by your phone though. Might need to roll if we find out some shit.”

“Got it,” I agreed, nodding, and making my way outside, just barely catching sight of Cinna as she ducked into a cab.

“Fuck,” I hissed, waiting for another one, and flagging it down. “Follow that cab,” I said, tossing a stack of cash at him, so he didn’t immediately tell me to get the fuck out of his cab.

It wasn’t a long drive.

And I knew almost immediately as the cab pulled down a side street leading to a much rougher area of town where we were going.

To Cinna’s place.

What the fuck was going on?

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Cinna

Not much would have called me away from something so major going on with the family.

But the call was from Joel.

And that could only mean one thing.

I answered figuring it would just be him giving me the lowdown about someone coming out of my place, snooping around.

“Someone’s here,” he whispered, voice tight.

“What?” I asked.

“Someone is here. Five-ten. Bulky. Brown hair. Thousand-dollar kicks. He’s—“

“Slow down. They’re still there?”

“Yes.”

“Right now?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. I’m coming,” I said, glancing around to make sure no one would miss me, then sneaking out the back, running toward the street to flag down a cab.

Excitement sizzled across my nerve endings at the idea of finally, fucking finally, getting a lead. Someone who would actually know something. That could lead to some answers. The guys I was looking for. So I could finally make them pay.

And, hopefully, in doing so, I might be able to take back that part of myself I felt like I’d lost that night. The part that was so sure of herself, so strong, the part that wasn’t afraid.

Because even as the cab drove down the blocks toward my apartment, the anticipation melted into something else. Something all-too familiar recently.

Anxiety.

Worse still, fear.

I swallowed back the coppery taste of it as I tossed money at the driver, then rushed out of the cab, refusing to give into it, to let it rule me.

I was up to my floor in what felt like a blink, my gun in my hand.

Joel was in his usual seat by the windows.

“Get in your apartment,” I whisper-yelled at him before going to my door, taking a steadying breath as the adrenaline spread through my veins, making me feel hot and jittery as I turned the knob slowly, trying not to alert whoever was inside.

My stomach was doing nauseating somersaults as I pushed the door open and flew inside.

Where he’d been waiting for me.

Just behind the door.

This hadn’t been a reconnaissance mission.

It was a planned attack.

A trap.

And I’d walked right into it.

I must have flinched, something inside of me sensing his presence, because he was close enough to be precise, but the blow landed across the back of my neck and lower part of my skull instead of a full head shot.

I stumbled forward, heartbeat punching against my ribcage, pain screaming through my head as I fought against the swirling in my brain, trying to keep my equilibrium and turn back toward him, face him, fight him.

But he was faster, hands landing on my shoulders, sending me flying, crashing.

I threw out my arms, coming down on my forearms, protecting my still-healing wrist.

Pushing, I rolled onto my back, bringing my legs up, knees to chest, feet out, kicking out as he got closer.

But the blow wasn’t enough to send him flying, just stumbling back and rushing forward, this time grabbing my legs when I tried to kick out again, wrenching them around, forcing me to twist and flip onto my stomach.

Panic screamed alarm bells through my head as I scrambled up, wanting to get off my stomach, knowing how badly things could go in this position.

But he was too quick, moving to stand over me, grabbing me around the throat, fingers pressing just right, making my breath catch, making my head go fuzzy.

There was a horrifying moment of clarity.

I was going to pass out.

And then he could do whatever he wanted to me.

My hands clawed at his, scratching over his skin, making him hiss in pain, but his hold stayed true.

My vision was starting to go blurry.

Then, suddenly, there was a loud crash, and my attacker’s body came crashing down on me, crushing me to the floor as he let out a groan of pain.

What just happened?

I pushed up, groaning against the effort to shove him off of my back and roll away.

To find Joel, the kid, standing there with my lamp in his hands, wide-eyed and shaky.

My little fucking savior.

“Joel, go!” I yelled, rushing up to my feet to get between him and the kid.

“Little shit,” my attacker snarled, reaching back to rub his head, his hand coming back red. “You’re gonna pay for that.”

“Over my dead body,” I said, reaching back to keep Joel behind me as I inched toward the side, mind on my gun on the ground.

“That’s the plan,” the attacker said, charging forward, slamming me backward. Into Joel. Who crashed into the wall. Crushed by the two of us. He let out a grunt as I cocked back my hand and swung, landing a bit to the side, catching the guy on his jaw instead of his nose.

But there was a satisfying grunt of pain in response, at least.

His own fist shot out, and I couldn’t dodge it, not unless I wanted Joel to take it, so I turned my head to try to have his blow graze instead of strike.

He had a ring on his finger, though, and I could feel it slicing across my skin, a burning sort of pain that helped me focus past my panic.

I brought my knee up, slamming hard between his legs, stealing his breath, and sending him stumbling back a few steps, giving me enough room to move away from Joel, so I wasn’t crushing him anymore.

“Go, Joel,” I hissed as I rushed forward, trying to take advantage of the guy’s incapacitation.

I charged at him, landing an uppercut to his jaw, sending him sprawling.

The grunt as he landed chased back more of my fears.

This.

This was what I was good at.

Fighting.

Winning.

I had a perfect track record, in fact.

No matter how close it got, I always walked away.

Even that last time, as bad as it had been, I’d gotten up. I’d gotten away.

They weren’t going to win.

They couldn’t break me, damnit.

He was fast, though, popping up like a ridiculous hero in an action movie.

But he didn’t charge at me.

He went for my weak spot.

He made a beeline for the kid.

Joel’s attention was on me, still wide-eyed and disbelieving, like he wasn’t even sure how he’d gotten here, let alone found himself in the middle of a fight.

“No!” I yelled, making Joel stiffen.

But it was too late.

The guy had grabbed Joel by the wrist, dragging him away from the wall. There was a popping sound followed by a loud howl from Joel. Like he’d dislocated the kid’s shoulder as he pulled Joel in front of him.

One hand produced a knife and pressed it to Joel’s throat. The other held him against his body. An actual human shield.

Joel froze.

Not that there was anything he could do, anyway.

The kid was all skin and bones.

The attacker wasn’t super tall, but he was bulky, strong. There was no getting away from him if you didn’t at least have some kind of training.

“Let him go. He’s no use to you,” I said, inching around as he kept moving, arching in half a circle, forcing me away from the exit, putting himself between me and it.

As if I could run and leave the kid.

Maybe others might.

Maybe he would.

But there was no reality where I was leaving Joel to deal with the consequences of my actions.

“Oh, I think he is. Got you squirming,” he said, a sick grin tugging at his lips. “Now walk your pretty ass over to the couch and sit the fuck down.”

Joel’s big eyes were watching me, and his head shook slightly side to side. Like he didn’t want me to do what I was being told.

But what choice did I have?

“Don’t even think about it,” he said as I eyed my gun on the way toward the couch. “Matter of fact, toss away your knife.”

“I don’t—“

“I’ll take it from you,” he said. “After I carve the Adam’s apple out of this kid’s throat.”

“Relax,” I said, voice shaky as I sat on the couch, reaching down for my boot, and pulling the knife free, before sending it flying across the room.

“Hey, Cinna,” Joel called, voice shaky, something in his eyes willing me to understand.

“Shut the fuck up,” the man snarled.

“Don’t talk,” I demanded, seeing the knife against his throat, close enough to prick his skin.

“Just be ready,” Joel said, something in his face making my stomach drop.

Just a second before he did.

Joel’s whole body went limp.

And I watched, a cry caught in my throat, as the knife scratched down his neck, a long red streak.

But shallow.

Superficial.

The attacker wasn’t prepared for the movement, and wasn’t ready to grab him tighter, and keep him on his feet.

So Joel went to the floor, scrambling away on all fours as I flew up, charging across the room, grabbing the bastard’s wrist and pinning it to the wall, trying to wrench the knife free.

His hand shot out, grabbing a handful of my hair, yanking back hard enough for me to see stars as the pain shot across my scalp.

“That’s all you got?” I snapped, nails clawing at his hand, prying his fingers loose.

The knife clattered to the ground, forgotten.

Because the next thing I knew, his fist was striking out and landing, making me stumble back.

I had to get a fucking weapon.

He was bigger. Stronger. And being faster wasn’t always enough to win against someone like him.

“Joel,” I called, ducking under the guy’s arm, feeling him catch my wrist. “In the cushion,” I called, yanking my hand free and stumbling back a few steps, just out of reach.

Joel’s hand plunged between the cushions, looking, face blank, until his fingers closed around it. The little round bottle.

My pepper spray.

Well, one of many.

I had bought extras and stashed them around, my paranoia these days knowing no bounds.

Except, of course, it wasn’t actually paranoia when someone was out to get you.

Joel held it up, cocked his arm back, and sent it sailing.

My hand grabbed it.

But so did my attacker’s.

Both of us pulling at it, trying to get control of it.

Somehow, in the struggle, one of us must have worked the safety cap off of it.

And the next thing I knew, one of us—or both of us—were pressing against the top, and the spray was shooting out.

There was no way to dodge it.

The spritz was just cold at first.

Until the burn set in.

“Fuck,” I hissed, stumbling back, eyes on fire, making it impossible to see, so I kept stumbling back, trying to get away from a man who had a major advantage now that my own fucking weapon was being used against me.

Disoriented, I was confused when my back slammed into something waist height.

My kitchen counter.

Kitchen.

I didn’t own a single pot or pan.

Not a spatula or soup ladle.

But I did have knives.

Frantically trying to blink at the sting in my eyes, I fumbled along my counter, trying to orient myself.

Until I came across the long, low drawer.

I grabbed at it, yanking it open, misjudging its placement, and hitting my hip in the process.

My hand plunged in, grabbing at silverware until, finally, I felt the thick handle of my biggest knife.

“Right in front of you!” Joel called as I pulled the knife out, holding it close to my body, so my attacker couldn’t wrench it from me until I was sure of where to strike.

I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to see anyway, but hoping it would help the pain.

Which put me relying completely on my other senses.

I felt the air move just a second before a hand closed around my throat.

Panic soared, but I tamped it down.

This was good.

He was close.

I could feel most of him against me.

Which gave me a good target.

I shifted my hand on the handle, tightened my grip, and plunged.

It was a low blow, down by his hip because I didn’t want to risk hitting him somewhere that would allow him to stop me.

It took more force than most people would imagine to stab a knife into someone. More than superficially anyway. And I was trying to do damage.

“Fuck,” he growled, releasing my throat as he stumbled back.

I yanked on the handle, feeling the tension as his muscle and fat tried to hold onto it.

As soon as it was out, I slammed forward again.

And again.

And again.

Blood wet my fingers, slipped down my hand, made my hold sticky on the handle.

But I was too crazed in that moment to care, pulling it out over and over, slamming it back in.

There was a thud as he suddenly fell to the ground.

I followed him, my body coming down on his.

And I just kept plunging in the knife.

His stomach.

His chest.

Over and over.

The definition of overkill.

Especially when his body went limp under mine.

“Cinna!” Joel cried out, making me still.

“What? What is it?” I asked, head whipping around, but my vision was still blurry.

“You can put the knife down, love,” a familiar voice said, making my belly flip-flop. “He’s dead.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Dav

The problem with someone as fucking secretive as Cinna was that while I knew the general vicinity of where she lived, I didn’t know any other details.

The cab got caught at a red light, and I lost sight of Cinna.

A frustrated grumble moved through me as I flew out of the cab, eyes scanning the street, hoping I might see her ducking into a building.

But there were no women around. Just a crew of men who, from the looks of things, were dealing or running girls.

Well, most criminals spoke the same language.

Money.

Hopefully I had enough to loosen some lips.

“Yeah, move along, pretty boy. You don’t want what I got,” one of them said as I approached, his laid-back demeanor making me think he was someone in charge.

“I’m looking for a woman,” I said, reaching for my wallet.

“Not my deal. Up around the next corner.”

“Not like that. Someone who lives around here. Cinna. Yay high. Gorgeous. Personality like a cactus.”

The way his lips quirked up let me know he knew exactly who I was talking about.

“Not in the business of selling information either,” he said, shrugging, barely glancing up from his phone.

“She’s family.”

“Then you should know where she lives.”

“Not that kind of family,” I said.

That finally got his attention, making him watch me with scrunched brows.

“Still should probably know where she lives.”

“I know it’s on this street. And I know she’s in some sort of trouble. So tell me, or I’ll have my whole crew down here in five minutes to deal with you.”

“Don’t need to get your panties in a bunch. She’s in here,” he said, waving toward the building he was leaning against. “Came in like her ass was on fire. So I figure you’re not lying. And you better not be. Because I’d rather not be on that chick’s bad side.”

I didn’t waste any more time on him as I made my way to the door, about to hit all the intercoms until someone opened up, until I realized the door wasn’t even latched.

Real safe place.

Banking down my annoyance that she was so careless about her own safety, reminded myself that she was a grown-ass woman who got to make her own decisions, regardless of how asinine I might think they are.

Getting in was easier than I’d been planning.

But finding Cinna, that wasn’t easy.

Sure, there were mailboxes in the lobby, but none of them had her name on it. None of the packages gathered on the table had her address either.

“Fuck,” I grumbled, going into the elevator to go up to the first floor of apartments.

Where I proceeded to start knocking, acting like a clueless, lost visitor, claiming my sister must have given me the wrong apartment number.

The problem was, either no one actually knew Cinna by name, or they just weren’t willing to give out any information.

I made my way up to the second floor, and was waiting for some old lady with a three-pack-a-day habit voice to get to the door when I heard it.

Slamming on the floor above.

Some sort of struggle.

Adrenaline surged through me as I flew down the hallway, going to the stairs because I could run up them faster than the elevator could get to me.

My heart was in my throat, my pulse pounding in my ears, as I imagined all sorts of horrible scenarios of what could be happening to her already. Because I’d been wasting so much time trying to find her.

I was running down the hallway when I heard it.

Another loud thud.

Then grunting sounds.

I ran toward it.

Paused outside a closed door, not wanting to charge in until I was sure.

Inside, there was a muffled thunking sound, more grunting, and I decided to take my chances, whipping open the door, and moving inside.

“Cinna!” a voice called, drawing my gaze over toward a teen sitting on a hideous brown and white striped couch, his eyes huge, blood trickling from a cut on his neck.

“What?” Cinna’s voice called, high, panicky. “What is it?”

My gaze shot toward her voice, finding her on the ground, straddling the still form of a man, a large chef’s knife in her hand, blood soaking it to the handle, covering her hand.

She was turned to look back at me, but her eyes were unfocused, the whites and the skin around them bright red.

“You can put the knife down, love,” I said, eyeing the man below her, his shirt saturated with blood, almost a dozen holes in his shirt from her knife. He was unmoving. No rise and fall of his chest. “He’s dead,” I told her.

I watched as her mouth fell open, looking around me, but not quite at me.

“Dav?”

“Yeah, Cin. It’s me,” I said, pushing the door closed, and locking it.

This was a crime scene now.

No one needed to see inside.

Her shoulders slumped, and she suddenly flung the knife like it had burned her as she scurried off of the man, scooting backward until her back slammed into the kitchen cabinets.

“What happened?” I asked, looking between Cinna, who seemed like she was having a panic attack, gulping for air, and the kid on the couch.

“He attacked her,” the kid said. “She got pepper sprayed.”

“Fuck. Okay,” I said rushing toward her, going into the cabinets until I found a cup, then filled it with water, then squatted down in front of Cinna. “I’m gonna rinse the spray off,” I told her, tilting her chin up. “Hold your breath for me,” I demanded, but started pouring before I knew if she was actually following instructions or not.

The effects would wear off in a half an hour or so, regardless of if you treated it, but it burned like a mother fucker the whole time. And you had more of a chance of blisters and breathing problems if you didn’t rinse the shit away.

The common consensus was to use milk, but the science said water was the best bet. Which was a fuck of a lot less messy.

“It’ll stop stinging in a minute,” I assured her, getting more water, and pouring, soaking through her shirt, getting her hair drenched.

Another three or four cups, and she was breathing normally again, blinking at me like she was starting to see more.

“Any better?”

“I can see better,” she agreed as I reached out to wipe my hands across her cheeks. “Still hurts.”

“I’ll get more—“ I started.

“No,” she cut me off. “I feel like I’ve been waterboarded,” she added, making my lips curve up. “Joel,” she said, eyes widening.

“He’s sitting on the couch,” I said, glancing over at the kid. “You okay?” I asked, seeing her breath start to speed up.

“I… can’t…” she panted, breathing faster.

“It’s the pepper spray,” I said, but even I wasn’t convinced about that. She’d been breathing alright even before I’d rinsed her off.

And she was getting more frantic by the second.

This almost seemed like, well, a panic attack.

“I can’t…” she said, suddenly flying up onto her feet, and running across her apartment, the door slamming as she closed herself in.

“You alright, kid?” I asked, turning to look at him, finding his gaze on the body.

“I… yeah.”

“Your throat…”

“Just a scratch,” he said, wiping at it with his sleeve.

“If I go see if she’s okay, are you going to stay there?” I asked.

“Got nowhere else to be.”

That was good enough for me.

I turned and made my way toward the closed door, knocking, but getting no response, save for the rapid breathing on the other side.

“I’m coming in, Cin,” I said, pushing open the door to find her sitting off the side of the tub, head ducked, breathing even more unevenly than before.

“I can’t breathe,” she gasped between breaths, making my heart ache for her as I moved forward.

“Okay,” I said, moving up to her, then stepping into the tub, and lowering down, pulling her with me, her back against my chest, her whole body between my legs. “It’s gonna be alright,” I assured her, letting my hands drift over her. Down her arms, up her legs, over her stomach, over her jaw, her hair. Trying to ground her. To distract her.

“What’s the matter with me?” she asked, sounding dangerously close to crying.

“Nothing’s wrong with you,” I assured her. “It’s just adrenaline,” I added, since she was too rational to bullshit her.

“I’ve had worse fights,” she said, still sucking in her breath too quickly, but she wasn’t so stiff against me.

“Not in your own home,” I reasoned. “And you never had a kid to protect,” I added.

“Joel!” she gasped, trying to sit up, but I wrapped an arm around her middle.

“He’s okay. He’s waiting in the living room.”

“He’s hurt.”

“Just a cut. He’s fine. Just sit with me for a minute,” I said, resting my face against the side of her head. “Say okay.”

“Okay,” she agreed, melting into me, taking a slow, deep breath. On the exhale, more of the tension left her body.

“Taking another deep breath for me,” I said, nuzzling into her neck, feeling her pulse against my lips, still fast, but not frantic. “There you go. Told you it was gonna be okay,” I said as her breathing began to return to normal.

That was the wrong thing to say, it seemed.

She tensed and pulled away, then moved to stand, climbing out of the tub entirely, and going to the sink, scrubbing at the blood on her hands.

“I, I have to check on Joel,” she said, not even bothering to dry her hands as she grabbed her first aid kit then she rushed out of the bathroom and away from me.

On a sigh, I climbed out of the tub and followed.

Joel was exactly where I’d left him, surprisingly calm, considering what he’d been a part of.

“Here, let me see,” Cinna said, moving to sit on the coffee table in front of the kid, opening her kit, then using some antiseptic spray and gauze to clean the kid’s neck.

I’d seen her take care of many injured men over the years. She’d always been kind of rough about it. But she was surprisingly gentle as she took care of Joel, wincing as she wiped at the cut even though the kid showed no reaction.

“Are you okay?” she asked after slathering on some triple antibiotic and pressing on a giant bandage.

“I’m fine.”

“You were really fucking brave,” she told him, cleaning up her kit. “Stupid. But brave.”

“Couldn’t stand by and let him hurt you,” Joel said, shrugging.

“You could have. Plenty of others would.”

“He’s dead,” Joel said, glancing over at the body.

“Yeah,” she agreed, nodding.

“It was self-defense,” he insisted.

“Yeah,” she said.

“Are you calling the cops?”

“No,” she and I both answered at the same time.

The kid’s gaze slid to me.

“Ah, Joel, this is Dav. Dav, this is my neighbor, Joel.”

“He works for you?” I asked.

“He just keeps an eye on my door.”

“Since she got robbed,” Joel said.

“What?” I snapped, gaze sliding to her.

“It wasn’t a robbery,” she said, shrugging. “The place was just tossed.”

“Just tossed? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because it wasn’t your problem. I have it handled.”

“Yeah? ‘Cause it looks like relying on a kid to help you fight an entire crew that almost fucking killed you. The fuck is going on with you?”

“I don’t have time for your bullshit, Dav. I have shit to do,” she said, moving over toward the body, snatching up the knife, and tossing it into the sink, water on full blast.

“Did you forget that you’re a part of a family, Cin? That the whole point of that is to have people around to have your back?”

“This is my problem. Not theirs.”

“That’s not how this works.”

“Just this once, it has to be.”

There was no reasoning with her about this. Not right now anyway. She was in damage control mode.

This shit had to get cleaned up.

Then maybe I could convince her to let me in on this. Because things were not looking good.

She grabbed a bottle of bleach from under the counter, pouring it over the knife and sink, and just letting the water run as she turned back to the body.

“Do you know him?” I asked.

She stared down at him for a long time before shaking her head. “No.”

Then she was squatting down, patting his pockets, finding a wallet, and pulling it out. “Chet Wheaton,” she read off his license. “That means nothing to me. You?” she asked, looking up at me.

“No. And it doesn’t sound Irish or Russian.”

“Contract, maybe,” she mumbled to herself.

“It’s a name, at least. Something to go on.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, putting the wallet on the counter to deal with later.

“Suppose you don’t have any of those giant plastic garage totes,” I said, figuring this guy was too big to stuff in any luggage.

“No. And it’s too late to—“

“There’s one in the basement,” Joel cut in, making both of us turn in his direction. He shrugged. “Been down there forever. I can get it.”

“You’re already too involved in this,” she said. “Tell me where it is.”

“I’ll get it,” Joel said, hopping up. “I go down there all the time. It wouldn’t look weird. You don’t.”

“Joel, I can’t ask—“

“You’re not,” he cut her off, getting up and making his way to the door. He was gone before she could say anything else.

“Can you trust him?” I asked.

“I… I think so,” she said, taking a deep breath. “He needs the money,” she added. “Hear that?” she asked, holding a finger up.

I listened for a minute, then heard the raised voices of a man and a woman from a distance.

“Yeah…”

“That’s his parents. He wants to get away. Money is the only way to do that.”

“He a street kid?”

“No. He mostly just sits in the hall listening to music.”

He said nothing else, just stood there listening to our own breathing and Joel’s parents’ unending arguing, just waiting to see if the kid returned, or if he was out selling us out to the cops.

But, not ten minutes later, we heard the dragging sound out in the hallway before the door flew open, and there was the kid. Pulling a black garage tote with a yellow lid, the whole thing covered in cobwebs.

“Is it big enough?” he asked, kicking the door closed, then eyeing the body.

“It’ll do,” I said, nodding. “Thanks. You should really go now,” I added. “You’re implicated enough.”

“I got nowhere else to be,” he said. “I can help.”

I wouldn’t lie. A tub full of a dead body was heavy as fuck. And as strong as Cinna was, the man outweighed her. She’d be helpful carrying out the tub, but I could use some extra hands.

My gaze slid to Cinna.

“It’s your choice, love.”

“Just this once. And just to get the tub in a car. Then you go back up into the hall, and pretend nothing ever happened, okay?”

“Yeah, alright,” he said. I heard a hint of something in his voice that Cinna must have missed, but there was too much to do now to worry about small shit like that.

“Help me drag him up,” Cinna said to me, pointing to the body.

“What for?”

“I want to get a picture. But if he’s on the ground, he’ll look dead.”

Couldn’t argue with that logic.

So I helped her drag him up, sitting him against the fridge, wincing at the blood that would need to be cleaned up as Cinna reached out, pulling his eyes open, then grabbing for her phone and snapping a few pictures.

“Okay,” she said, nodding. “Let’s get to work.”

With that, we did.

Gloves were found.

Hair was tied back.

The tub was wiped down of fingerprints. The body was stripped, then cleaned, just in case of trace, even though we were going to find somewhere to bury it where it wouldn’t be found.

The floor and fridge could be dealt with later.

Getting the body out was the most important part.

“We need a car. Preferably an SUV,” Cinna said.

“Your crew doesn’t have one?”

To that, Cinna shook her head. “I don’t drive,” she admitted.

“No shit,” I said, brows shooting up at learning this new fact.

“Never leave the city,” she admitted.

“I’ll have someone drop off my SUV.”

“You drive?”

“Yeah. Spent a lot of time driving the previous boss around when I was young,” I admitted.

“Okay. Good. Then…”

“One step at a time,” I said, reaching for my phone, and shooting off a text. “Your guy down on the street… he gonna mind his business?”

“That’s what he’s good at,” Cinna agreed, nodding. “Even if bribed.”

“Trust me, he doesn’t need anyone’s money. Unless someone was fronting him a couple hundred grand in cash, he won’t have anything to say.”

“I’m starting to see why you live here,” I said, then looked around. “But you could actually move into this place.”

It was a nearly empty space, save for the hideous couch, a coffee table that had likely been picked up off the street, given the scuffs and carvings on the surface.

No window treatments, save for the cheap plastic blinds that likely came with the place. No carpets. No art on the walls.

The only proof of Cinna around was the expensive-ass coffee machine on the counter.

“I’m never here,” Cinna said, shrugging. “It has everything I need,” she added.

“Does it happen to have any winter gloves?” I asked, looking down at the white gloves on all our hands, knowing it wouldn’t exactly look inconspicuous if we passed by anyone other than the dude out front.

“I have my pair…”

“I have some,” Joel said. “I can grab them.”

“I’d appreciate it. A pair for the two of us.”

Joel nodded, but looked immediately tense at the prospect of going back into his apartment.

I felt bad for the kid, but the situation was too desperate to insist he didn’t have to.

“Are his parents abusive?” I asked when he was gone.

“I’m not sure. All they do is scream. I imagine if he is in there, he gets screamed at too.”

We both shared a look, our mutual past traumas on display for just a moment.

But then Joel was back, looking paler than a moment before, but he had the gloves, and that’s all that really mattered.

“Ah, Cinna?” he said.

“Yeah?”

“You might want to change…”

Cinna’s gaze moved down, looking at the blood on her shirt and pants.

“Right. Yeah. Okay,” she said, moving down the hall into the bathroom.

I went under the sink cabinet, grabbing the beach and then the cleaning bucket before moving into the bathroom, this time without knocking, finding her stripped down to her bra and panties, scrubbing at her stomach where the blood had seeped through the fabric of her shirt.

“Here, toss it all in here,” I said, holding out the bucket.

Cinna silently dropped her clothes in and I went to the tub, filling it with water and a shitton of bleach, rinsing, then doing it again, before finally leaving the clothes in the the bucket with the rest of the bleach and a bit of water. The fabric would degrade, but the DNA would be ruined too. I would deal with it when we came back to clean her apartment when we were done with the body.

“I’ll grab you some clothes,” I said, moving out and into her bedroom.

It was every bit as bleak as the rest of her apartment. Just a headboard-free queen-sized bed with a rumpled black comforter, an ancient nightstand with a lamp, and a closet full of her usual dark clothes.

I picked out jeans and a long-sleeved tee then made my way back into the bathroom where she’d dropped the washcloth into the bucket with her clothes, then moved to stand in front of the mirror, staring at herself with a blank look in her reflection.

“Hey, I can do this myself if you need to tap out,” I said, moving behind her, feeling her stiffen until my hand moved out, tracing a finger over her bare shoulder. Then she fucking melted back against me, closing her eyes, taking a deep breath.

“I’m not tapping out,” she said as I dropped her clothes on the sink cabinet, then wrapped my arms around her. “I just need a minute.”

“I could leave,” I offered, just to hear her tell me not to.

“No. Stay. Just for a minute.”

“Just for a minute,” I agreed, pressing my lips into the side of her head.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Cinna

“Would it have killed the bastard to eat a couple salads in his lifetime?” I grumbled as we dropped the tub down inside of the elevator.

We were all dressed for the cold, jackets, hats, and gloves. But sweat was already beading up on my skin beneath from the weight of the damn tub.

“How inconsiderate of him not to make his dietary choices based on how heavy his corpse would be?” Dav shot back, a smirk toying at his lips.

This was dangerous, I knew. Having him there. Having him help. I should have kicked him out as soon as he came into my apartment.

But then, I reminded myself, who would have taught me to breathe again? Would have held me until the panic passed? Would have held me when I needed it? Without seeming to lose any respect for me?

I didn’t understand what was going on with me, why I was suddenly feeling so fragile and unsure of myself. I just knew that there was no one else in the world I would feel comfortable displaying it in front of aside from Dav.

So I was letting him tag along.

Even if it meant it was going to get even easier for me to melt into him, to give in to my feelings for him.

“The car is right out front,” Dav said. “It’s the lifting it in that is going to be a bitch.”

The doors opened then, and all three of us sucked in a deep breath before grabbing the tote and moving out.

We all acted like our arms weren’t turning to jelly as we made our way out of the building, down the steps, and to the car.

Luckily, the local crew was occupied by some kind of disagreement going on at the corner, so we didn’t have to act like lifting the tote up into the SUV wasn’t killing all of us.

“Christ,” Dav said, slamming the trunk door and huffing out a breath.

As much as I hated to admit it, he’d been shouldering more of the weight than myself and Joel combined.

“Okay. Now, you get your ass back upstairs and pretend tonight never happened, okay? I will come and talk to you when we’re done.”

“Got it,” Joel said, nodding.

“Hey, kid,” I called when he turned to walk away.

“Yeah?” he asked, turning back.

“Thank you. Dunno if I’d be standing here right now if you hadn’t come in,” I admitted, even though it hurt my pride to do it.

“No problem,” he said, shuffling his feet, looking uncomfortable. After a lifetime of getting screamed at, I imagined kindness was foreign and uncomfortable to him.

We watched to make sure he got back in the building before Dav and I silently climbed in the SUV.

“What’s the plan?” I asked. “Probably too cold to dig a grave.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, pulling away from the curb with one hand as he reached to fiddle with some buttons with the other. A second later, the seat started to warm up, chasing the chill out of my bones. “A body of water is likely the best bet this time of year.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “If we anchor it, might never come back up.”

“And even if it did, it would be after a frost and thaw. Not much would be left of it.”

“So I guess the question is… salt or fresh water?” he asked.

“I think anywhere salt will have cameras to worry about.”

“Fresh it is then,” he agreed.

“There’s no fresh water in the city. Central Park aside. And that’s never gonna work.”

“Looks like we’re taking a little road trip, love,” Dav said. “Should we stop for snacks?”

“Coffee maybe,” I said, feeling the exhaustion of the day starting to leech into my bones.

“You could sleep,” Dav said as if he was reading my mind.

“No, not yet,” I said. And when his hand moved out, landing on my thigh, I didn’t push it away.

Just one more night, I would let him be close.

Then, then I had to push him away again.

No matter how hard that would be.

How much it might hurt.

“Mood is getting all sorts of dark in here,” Dav said, glancing over at me.

“We do have a corpse in the trunk,” I reminded him.

“Does that mean it would be wholly inappropriate to put the music on?” he asked.

“Probably,” I agreed, but I reached for the volume myself, wanting something to distract me from the thoughts racing around in my mind.

It only took about an hour and a half of abiding all of the speed limits and traffic lights to reach Jersey. But another couple of hours to get from the built-up part of the Garden State to an area that actually had natural water features.

They were all closed for the year, but the legality of that wasn’t exactly a concern when we were, you know, carting the corpse of the man I’d murdered.

“Shouldn’t you have turned down the last street?” I asked, getting a raised brow from Dav.

“No.”

“I’m pretty sure the arrow said it was that way.”

“Didn’t we agree that your job was to control the radio?” he asked, raising a brow at me.

“Fine. Don’t blame me when we have to backtrack then.”

“You could get your license, and the next time we have to hide a body, you could drive.”

See, the thing is, when you’re doing something illegal, you couldn’t have your phone on you, let alone use GPS to direct you where you were going.

So, yeah, there’d been some snipping at each other during this little road trip.

Fine.

I’d been the only one doing the snipping.

Dav had been all affability, singing with the radio, stopping to get me coffee, taking my surly attitude with a grain of salt.

“So, is your objection to long car rides in general, or not being in control?” he asked, pointing out the dashboard to the sign for the stupid lake I’d just insisted was in the other direction.

“I just want this done,” I said, anxious now that we were close to being finished.

We’d stopped three times on the road.

To get fuel.

To get coffee.

And to get some rope and weights at an all-night box store.

“We should leave the car here,” Dav said, cutting off the lights and the engine on the stone road that cut off not far ahead of us. “No tracks,” he added.

“Ugh,” I grumbled, gauging the distance to the pond. With a heavy dead man. And weights to sink him in the pond with.

“I’ll do the heavy pulling,” he offered.

“You do realize the weights are a solid hundred pounds all together too, right?” I asked.

“So we get to skip the gym this week,” he said, grabbing more rubber gloves, slipping them on, cutting the engine, then climbing out.

Suppressing a grumble, I followed suit, slipping the rope over my arm, grabbing the stack of weights, then following behind Dav as he dragged the tub toward the pond.

“What are you looking at?” I asked when he paused a few feet from the edge of the lake.

“Sign,” he said, moving out of the way, so I could check it out for myself thanks to the way the moon was peeking through the clouds.

“What is red algae?”

“Never watch the news, huh?”

“New Jersey news? No. Why?”

“Red algae means no swimming. This sign looks of the permanent sort. Figure this has been going on for a few years. No one swimming… not much of a chance of ever knocking our little anchor loose.”

“Huh. Good,” I said, nodding.

Contrary to what popular movies suggest, it wasn’t exactly easy for the mafia to hide bodies. At least not in the city. Sure, sometimes we got lucky with groundbreaking on new construction sites. And, yeah, the ocean was always an option if you were careful.

I heard one of the other Five Families, the Costas, actually had a guy on the payroll whose only job was to clean up crime scenes and bury bodies.

Us Lombardis, though, we all handled our own bodies. Which wasn’t always easy. Especially when you didn’t drive.

As Dav opened the tub, then dragged out the body, I had to admit that I was really thankful for his help this time. I’m sure, if I tried hard enough, I would get the job done by myself. But every moment of it would suck.

Dav was as chipper as ever, though, as he took the weights, then began tying them to the arms and legs of the corpse.

“What in the Boy Scouts?” I asked at his effortless rope tying.

“Handy skill to learn,” he said, shrugging it off. “So, what do you think? Weights good enough, or should we slice open the stomach, so it doesn’t bloat up? What?” he asked, looking up at me from his squatted position, head cocked to the side.

“Just… every once in a while, one of us will say something that reminds me how fucking insane our lives are,” I admitted. “This is one of those moments. But, ah, I think he might have enough holes in him.”

“Fair enough,” Dav said, looking at the body. “Alright. If you can carry two of the weights down the dock, I can take him and the other two.”

So that’s what we did, grunting and grumbling and sweating through our coats and gloves.

In the end, the body flew over. Half a second later, all the weights were in too, and we stood there at the end of the dock, panting for breath and watching him disappear.

Dav lowered down onto the dock, exhaling hard.

“Fuck,” he sighed, slipping off his rubber gloves, and shoving them into his coat jacket, then taking off said jacket to rest it on the dock and lay back on top of it.

“What are you doing?”

“It’s a nice night. Trees. Sky. Fresh air.”

“Pesky, rotting corpse just underneath us…”

“Get your pretty ass down here and enjoy it for five minutes,” he demanded. When I didn’t immediately move to do just that, he reached up, snagged my wrist, and pulled me down next to him.

I shrugged out of my jacket, spreading it beside Dav, then moved to lie flat as well, reminding myself that I was allowed to have this one last night before I pushed him away again.

“Okay. It is pretty. Corpse aside,” I agreed, looking up at the moody night sky, the clouds moving across the moon, giving it a spooky look as the wind kicked up, surrounding us with scents of dirt and leaves and water. Things the city didn’t really have to offer.

“Ever want to move out of the city?” he asked.

“No,” I said immediately. “But to be fair, I’ve spent almost no time outside of it.”

“I don’t really ever either. But that one summer in rural Pennsylvania had me wishing for a change of pace for a while. Sun, long days out by the pond, riding bikes, four-wheelers, local wildlife that wasn’t rats the size of your average cat…”

“When you were a teen, right?” I asked, remembering his story about his cousins and the porn.

“Yeah. Just the one summer.”

“Why?”

“Because my old man was locked up for knocking around my mom. And my mom was in the mental institution for trying to kill herself for the third time. Either my aunt had to step up, or I was going to go into foster care. And since next to no one wants a teenage boy, I would have been in a group home.”

“I didn’t realize your mom…”

“Had a habit of taking handfuls of pills to escape reality?” he filled in. “Yeah, no one does.”

“Did you get to go back with her?”

“Fucked up part is my ma was locked away longer than my father was,” he said, shaking his head. “He came to get me, dragged me back to the city, then beat on me while he waited for my mom to be released.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Figure you have a similar story,” he said, shrugging it off.

“I didn’t have a dad,” I admitted, surprised the words were coming out of me. “I mean, there was a man who fucked my mom and made me, but he was never in the picture. No name on the birth certificate either. Figure my mom didn’t even know who it was.

“She was always too strung out to pay attention to pesky details like someone’s name. Or what they were trying to do to her daughter…”

“Cin…” Dav said, voice horrified as he reached for my hand, fingers slipping between mine, and squeezing hard.

“I was good at hiding when I was little. Then better at sleeping with a knife when I was older.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, pulling my hand to his lips and pressing a kiss to the back of it.

“I survived.”

“You shouldn’t have needed to survive that.”

“I made it,” I said, shrugging. “Though I think you came out of your shitty childhood better than I did.”

“Don’t say that,” he said, his voice soft. “I like how you turned out.”

“Yeah, okay,” I said, rolling my eyes as I looked back at the moon.

“Hey,” he said, voice demanding my attention, so I turned. “I have no reason to lie about that.”

“Except for to get in my pants again,” I said, trying to brush it away.

“Love, I wouldn’t have to lie to get that,” he said, his other hand sliding down my belly, heading lower, making my breath catch. But he paused just before he could touch me where I needed him most. Before I could stop it, a grumble escaped me. “See?” he asked, turning on his side, his warm breath on my ear.

“Dav…”

“Yeah?” he asked, teeth snagging my earlobe. “Dav, what? Slide my hand between your thighs, and touch your sweet pussy?” he asked, dragging a little whimper out of me as he toyed with my button, but didn’t work it free.

“Yes,” I sighed when his hand refused to move without an answer.

“Are you wet for me?” he asked, lips going to my neck, making a little shiver course through me.

“Yes.” There was no use denying it. I swear I was turned on anytime he was near. Hell, I was turned on just by the idea of him anymore.

“Hmm. Maybe I should check,” he said, pushing the button through, then sliding down the zipper.

My breath felt tight in my chest, anticipation sizzling across my nerve endings, as the backs of his chilled fingers teased across my bare skin.

That rumbling sound escaped him as his fingers slipped suddenly under my panties, teasing up my slick cleft.

“Fuck,” Dav groaned. “I love how much your pussy is always so wet for me,” he said, fingers sliding up my cleft to tease over my sensitive clit.

My back arched at the touch as a little moan escaped me.

“So sensitive,” he said, working me in slow circles.

I could feel him, his hardness pressing against my thigh, making my sex ache at the idea of him inside of me again.

My hand was moving before I even realized I was intending to do so, closing over his cock, and working my hand around it with my palm.

A groan escaped Dav, and his fingers slipped down, sliding inside of me as his thumb worked my clit and his hips rocked against my touch, needing more.

And I wanted to give it to him.

My palm left him, so I could work his pants free, reaching inside, and closing around his length without the barrier.

A growl escaped Dav as I worked him.

“Fuck,” he groaned, breathing hard.

“Dav, fuck me,” I moaned, my hips rocking against his hand, needing more. Needing him.

“I’ll never get tired of hearing you say that,” he said, finding a condom with one hand, then sliding his other out of my pants to protect us as I kicked out of my boots, then yanked off my pants and panties, feeling the cold night air bite at my overheated skin.

Dav moved in at my feet, his hands sliding down my legs to sink into my hips, pulling me up onto his lap. Then, with his gaze fixed on mine, he surged inside of me.

“Fuck,” we both groaned in unison, our bodies tensing, our breaths catching.

My hands reached out, grabbing his on my hips as he started to fuck me.

Fast and desperate as we were both feeling in the moment, too needy for each other to think of anything but oblivion, we rose together, breath going ragged, bodies tensing and writhing.

“That’s it,” Dav said as my walls tightened around him. “Come for me.”

Just like that, I did, crying out into the open night air.

“Fuck, again,” he said between gritted teeth, trying to hold out, to make it last, as he kept slamming inside of me.

I was still gasping for breath when I grabbed for him, using him for leverage to move up onto his lap, riding him as his lips crashed down on mine.

I melted into him as his arms wrapped me up, holding me close as my hips did little rocking movements, stoking the need, but doing nothing to satisfy it.

Not that it mattered.

I was too focused on his lips, in the deep intensity of them, in the way I felt those same warm, confusing feelings for him move across over me, sink into me, fill up all the dark places inside.

It was all well and good until my heart felt like it was swelling, filling up with him.

The exact thing I couldn’t let happen.

I broke the kiss, then pushed him until he moved to lie flat on the dock, the space breaking the spell, but reigniting my desire as he looked up at me with hungry eyes.

His hands slid up my thighs, then under my shirt, reaching to cover my breasts through my bra.

Frustrated, needing more, I reached down, yanking off my shirt, ignoring the way goosebumps spread across my skin.

The rumbling sound that escaped him made my pussy tighten around his hard length.

Reaching behind my back, I yanked at my clasps until they freed, then pulled off my bra.

My nipples tightened in the cold, and the shock of his warm hands on my breasts dragged a ragged moan out of me as I started to ride him, the need a clawing thing as he touched me.

His hips started to rock up into me as I moved in fast circles, driving us both up, our ragged breaths and groans filling the air.

“You look so fucking good riding me,” Dav moaned, his gaze vacillating from my face, my chest, and where we were joined, then back again.

“Fuck,” I moaned, head falling back as the orgasm started to crest.

Dav thrust up into me harder, faster, driving me right through the orgasm that had me crying out over and over, my body shaky as I took him with me as while called out my name.

I was still straddling him, sucking deep, greedy breaths, when, suddenly, one caught on a bubble of laughter that only spread until it was a full, rolling laugh.

“What is it?” Dav asked, giving me a strange smile as his fingers moved up and down my thighs.

“This is insane,” I said, shaking my head. “We just fucked over the sinking corpse of a guy I just killed.”

A chuckle moved through him as I lifted off, trying to gather all of my clothes and slip back into them.

“Hey, if ever there was a night when we deserved a little stress relief, this was it,” he reasoned.

“There’s a trash can back there,” I said as he removed the condom. “We can take the bag with us,” I added. “Drop it off somewhere on the way back to Brooklyn.”

With that, he walked off, leaving me to complete the unglamorous job of getting my boobs back into a bra in private.

“What’s the matter?” Dav asked as he walked back, finding me standing there, fully dressed aside from my jacket that was still on the dock beside his.

“My boot is missing.”

His gaze immediately went to the water, dread filling his eyes. “Do you think the algae is dead in the winter?” he asked, grimacing at the idea of going in.

“This is when I would normally insist on getting it myself,” I said, looking at the water too. “But I am going to play the role of damsel in distress and let you go get whatever flesh-eating bacteria that water has to offer.”

Another laugh burst out of Dav at that, his gaze sliding to me, something on his stupidly handsome face that had my chest feeling all gooey.

“Damn,” I said when my gaze slid away, liking that sensation too much, and knowing I needed to tamp it down.

“What?”

“It’s right there,” I said, waving toward where it had fallen off the dock into the dirt. “I was really rooting for the flesh-eating bacteria.”

That got another chuckle as he fetched the boot, then knelt down in front of me, offering it like a prince in a silly fairy tale.

Except I was nobody’s princess.

I shoved my foot in and was quick to walk around Dav, wanting to put more distance between us again.

The ride back through New Jersey didn’t have as much of the ease as riding into it had. We stopped for more coffee and fuel, dropped off the trash bag we’d taken, and got something quick to eat in the car.

By the time we were idling outside my apartment, the sun was up, blinding to my tired eyes.

“Go home and get some sleep,” I said when he moved to put the car in park.

“I need to help clean—“

“I’ve got it,” I cut him off. “You figure out something to do with that tote for me.”

“Cin…”

“Thanks, Dav,” I said, rushing out before he could say whatever he was about to.

I knew I was too delicate right then.

Too willing to let myself want things I couldn’t have.

It was better this way.

Even if each step up into my building ached.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Cinna

I smelled the bleach when the elevator doors slid open.

Christ.

Did someone spill an entire bottle somewhere?

On a sigh, I made it to my door, working all the locks free, thankful that Joel had locked up for me.

As soon as I whipped open the door, a wall of bleach stench slammed into me, making me hold my breath as my eyes burned.

My gaze went immediately to the spot on the floor where the body had been. Where a giant blood puddle had been.

But it was gone.

So was the blood on the fridge from propping up the body.

Joel.

That kid was really going far and beyond.

It wasn’t until after I closed and locked the door behind me that I realized I wasn’t alone.

Because right there on my couch, huddled under a winter jacket for warmth, was Joel. Sleeping soundly.

I knew I was supposed to wake him up, push him out, let him know he was gonna be late for school.

But the kid had a rough night, even before cleaning up a literal crime scene for me.

I walked over to the kitchen, sliding the window open to air out the bleach smell a bit, then walking into my bedroom, finding my only extra blanket, and bringing it out to drape over him.

He didn’t even flinch.

Did he always sleep that soundly?

Was it the adrenaline or exhaustion?

Or was it something else? The sleep of a kid who finally, fucking finally, had a safe space?

I understood that feeling all too well. I wasn’t sure I even realized how sleep-deprived I’d been my whole childhood until I moved out at eighteen and had several locked doors between me and anyone who wanted to hurt me.

More than anything, that was why I let the kid sleep. All through that morning as I went over his cleaning with a fine-tooth-comb, never truly satisfied if I wasn’t in control of a situation. Then part of the afternoon as I packed up my blood-free clothes to toss, showered, and tried to catch some sleep, but found my mind wandering back to the woods, to Dav, and all those sticky, complicated feelings I was trying to avoid around him.

It was a door slam coming from across the hall that finally had him jerking upright on the couch, sleepy eyes wide, his hair all mussed.

“You’re alright,” I said over the mug of my coffee. “Just the neighbor,” I added as he focused on me, confused for a moment, before it all came rushing back. “Thanks for cleaning, kid. I don’t think my floors have ever been this clean.”

“Didn’t know it was white linoleum under all that dirt,” he teased, making my lips curve up as he sat off the side of the couch.

“Want coffee? Fair warning, everyone thinks I make it too strong.”

“No such thing,” he said, folding his blanket and draping it over the back of the couch before coming and taking a cup from me, then going for the canister of sugar that sat unused most of the time since I liked my coffee bitter enough to start a rock band.

“Well, no, not when you put a cup of fucking sugar in it,” I said as I watched him pile it in, stir, and take a greedy sip.

“What time is it?”

“Two. In the afternoon. You missed school.”

He shrugged that off. “I never cut. It’s fine.”

Of course he didn’t. School was a place away from his asshole parents.

“Hungry?” I asked. “I was thinking of ordering.”

With that, I had a ton of shit delivered, and we sat on the couch eating while talking about the night before, about how he didn’t have to worry about the body, that it was handled, that he was best to just forget there ever was a body.

And it was all very… comfortable.

Which was weird as fuck, considering I never had someone else in my apartment. Maybe the abused kid in me just recognized it in him or something like that.

“I liked that guy,” Joel said as we sat back on the couch, watching the idiots on the remodeling show rip out a bunch of original woodwork and stained glass.

“What guy?” I asked. I felt his gaze on my profile, his brow raised.

“Oh, right. Dav. Yeah.”

“He likes you,” Joel said.

“Oh, what do you know? You’re ten.”

“Fifteen,” he said, doing that chest-puff thing again.

“Same difference,” I said just to annoy him.

“He does, though,” Joel said, shrugging, not knowing when to shut up. “Like you. Why’s he not here?”

“Because it’s not like that.”

“He wants it to be.”

“Dude, how could you possibly know that? You’ve probably never even talked to a girl.”

He didn’t take the bait, though, shrugging it off.

“He looks at you like Spike looked at Buffy.”

“That reference is… way too old for you,” I said.

“It’s true, though,” he said.

“I’ve never watched Buffy,” I admitted. “Had my hands full with real-life monsters growing up. Hey, don’t turn that off before I can rant and rave about how ugly the final renovation is,” I grumbled as he reached for the remote.

“You don’t have streaming?” he asked, shooting me a disgusted look.

“I don’t watch much TV.”

“I’ll scam you a free week of the one that Buffy is streaming on.”

“Scam me a free week?”

“Yeah. I just make a bunch of new email addresses, use a Visa gift card with next to nothing left in it, then sign up for a free week, and cancel it before it tries to charge me. Rinse, repeat.”

“Or you could, you know, use my credit card,” I said, giving him a small smile as I got up to hand him my wallet. “Sign me up. I’m making more coffee.”

We sat on the couch for the next few hours, watching the grainy first season of the show about slayers and vampires and witty sidekicks.

“So… Spike…” I said when by the fifth episode, he still hadn’t appeared.

“You have to be patient. The look isn’t until like season five or six.”

“Five or six?” I snorted.

“Don’t try to act like you don’t like it.”

“I don’t… dislike it,” I started. I mean, badass girls who kick ass, what’s not to love? “But that’s a big commitment just to prove a point.”

“But you have to see the whole evolution. We can watch it whenever you have free time,” he added, and there was a needy edge to his words that pulled at something inside of me. It was that same thing that had me befriending Lore, even though we’d been polar opposites. I might like to project myself as cold and unfeeling, but some people could get to me.

Lore.

Joel.

Dav.

“Alright,” I agreed. “But I reserve the right to make fun of you mercilessly when we get to season five or six and we both find out you’re wrong about Dav.”

“I’m not,” he said, all teenage cockiness. “It’s gonna be nice to watch it on a big screen,” he admitted.

“What have you been watching it on?” I asked.

He reached into his pocket, producing a phone with a spiderweb crack toward the top corner, likely obscuring part of whatever he was trying to watch on it.

I’d never had just a strong urge to buy someone something as I did now. A big fucking tablet or something. I wondered if he would even accept it. Maybe I could lie about him needing it to work for me. That it was related in some way.

“Alright. Cue up the next episode.”

“Fair warning, this is one of the worst episodes,” Joel said. “Eclipsed only by the fucking swim team episode,” he said, grimacing.

“Look at you with the potty mouth,” I teased.

“You must be rubbing off on me,” he shot back.

We watched the show until, eventually, the last twenty-four-plus hours caught up to me, and I crashed on the edge of the couch, waking up covered in a blanket and confused by the daylight streaming in through the windows.

Stretching, I looked around.

“Joel?” I called, but got no answer.

I got up, making my way toward the scent of fresh coffee, finding a pot waiting for me with a note beside it.

School. Coffee new @ eight.

Huh.

There was a perk to having someone else around, it seemed, as I made coffee and finally went in search of my phone, reading through the texts from Renzo, talking about a meeting in two days about the whole butcher shop situation.

I’d almost forgotten all about that with everything else going on.

I was about to check in with my crew when there was a knock at the door, making my heart shoot up into my throat, and start pounding frantically, making it hard to breathe.

What was wrong with me?

I reached for my knife, the one that already had one body on it, and made my way to the door, only to have it shake as someone knocked again.

On a gasp, my coffee cup slipped from my hand, splashing hot liquid over my feet, porcelain shattering around me.

“Cin?” Dav called, voice tight, likely having heard the crash.

“Dav?” I asked, ripping at the locks to pull open the door and glower at him. “What the fuck?”

“Good morning to you too, love,” he said, head tilted to the side, looking at me. “Did I scare you?”

“Don’t be stupid,” I said, even though my chest and throat still felt tight.

“I would have called,” he said, pushing his way in, even though I hadn’t moved out of the doorway. “But I didn’t think you’d pick up,” he said as he reached out, tucking some of my hair behind my ear.

That little touch seemed to ease the tension in my chest and throat, letting me breathe again.

“I wouldn’t have,” I agreed, stooping down to gather the pieces of my cup. “Joel is going to be pissed at you.”

“The kid? Why?”

“Because he scrubbed the shit out of the floor last night,” I told him, tossing the cup fragments and reaching for the paper towels as Dav dropped a bag on the counter.

“He was still here when you got back?”

“He cleaned up then crashed on the couch. Then made me watch almost a whole season of Buffy with him.”

“He seems like a good kid.”

“He weighs all of a hundred pounds, but he rushed in here to crash a lamp against that asshole’s head while he’d been choking me out.”

“You didn’t tell me that,” Dav said, his gaze sliding to my throat.

There were some bruises there if you looked close, but that Chet Wheaton guy knew what he was doing, putting pressure in the carotid instead of just choking me with pure brute force.

“I didn’t think there needed to be a blow-by-blow,” I said, shrugging, as I wiped up the coffee. “What’s in the bag?”

“Breakfast sandwiches. Did he do anything else to you? Aside from your cheek.”

The cut from his ring had been pretty superficial, despite how bad it had bled. It was just an angry scratch now, likely sealed after a full day, and nothing but a memory in a week’s time.

“I’m fine.”

“And that’s not what I asked,” he said, digging into the bag to pull out two foil-wrapped sandwiches. “Bacon or sausage?”

“Is that even a question? Bacon,” I said, holding a hand out, and he slapped a sandwich into my palm. “Why are you here?”

“You’re pleasant this morning,” he said, voice as calm as ever, unfazed by my attitude. “I am here because I figured you got enough sleep now, and we can hit the streets.”

“Excuse me?” I asked, pausing before biting into the bacon, egg, and cheese on a bagel.

“Find out who Chet worked for.”

“Um, no,” I said over a mouthful. “Absolutely not. This is my problem.”

“And, yet, here I am. You can tell me no all you want, love, but I’ll just follow you around then.”

“You’re a pain in the ass,” I grumbled, even if some part of me was pleased at the prospect of not having to do this by myself, of there being someone to have my back if things went sideways again.

“I can tell everyone that you’re my bodyguard, if that makes you feel better,” he invited, looking pleased at the prospect.

If there was one thing you truly had to respect about Dav, it was his unshakable comfort in his own masculinity. He never felt less than when he let a woman take the lead.

“You can come with me, but only if you let me do the talking. Some of these people I am going to talk to are skittish.”

“You take the lead, boss,” he agreed, polishing off the rest of his sandwich. “Is that coffee going to melt my stomach lining?” he asked, nodding toward it.

“Joel said it was good.”

“What? Did he put a pound of sugar in it?” he asked, shaking his head as he brought down two mugs, pouring me a new cup, then himself one. “I owe you a new mug,” he decided.

“If it is anything pink and girly, I will break it on purpose this time.”

“Not pink or girly. So covered in dicks would be fine?”

Damn him.

Why did he have to be so utterly… tolerable? Even likable? He was making it really hard to keep him at a distance. Especially when his stubborn ass was insisting on being at my side through this.

“Okay,” Dav said, clapping his hands when he was done with his coffee. “So, where to?”

“The electronics store,” I said, getting scrunched brows from him. “I want to get a tablet. And then we can go from there. It’s gonna be a long day. If I don’t do the store first, I won’t get to it.”

“This tablet… would it happen to do with a certain teenager?”

“So what if it is?” I asked, crossing my arms.

“Retract the claws, love. I was just asking a question. He seems like he needs someone to give a fuck about him,” he said, walking over to grab my jacket, holding it open for me. And I tried not to notice how his hands lingered on my shoulders for just a second after I slid into it.

“Let’s go,” I said, putting as much space between us as possible as we left.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Dav

Cinna couldn’t help herself at the electronics store. Just picking up a tablet became researching the best tablet in the store before getting it, a case, a foldable keyboard, a new set of expensive headphones, a burner phone—because Joel’s was cracked, and he needed a phone to contact her with—, and a gamer backpack to keep it all in.

It was the poor guy who worked there who actually talked her out of a laptop as well, insisting that the tablet was pretty much the same thing.

I said nothing as she made another stop, cloning her many keys to her door, and slipping them into the bag as well before stopping off at the local high school, and asking them to call down Joel Davis to give him his backpack.

But she’d walked out as the secretary was making the call to his classroom.

Like she didn’t want him to feel weird about having to thank her for the gifts. Or put herself in the position to try to brush away his thanks.

“Okay. I feel like I should give you an out now, before you get any deeper in this,” she said, looking past me down the street. “Because I don’t want any of this getting back to Renzo. Not until it’s done.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” I was already neck-deep in this. “What is the end-game here, though?”

“Those three bastards dead. Along with whoever sent them after me.”

“You have no idea?” I asked.

“Not a fucking clue. I mean, I’m not the most pleasant person, and I imagine I piss people off. To shit-talk me. Or sabotage a job. Yeah. But to this extent? No, I have no idea.”

“What jobs have you been working the past year?” I asked, falling into step beside her. “What?” I asked at her scrunched glance.

“Too many to name. Not all of us are complete slackers, you know,” she said, but there was no bite in her words.

“Did any of the jobs fuck someone over?”

“Almost every job fucks someone over in some way or another. Someone else always wants what we end up getting.”

“True,” I agreed. “But that was a lot of violence. Like they were told to make you suffer first.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, eyes going sad.

I didn’t want to push her, knowing how quick she was to throw up her walls when she felt defensive. So I just followed her around as she talked to neighborhood crews and contacts in local businesses.

A few people thought that Chet looked familiar but couldn’t place why.

Drake, the dealer I’d talked to outside of Cinna’s building, had been the only one to look at the picture with a raised brow. “Never saw him. Now I guess I never will,” he added with a knowing look.

“Can I ask your scouts?” she asked, nodding toward the kids on the block, some riding bikes, others just seemingly hanging out.

“Whatever knocks your socks off, ma. But it’ll prolly cost ya.”

“I’m almost out of cash,” Cinna admitted, having already bribed half a dozen people to get information out of them.

“I got enough to bribe some kids,” I said, underestimating just what hustlers children their age could already be.

But we’d lucked out on kid three, my last several twenties tucked in his pocket as he slowly circled us on his bike.

“I’ve seen him,” the kid said, seeming to enjoy having the power, wanting us to ask for every bit of information.

“Where? When? With who?” Cinna asked, trying to be patient which was, admittedly, not her strong suit.

“Last night, maybe?” he said, pausing in his circles. “Saw him get outta a car.”

“Any chance you know your cars?” I asked.

“Black one,” the kid said with a smirk. This was the city, after all. Most kids who grew up here would never have a reason to get a license or drool over cars.

“Who was in it?”

“That guy. Another one driving. And a lady riding passenger.”

“A lady?” Cinna and I asked in unison.

“What did she look like?” Cinna asked, and I could see her gears turning, trying to figure out what woman she might have wronged in a deal. Which was likely a much smaller pool of possibilities than if it had all been men.

“Brown hair. Old, like you,” the kid said, making Cinna let out a surprised scoff.

“That’s me. One foot in the fucking grave,” she said, shaking her head. “What about the driver? Anything stand out about him?”

“Looked like everyone else,” the kid said, shrugging. “But the lady was yelling at him before they pulled off, leaving the other guy here. Never saw him come out.”

“Any chance you’d recognize them or the car if you saw them again?”

“Maybe.”

“And if I asked you to call me if you saw them…”

“Drake don’t let us work for anyone else,” he said, getting back on his bike and letting out a surprisingly loud whistle for such a small kid.

“It’s something,” I said to Cinna who stood there looking defeated.

“Is it?” she asked. “I haven’t done a deal with a woman. She could be anyone. A daughter or wife of someone whose business I ran down. Someone related to a guy I had beat up or killed. This doesn’t narrow it down much.”

“It’s more information than we had this morning,” I reminded her, but her shoulders stayed tense. “How about we go back to your place for some food? Toss some ideas around?”

I saw the battle on her face as it waged.

Part of her didn’t want to spend any more time with me than necessary, was worried about not being able to keep the wall up with more time spent together. The other part, though, and I watched as it started to win, wanted my company.

“Fine. Then go ask around your crew,” she said, drawing a line in the sand. You’re not staying the night.

We headed back to her apartment, and I stood there as she worked all her locks free before moving inside and jerking back into me.

“Sorry. You left me the keys…” Joel said, sitting on the couch with his new tablet on his lap, his headphones around his neck.

“No, it’s fine. I just… you surprised me. You remember Dav,” she said, absentmindedly waving toward me. “Don’t start,” she added, shooting the kid a pointed look that made me feel left out.

“Dav,” Joel said, inclining his chin at me. “Any chance your nickname is The Bloody?”

“I swear to god, kid,” Cinna snapped, pointing a menu at him.

But Joel was still smiling to himself, unbothered by her tone. I guess when you had parents like his, who I could hear through the walls a few apartments away, you weren’t fazed by a little attitude. Besides, he was clearly goading her, even if I didn’t understand the reference.

“We’re ordering food,” she said. “What do you want?” she asked, bringing him the menu.

It was interesting watching Cinna interact with Joel. It was part annoyed big sister and part concerned mother. Sides of her that I wasn’t sure anyone else got to see.

“Where are you going?” she asked after we placed the order, and Joel hopped up and headed to the door.

“Gotta grab something,” he said, shrugging off her concern, likely not used to having anyone give a shit if he was coming and going.

He came back a few minutes later with a lot of banging outside of the door, prompting Cinna to rip it open, only to find the kid dragging metal folding chairs in.

“Where did you get those?” she asked.

“Basement. Lotta shit down there,” he declared. “Little dirty. But they’ll work. Want me to go get the food?”

“Normally, no,” she said, reaching to pull off her boots. “But my feet are killing me. One sec,” she added, disappearing into her bedroom, then coming back with a stack of cash. “There. Get drinks too. I don’t have anything.”

“Be back,” the kid said, grabbing his new phone before rushing out, excited to have a job. And maybe, in his own way, to pay back Cinna for the gifts, even though neither had mentioned it.

“Ugh,” Cinna said, dropping onto the couch, flexing her sore feet.

I moved to sit next to her, reaching for her legs.

“What are you doing?” she asked, suspicious until she felt my thumbs press into her arch, which made a sound escape her that went right to my dick.

“This isn’t going to lead to anything, you know,” she said, narrowing her eyes at me even as her back arched when both my thumbs pressed into her sole.

“Okay,” I agreed.

“I mean it.”

“I’m sure you do,” I said. “Are you going to keep talking, or do you want to actually relax and enjoy this?”

“I am going to make a list of all the jobs I’ve worked. Go through it one by…” she started saying, breaking off on a little mewling sound.

“You really don’t understand the concept of relaxing, do you?” I asked, pressing into each of her toes, then giving them each a slight tug before moving onto her other foot.

“It’s not my strong suit,” she admitted, watching me with heavy-lidded eyes. It was mostly enjoyment, but there was a little spark there too that I could have stoked into a flame if the kid hadn’t come back with food, muttering about some fight going on at the pizza place, completely oblivious to interrupting something.

Within a few minutes, food was spread across the coffee table, Joel was on the couch, and Cinna and I were on the folding chairs, watching one of Cinna’s home renovation shows until Joel complained his way into Buffy reruns.

Cinna grumbled, but she was clearly just as into it as the kid was. Because, before anyone even realized how much time had passed, we were five episodes deep, and the kid had pulled down the blanket from the back of the couch, and was struggling to stay awake.

Not long after, Cinna quietly got up to start cleaning up the mess from dinner, tiptoeing around her apartment.

“Does he sleep here a lot?” I asked, voice low, as I washed up the mismatched plates. She had exactly two of them, so Cinna herself had eaten off one of the lids of the to-go containers.

“This is only the second time,” she said. “I know I probably shouldn’t let him. But…”

“But it would have been nice if someone had done something like this for you as a kid,” I filled in, understanding.

“Something like that,” she agreed. “I know what it’s like to feel like you’re sleeping with one eye open. I think it’s why he’s so tired when he’s here. He knows he’s safe.”

“You’re good with him,” I said.

“I usually suck with kids. They’re always afraid of me.”

“He’s not really a kid,” I said, shrugging. “No more than we were at his age, anyway.”

“Yeah,” she agreed.

“Besides, I’m sure you’ll be good with kids you know.”

“I’m not having kids,” she said as she put leftovers into the fridge. “I can’t, actually, even if I wanted them. Which I don’t.”

“I’m not having kids either,” I admitted, realizing I’d never actually said that out loud before.

“Really?” she asked, watching me with her head tipped to the side.

“Really. These fucked-up genes end with me. Hasn’t been a normal person in my bloodline in generations.”

“You’re normal,” she said. Then, at my raised brows, I saw her remember the times when the mask slipped, when the darker side of me came out. “I mean… normal for a mafia capo, anyway.”

“I got snipped at nineteen. I’ve never regretted it,” I said, shrugging. “I can enjoy everyone else’s kids. Then go home and get a good night of sleep.”

“I’m a fucking nightmare when I’m sick. The idea of having to take care of a needy, crying kid when I’m feeling like shit…” she said, shaking her head.

“Yeah, you’re not a great patient,” I said, smiling at her.

“I’m pretty sure I actually snarled at you a time or two.”

“Or twenty,” I agreed, getting that rare little twinkle of laughter out of her.

“I bet you’re a big baby when you’re sick,” she accused.

“Next time I have a cold, I’ll call you over to play nursemaid. Not,” I said at her eye roll, “what I meant. Though, you’d look fucking amazing in a sexy nurse getup. Short white dress, thigh highs, a red bra peeking out…”

“Given this a lot of thought, have you?” she asked, shaking her head at me, but there was a smile on her lips as she turned away from me. “Keep dreaming because that’s not going to happen. I don’t think I’ve… ever worn a dress.”

“We’ve finally found the real reason you didn’t go to the boss’s wedding,” I teased. “You didn’t want to wear a dress.”

“You got me,” she agreed, stifling a yawn. “I’m gonna go take a shower. If you could lock up on your way out, that’d be great,” she said as I dried off a plate.

I was going to do just that, not wanting to push when things were going… if not well, at least not badly. She wasn’t icing me out. That was a step in the right direction. But as she was making her way to the bathroom with her change of clothes in hand, I caught her giving me a long, longing glance before she closed herself behind the door.

I battled with myself for all of a minute after the water turned on.

Then I was striding across her apartment, reaching for the knob, finding it unlocked, and letting myself inside.

She had a solid shower curtain, so I managed to strip down and pull back the curtain before she even knew I was there.

She let out a surprised little gasp, but her gaze immediately heated and moved over me as I stepped inside.

I pulled the curtain closed, then stalked toward her, backing her up against the wall, grabbing the back of her neck and letting my lips crash onto hers, swallowing the little moan she let out as our bodies touched.

Her lips were hungry under mine, demanding, even as her hands started to roam over me, sliding over my back, her fingers finding old scars and running over them.

My teeth snagged her lower lip, biting hard enough to drag a ragged moan out of her. I took advantage, my tongue sliding inside to find hers, feeling the way a shiver coursed through her at the sensation.

It was all feeling then, our hands sliding over each other’s wet bodies, teasing, squeezing.

Frustrated with the need to feel more of her, I grabbed her, turned her, pulled her back against my chest.

My hands drifted over her then, up her thighs, over her hips, her belly, then up to cover her breasts, squeezing.

Cinna moaned, her head falling back on my shoulder as my thumbs and forefingers found her nipples, and started to roll them, working them into tightened points.

It wasn’t long before my hand was between her thighs, teasing and toying until she was writhing against my fingers and palm, until she was rocking back against my cock.

“Dav, please,” she moaned, her hips rocking harder.

I used my foot to spread her legs a bit, then shifted so my cock slid against her pussy, loving the way she gasped and wiggled back against me.

“Now, Dav,” she begged. “It’s okay,” she said. “I’m all negative,” she added. “You?”

“Yeah,” I said, anticipation building.

I had rules about sex. Namely, I didn’t have it without protection. Ever.

But this was Cinna.

It was… different.

“Same,” I said, rocking a little faster against her.

“Then what are you waiting for?” she grumbled, angling her ass up a bit more.

I didn’t need more encouragement than that.

I slid back, pressed against her, then surged in, feeling her tight walls close around me, making me almost lose fucking control right then and there.

And, still, my control over myself right then was fragile as my hands sank into her hips, using them to jerk back against me as I slammed into her again.

Hard.

Deep.

Cinna threw out her hands, bracing them on the wall of the shower to hold herself in place as I fucked her, both of us losing ourselves in each other with each passing moment.

Cinna’s moans echoed in the space as my thrusts got faster, rougher, losing myself into that darker part of myself by each moment.

But she just begged for more of it, gladly took all of me, through one orgasm, then building toward another, making my hand go around to close over her mouth, not wanting her to wake up Joel as she got more and more lost in the sensations.

“Come for me,” I demanded, getting close myself, needing her to shatter with me.

Cinna let out a whimpering sound, her breath frantic against my hand as I fucked her harder still.

Until her pussy was clenching around my cock, her body trembling as she came, taking me with her, slamming deep, and groaning out a curse as my hand slammed onto the wall above hers, my legs feeling weak.

“Fuck,” I hissed, forehead resting on her head as my hand left her mouth, wrapping around her waist instead, holding her against me, not wanting her to move away. Not yet.

But she showed no signs of moving away as she pushed off of the wall to lean back into me, head turning in toward my neck, eyes closed, happy to be there with me, letting me hold her. For just a little while.

It ended up being the shitty hot water heater in her building that had us finally breaking apart as the water went from hot, to tepid, to cold in the span of a few minutes.

I climbed out first as Cinna grumbled her way through cleaning up, making my lips curve up at her inventive language as I toweled off, then waited, holding a towel open for her.

Her gaze stayed stubbornly averted as she quickly toweled off, then turned her attention to the sink cabinet, fishing out a toothbrush and paste and getting to work.

I thought this was the beginning of the wedge again, her putting up those walls, forcing me to stay on the outside of them.

But then her hand went back into the cabinet, producing a sealed pack of extra toothbrushes, holding it out to me in a silent invitation.

I had a feeling Cinna was not the kind of woman to offer you a toothbrush unless she was inviting you to stay the night.

So I took the offer, standing beside her as we both did such a normal, mundane task together like people who had been together for years, instead of two unattached people who were clumsily trying to not fall on our faces as we navigated this new terrain.

She bent to gather all of our discarded clothes, bringing them with her as she moved out into her bedroom, so I followed in my towel, trying to keep my lips from turning up, knowing how mercurial her moods could be, and if she was feeling the slightest bit unsure about this, seeing me smiling might send it all shattering to the ground.

“You’re too big,” she grumbled after tossing and turning for a few minutes, bumping into me each time.

“Your bed is too small,” I countered, sliding an arm under her and curling her up on my chest. “There. Better. Go to sleep.”

She turned her head up to shoot me narrowed eyes, but there was a soft smile on her lips as she rested back down on me before drifting off to sleep.

I lay there a while, fingers drifting through her drying hair, hoping I’d managed to carefully remove a few more bricks from her wall.

And that she wouldn’t try to hastily brick herself back up when she woke up in the morning.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Cinna

I woke up with Dav still underneath me, his arm casually draped across my hips, his heartbeat a steady metronome against my ear, comforting in a way it had no right to be.

I knew I should move away, put some space between us, especially as my mind wished to be closer, to sink into his very skin.

But I couldn’t seem to make myself move, to create the wedge some part of me was still trying to convince me I needed.

It was just trying to protect me.

But… protect me from what?

From getting hurt? I’d been hurt before.

That same voice, though, whispered that it was different, that the kind of pain the ending of this might cause was the kind that I had no defenses against.

Still, I’d been through a lot.

There was no reason to assume I wouldn’t survive this as well.

So I let myself stay there, enjoying the feel of him, the warm sensation in my chest at being beside him.

Eventually, his fingers started to drift up and down my spine, taking me from warm and cozy to burning and aching in seconds.

That was all it took with him. The slightest of touches, the promise of more.

I slid more fully over him, my lips landing just below his jaw, then moving down the column of his throat, over his chest, down his stomach, my tongue tracing the dips of his muscles, loving the way his breath hitched and his muscles twitched as I kept moving downward.

I slipped under the covers, finding him already thick and straining, then teasing my tongue across his head, tasting his desire, then sucking him deep.

His hips bucked up into my mouth as he whipped away the covers, then gathered my hair out of the way, so he could watch as I worked him.

His breath grew fast and ragged as his hips rocked into my mouth, as his fingers dug into my neck, the taste of him filling my mouth as I worked him with my mouth and hand, the other slipping down to tease over his balls as his body tensed, and ragged groans started to escape him.

His hand tugged my hair, a silent warning that he wasn’t going to be able to last much longer. I didn’t want him to. I worked him faster, driving him up, then through the orgasm, his release sliding down my throat, and a little moan escaped me at that.

I couldn’t explain it, the way some strange, primal part of me wanted him inside me. In my mouth, coming deep inside of me like he had the night before.

I’d never felt that way before. Never let someone inside of me like that before. Somehow, though, with Dav, it felt right.

“Fuck, love,” he hissed as I finally released him, looking up with a satisfied smile. His hand moved out, teasing over my swollen lower lip. “You better get up here and let me have a taste too,” he said, hand pulling at my hair when I didn’t immediately move to do just that.

“Come on,” he said, wicked smirk toying with his lips. “Be a good girl and ride my face. I’m fucking famished,” he added, making a strange little laugh escape me as I moved up his body, my legs settling on either side of his head.

“Sit,” he demanded, grabbing my hips and yanking me down fully.

There was no more talking for either of us then as he started to work me with his tongue and lips, as his fingers slid inside of me, intensifying the sensations as I rocked against him, shameless in my own need for release.

He worked me relentlessly through one orgasm, but wasn’t satisfied with just that, taking me down from one and driving me upward once again.

His fingers got harder and faster inside of me, and I felt the slight stretch as he slid a third inside, gathering up my desire, then slipping back out… sliding back, pressing.

There was a second of hesitation, waiting for me to tense or object.

I found no objections to give him. I wanted everything he could give me.

So his other finger slid into my ass, creating a new sensation, intensifying the pleasure as he kept working me with his tongue, as his fingers started to thrust faster, harder, driving me to that edge, then sending me ruthlessly hurtling over, making my legs shake and me need to bite hard on my lip to stifle my cries.

“I can’t,” I whined afterward, my clit too sensitive to take any more.

Dav let me scoot down, but his fingers stayed inside of me, thrusting lazily as I straddled him.

“So fucking gorgeous after you come,” he said, his free hand moving up to glide over my cheek, down my neck, then chest, teasing my breasts and nipples until my walls were tightening around his fingers again.

A devilish glint hit his eyes as one of his fingers left my pussy, making me grumble, until it was sliding back too, slipping into my ass, stretching me.

“You like that?” he asked, already having his answer as a surprised moan escaped me.

“Yes,” I whimpered, hips rocking, needing more of the sensation.

That deep rumble moved through him as I felt his cock getting harder beneath me until he was just as needy as he’d been before I’d taken him in my mouth.

“Ride me, baby,” he groaned as his final finger slid out of my pussy, his other two staying in my ass as I lifted up, desperate for the fullness of him inside of me again, then sliding down on his length, the sensation amplified my his fingers inside of me at the same time.

“Oh, fuck,” he groaned, eyes molten as he watched me starting to ride him.

His cock and fingers had me rushing toward that edge faster than seemed possible.

“That’s it,” he groaned. “Squeeze my cock,” he demanded. Then just like that, I was, crying out as I came, the pulsations slow and deep, taking me under over and over. “Fuck,” he hissed as he came with me, the heat of his release filling me, making another little pulse of pleasure course through me before I was finally spent, falling against his chest, panting for breath.

“That’s one hell of a way to wake up,” Dav said, voice calm, sated.

“Mmhmm,” was the only response I could manage, sucking in slow, deep breaths. Then, as reality slowly came back to me, “Was I loud?” I asked, wincing as I pushed back to look down at him.

“I’ve heard you louder,” he said, shooting me a lazy smile. “For example, I’m pretty sure an entire forest of owls got good and spooked when we were out there.”

“Joel,” I said, glancing over toward the door.

“He’s fifteen. Pretty sure he’s well past the birds and bees discussion,” he reminded me, shrugging off my concern.

“Knowing about it and hearing it—“

“You think he hasn’t already used that fancy new tablet to watch all sorts of porn?” he cut me off.

“Gross,” I said, climbing off of him, leaning over the side of the bed to fetch Dav’s shirt from the day before to throw on to rush to the bathroom.

“He might already be fucking,” he added as I yanked the shirt over my head.

“Were you? At fifteen?” I asked.

“Yep. You?”

“Sixteen,” I said, memories of a quick, underwhelming fuck against a brick wall in an alley. Not the most romantic cherry popping story, but then, I’d never been a romantic kind of girl. “Maybe I can sneak you out before he sees you,” I said, pressing my thighs together as I made my way to the bedroom door, peeking out.

“Ashamed of me, love?” he asked as he leaned down to fetch his pants off of the floor.

“It’s not like that,” I insisted. “I’ll be right back,” I added before rushing out into the hall.

By the time I came back out, Dav had fresh clothes waiting for me.

“Thanks,” I said, getting into them, then handing him back his shirt. “Come on. Try to be quiet,” I demanded, leading him out into the main area of the apartment.

“‘Morning, Dav,” Joel called, voice thick with sleep, but smile amused as he sat up on the couch.

“Kid,” Dav said, struggling to keep his lips in a straight line. “I was just here, ah, braiding Cinna’s hair,” he said, making Joel’s gaze slide to my wild bedhead.

“Good job,” he said, holding in a chuckle.

“Yeah, I’m not very good at it,” Dav agreed, the two of them sharing a look.

“You guys could at least pretend that we don’t all know what this is about,” I grumbled, making my way to the coffee pot. “You staying for a cup?” I asked, glancing back at Dav.

“I think I’ll save myself the instant ulcer this morning,” he said. “I’m gonna go home, shower, change, get some food. You let me know what we’re up to today.”

“Okay,” I agreed, watching him undo the locks, then make his way out.

Joel beat me to the door, sliding the locks back into place before heading to the bathroom.

“There’s toothbrushes in the drawer,” I called, wincing at how… motherly that sounded as I grabbed my phone, placing a quick order for breakfast to be delivered, and making a mental note to grab some shit to actually keep in my apartment, since Joel seemed to be permanently crashing here now.

Cereal, breakfast bars, easy shit for him to grab if he was hungry, since I wasn’t around much to order food.

What else would a teenager need?

Deodorant, I decided, thinking of the permanent stench that seemed to cling to kids that age, no matter how clean they seemed.

A pillow or two.

“You always get up this early?” Joel asked, coming out of the bathroom a few minutes later, his hair looking like he’d combed wet fingers through it to tame it down.

“No. But I usually don’t get home that early either,” I told him. “I ordered breakfast. You hanging here after school?” I asked.

He froze at that, likely feeling put on the spot.

“Maybe.”

“Okay. I just want to show you something,” I said, leading him over toward the cabinet under the TV, opening the second drawer, where I slid open the top of a box. “This is here,” I told him, gesturing down toward the gun. “I’m assuming you know enough about one to know how to aim and shoot.”

“Yeah.”

“There’s no safety. So don’t be stupid with it,” I told him. “It’s just for if you hear someone trying to come in and you don’t have a way out. There’s a fire escape out the bedroom window,” I told him. “So try for that before you go shooting people. I don’t know if I want to deal with two bodies this week.”

“Okay,” Joel said, nodding.

“But if you can’t get to the bedroom, you shoot and you don’t think twice about it. If it’s you against someone else, you always have to pick yourself.”

“Got it,” he agreed, suddenly looking a lot younger to me. I probably should have been telling him to go back to his place where he was, relatively, safe. But as a former kid who wanted an out, and hadn’t been offered one, I couldn’t rip it away from him now that he had it.

“Good. I’m gonna pick up a new door. That piece of shit could be kicked in by an eighty-year-old with a double knee replacement,” I said, shaking my head at it. “Maybe I’ll try to get that done tonight.”

“I can help,” Joel offered as he grabbed two mugs.

“Yeah?” I asked.

“My old man, he did construction. Before he jacked up his back and…” he trailed off.

I didn’t need help filling that in.

Workplace accidents to prescription pills to street drugs. It was a lot more common than people realized.

“I know some things,” he added, pouring two cups of coffee.

“Good. Because I don’t,” I admitted.

“But you know how to kick ass, which is, arguably, better,” he said, holding out a mug toward me.

“How about you teach me home maintenance shit, and I teach you to fight,” I offered.

“Deal,” he agreed, turning to put a cup of sugar in his mug before drinking.

The food showed up, and we ate over another episode of Buffy before he had to dip into his apartment to get a change of clothes. It was quiet for a change, his parents worn out from fighting finally.

I got myself together by the time he came back, and we walked out together.

“Aren’t you supposed to wait for Dav?” he asked, shooting me a knowing glance.

“I’m not supposed to wait for anyone,” I told him. “We’re both equals in the organization. I’ve been going out on my own since I was nineteen.”

“But—“ he objected.

“I’m fine,” I insisted, waving him off as he ducked down the street for the high school as I kept moving.

The thing was, I actually wanted to wait for Dav.

That was exactly why I didn’t.

I didn’t want to start getting dependent on someone else because I was doubting myself. That wasn’t how a capo acted. Sure, we had crews. We had men and women to rely on when a job was too big. But I didn’t need someone hanging over my shoulder watching me do my job.

So I began working on the mental list I’d started as I got myself ready for the day. All the names of the people who I did jobs with, who might be pissed at me.

And I… started dropping in for unexpected visits.

I figured the best way to truly gauge if someone was holding a grudge was to show up unexpectedly and see their knee-jerk reactions.

The first two people I visited had just been perplexed, not understanding why they were seeing me again when things had been squared away for so long.

The third snorted at me as I walked in, shaking his head. “Here to take the actual food out of my mouth?” he’d asked. “That’s about all I got left.”

But that was all bruised pride and the frustrations that came with life beating you down.

Not something he’d hire people to attack me about. He couldn’t even afford it if he wanted to.

“You seen this guy around?” I asked them each, holding out my phone to show the picture of Chet.

But no one had.

I mean, this was Brooklyn. It wasn’t exactly a rural area where new faces would stick out like sore thumbs. And there was no way this guy was a local criminal, because I was pretty sure either Dav’s crew, my crew, or Drake’s crew would have known about it.

He wasn’t from this area.

Which wasn’t helping.

My phone vibrated in my pocket after a few hours, and I pretended to ignore the way my heart trilled at seeing Dav’s name on the screen.

You’re a pain in my ass, Cin.

I caught myself smiling down at my phone, and forced my lips into a straight line as I shot a text back.

I’ll let you know if I need backup.

Sure you will, he shot back. Then, Don’t forget we have a meeting with Renzo tonight.

Crap.

Yeah.

That shit with the butcher shop.

Like I needed something else to worry about.

Though, Renzo wasn’t an alarmist kind of boss. So if he was calling us in, this was probably something big. Maybe even that shit going down with the Russians that he was siccing Elian on.

I scrolled through my texts, finding the one from Renzo, then making a mental note to head in that direction around that time. Which still left me the bulk of the day to keep running down leads.

“And what about your wife?” I asked yet another guy on my list, six pints deep in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday.

“What about her?” he asked.

“She pissed at me?” I asked as he reached his hand into the bowl of nuts that likely had fifty unwashed hands in there per shift.

“Why would she be? You weren’t the chick I was fucking instead of her.”

“You’re real charming, Joe,” I said, rolling my eyes at him.

“She had a good snatch too,” he said, looking down at his beer. “Even after the kids. Dunno why I did that.”

In general, I thought I liked working in a male-dominated profession. I fit in better with their detachment and coldness. But, fuck, every once in a while, one of these idiots made me wish I was a hairdresser or some girly shit like that.

I was about to walk out when Joe called back to me. “Can I see that picture again?” he asked. “Something’s bothering me,” he added as he finished off his beer.

With a small surge of hope after another long day of nothing at all, I walked back, holding out my phone.

“Think I maybe saw him with Lip once. Givin’ the poor guy a hard time.”

“Lip?” I repeated, brows scrunched.

“Guy out front of the sushi place over a block or so,” Joe said, waving in the general direction.

“Guy out front?” I repeated. “You mean homeless?” I clarified.

“Think the PC term is Person experiencing homelessness,” Joe said with an eye roll. “But yeah. Think that fucker in the picture might be the guy I chased off a while back when he’d been harassing the kid.”

“Okay,” I agreed. “Thanks. Maybe you’ll get your wife back,” I said.

“Nah. She’s fucking some stock broker now,” he told me.

She was trading up, it seemed.

Good for her.

I moved back outside, heading down the street to duck into a sub place, grabbing one for myself and this Lip guy before I went in search of him.

He was exactly where Joe had directed me, down a block, sitting in front of a sushi place that boasted a C rating from the health inspector on the window.

Lip was sitting on a piece of cardboard, his long legs pulled up to his chest to protect him from the cold whipping down the narrow street. A black hoodie was pulled up over his head under a large puffer jacket that had been ripped in several places.

“Want some lunch?” I asked, passing him the sub without waiting for an answer, then a bottle of water as well.

“Thanks,” he said, and I could feel his gaze on me as I unwrapped my sub. “You don’t have to sit with me,” he added, his words piercing me a bit. I mean, I’d lived in Brooklyn my whole life. Homelessness was a harsh reality of everyday life. I never wanted to be unaware of it, but it became just… part of life. As awful as that was. So I didn’t always feel that twinge, no matter how many times I brought someone a coat or socks or some food. “I probably don’t smell great.”

“I got a kid crashing on my couch at my apartment who smells worse than you do,” I told him. “You’re Lip?” I asked, finally looking over at him.

He couldn’t have been much older than Joel. Maybe sixteen, seventeen max.

It was another hard truth in big cities that unhoused kids weren’t exactly a rarity. Of all ages. But especially teens. Runaways. Foster kids who opted for the streets instead of going to another home or group facility.

That fact didn’t make it any easier.

Lip was a lot like Joel in that long, gangly way many teen boys were. Like their arms and legs grew faster than the rest of them. Though Lip’s living situation was likely more to blame for his thinness than just a killer metabolism.

He had skin stretched gaunt over what would likely become strong, masculine features if he got some weight on him. A square jaw, stern brow, low cheekbones. His nose had the slightest bend from being broken at some point. And his dark brown eyes looked sunken.

I couldn’t see what color his hair was under his hood, but I imagined dark.

“Yeah.”

“I gotta ask. What the fuck kind of name is Lip?”

“My name is Philip. It’s my old man’s name, though. Didn’t want to use it.”

“Solid reason. I like the sound of Lip better anyway,” I decided, taking a bite out of my sub.

“You’re not sitting here just to be nice,” he accused as he took a much bigger bite of his food, making me wish I’d picked up some chips or desserts too.

“No one who’s met me has accused me of being nice,” I agreed. “I actually just have a question about someone who was harassing you.”

To that, Lip let out a humorless laugh. “Which one? Which one on which day?” he asked.

“People are assholes,” I agreed, reaching for my phone to show him the picture.

“Oh, that guy,” he said, plowing through the second half of his sub.

“Was he just being a dick, or did he say anything specific?”

“He was rambling about how his boss was going to get bums like me off of the street.”

“This street?” I asked, looking up and down it.

If you were being technical, all of Brooklyn was Renzo’s turf. But a lot of the neighborhoods were broken up by other, smaller crews who kicked up money to our family that allowed them to continue to operate in the area without interference.

I was blanking on who this crew was here. Or how I might be connected to them.

“Did he say anything else?” I asked, watching as he balled up his wrapper, sucking in a deep, satisfied breath, his stomach likely fuller than it had been in weeks. “What is it?” I asked.

“Something I probably shouldn’t repeat,” he said.

“I’m a big girl,” I told him, wrapping up the other half of my sub and leaving it on the sidewalk as I moved to stand. “I can take it.”

“He said they just have to ‘take care of some cunt’ around here first.”

“Huh,” I said, racking my brain for why I would have anything to do with this area, but at this point, my mind was spinning with all the different names and jobs I’d been mulling over for the past few weeks.

“Do you know who that is?” he asked.

“I think I’m the cunt,” I admitted, watching his eyes widen as I reached in my pocket for my phone, ready to reach out to the other capos and ask for clarification on who ran this area.

I didn’t even get my finger on the unlock button.

“No!” Lip yelled, trying to fly up off the ground, his panicked eyes behind me.

But it was too late.

I was too slow.

A van door flew open, hands reached out, and I was pulled inside.

Even as the door slid closed, I felt the prick of something in my neck, and the dizziness swirled within seconds.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Dav

Where the fuck was Cinna?

I flipped my wrist to check my watch for the fifth time in the past ten minutes, then glanced around the room again. It wasn’t like she’d get swallowed up in the crowd. She always stood out. Which meant I was likely not the only one who noticed she was missing.

As if sensing the train of my thoughts, Elian moved in at my side, glancing around. “Cinna’s not here yet?” he asked, sounding confused.

Because, yeah, Cinna was fine being late for a hangout, but she was always on time when she needed to be. Especially if it was Renzo calling a meeting.

“I know she was working today, but it’s not like her to be late,” I said, hoping some of the panic I was feeling didn’t bleed into my words. If anything, I was normally the person saying something meant to wave off everyone else’s concerns. But I was too debilitated with my own worries to really care about what others were thinking.

I’d texted her twice already, and I was in that place where I wasn’t sure if I did it again, she would freak out about me being needy and push me away. We’d taken steps forward finally. I didn’t want to fuck shit up.

“How are things with the Russians?” I asked Elian as I told myself that, if she didn’t show up by the time Renzo started the meeting, I would text her one more time.

“That’s kind of part of all of this,” he said, waving toward the meeting.

“Renzo taking the job from you?” I asked.

“No. But I’m working close with him on this one.”

“Alright,” Renzo called a few minutes later. “We all have places we’d probably rather be right now, so let’s get this shit over with,” he said, getting a murmur of agreement from everyone.

“The Bratva is moving into our territory,” he said, cutting right to the chase. “I’m not worried, but we all need to be more aware. The butcher shop, for example, had almost been taken right out from under us.”

“Almost?” one of the other capos called out.

“Well, congratulate Rico on his new legit business,” Renzo said, clamping his old friend on the shoulder. “We managed to… persuade the current owners into selling it and skipping out of town. But we are keeping eyes out in case they get other ideas. Especially the older son. He’s my only real concern. Cocky fuck.”

“What about the guy who was strung up?” Saff asked, shoving two capos out of the way, so Renzo could see her in the crowd as he spoke to her.

“That is the current leader of one of the local H dealers in the area. They were attempting to get him to agree to changing his alliance to the Russians.”

“Why are they doing the dirty work for the Bratva?” Saff asked.

“Seems to be a loyalty thing. Or a mutual dirt thing. These fucks can’t try to back out when they got blood on their hands too.

“So, now, it’s important for you to tighten your hold on all your local crews and businesses. Check in. Make sure shit is how it should be. This will not be the only business and crew that the Bratva will try to take.

“If you notice that someone who used to always pay on time is suddenly full of excuses, it’s time to bring some of your crew, and pay them a visit. If you can’t find a legit reason for the lack of cash flow, you’re going to need to bring them in for questioning.”

There were nods and grunts of approval coming from around the room, everyone ready to knock some heads together if they had to.

“The other concern about the Russians right now is that they are making friends.”

“What kind of friends?” someone in the crowd asked.

“Ones in high places. Suddenly, a few beat cops that have been loyal to us don’t want to talk to us anymore. It wouldn’t be paranoid to assume it goes to detectives, judges, and maybe even higher.”

“Great,” someone grumbled from the crowd.

You had to understand that sentiment. After years of a rivalry with the other four New York Families, it was nice to be experiencing a little peace.

It was naïve to think it would last, though.

“Elian is taking the lead on this case. So unless shit is going down in an emergent kind of way, I want you deferring to him. He will keep me updated on shit, and we will both figure out the next best move. Anyone got any questions?”

“I got one,” one of the men asked, raising a hand a bit, “We getting a break on meat at Rico’s new place?” he asked, making a chuckle move through the crowd, cutting the tense mood.

Renzo and Elian went through a few more minor details before Renzo said the meeting was over, but anyone was willing to hang for a bit. Though I suspected the only reason he offered was because his wife’s brother had swung by to take her out to dinner right before the meeting started. He would always rather be with his wife these days than hanging with us.

I waited until everyone seemed to get involved in conversation before I made my way out of the apartment door, heading to the elevator, then out of the building. After scanning the street, and not seeing Cinna anywhere, I stopped and reached for my phone.

This time, though, I wasn’t texting.

I was calling.

And calling.

And calling.

My stomach churned into knots when it kept going to the machine, thinking of her on my doorstep, beaten, sobbing, broken. Of her in her apartment, having a panic attack after fending off another attacker.

It had been almost a full day since she’d checked in. And while it wouldn’t be something she would normally do, I figured that since we were working this together, and because we’d… gotten closer, that she would at least shoot me an update.

“Come on, pick up,” I grumbled, walking further down the street, not wanting anyone to talk to me if they exited Renzo’s building.

“Hello?” a voice picked up, small, unsure, young. And… male.

“Who is this?” I asked. “Joel?”

“No…, ah, no. This is Lip.”

Lip?

Who the fuck was Lip?

I mean I knew Cinna’s soldiers by name, but not all of her associates. Could this be one of them?

“Who are you? Where is Cinna?” I asked, something about the way my stomach was clenching telling me that shit had just gotten bad.

“She… someone took her. She dropped her phone. I—“

“Where?” I barked, flagging down a cab, and jumping inside, shooting off the address as the kid gave it to me. “Give me more details,” I demanded, feeling dread spread through my veins.

“She got me a sub. And we were talking about some guy who had been hassling me.”

“Did she show you a picture on her phone?” I asked, cursing the red light the cab pulled up to.

“Yeah.”

Chet.

This was about Chet.

It was one more turn before I was hopping out of the cab, running toward the only person standing on the street, looking panicked and lost, a phone pressed to his ear.

“Lip?” I asked, tucking mine away.

“She was taken from right there,” he said, pointing toward the curb I was standing near. “She was just talking to me, and then a van pulled up. I tried to warn her, but it was all too fast. The door flew open, they grabbed her, and she was gone.”

“Did they hurt her?” I asked, adrenaline surging through my system, making me jittery.

“I think they drugged her,” he said. “Someone was doing something to her neck.”

“Fuck,” I growled. “The van. Tell me about the van.”

“It was just black. A black van. Nothing on it. With the sliding door. Like a work truck. No windows. I told the cops all of this,” he said.

“The cops? Are they looking for her?”

I’d never been happy for the cops to be involved in family business. Except for now. With Cinna’s life on the line.

“They thought I was fucking crazy,” Lip said, jaw going tight, eyes looking a little watery with frustration.

It struck me then how young he was. Just a kid, really. Probably not much older than Joel. And living on the street. Then being a witness to a crime and having no one believe him because he was a street kid.

“I know you’re not crazy. Tell me more. What did they look like?”

“I don’t… it was too fast. I saw two men in the back. Maybe three men total?” he said, squinting as he tried to bring the memory back into focus.

Three.

That was how many had attacked her last time.

Who’d done such savage damage to her.

Who now had even more motivation to hurt her since she’d hurt them, fucked with their pride, and likely brought the wrath of their boss onto them.

“Okay. It’s alright,” I said, feigning calm I definitely didn’t fucking feel right then. “What were you talking about before they showed up?”

“She was asking me about the guy on her phone. She heard he’d been harassing me. I told her that he was telling me that his new boss was gonna get rid of the likes of me when they took over. But they wanted to take care of some… cunt,” he said, whispering the word, “around here first. That was it. That was when they pulled up and grabbed her.”

“How long ago?” I asked.

“Hours. This afternoon.”

Fuck.

“Okay. Alright,” I said, reaching for my phone, and doing something Cinna was going to hate me for. But she could only hate me if she was alive to do so. And this was the only way I could think of to make sure she stayed that way.

I had to break my promise.

I had to share her secret.

I had to tell the boss.

“Miss me already?” Renzo answered, the sounds of the party in full swing behind him.

“Listen to me,” I said, voice tight enough to vibrate.

“Cut that shit off!” he barked at the party, making everything go silent in a beat. “What is it?”

“Someone has Cinna,” I told him.

“The fuck you mean someone has Cinna?”

“She’s been on the trail of someone who is fucking with her. Something felt off about her not being at the meeting, so I called her phone. Some street kid had it, told me the whole thing. Pulled her into a van, drugged her, and drove off.”

“Mother fuckers,” he snarled, snapping at those gathered around him, and I could practically see them all moving out of the apartment in unison.

“Who runs the area around Amboy?” I asked. “That’s where she was taken from while asking the kid about some guy who said his boss was taking over this area.”

“Amboy? Fuck, Rico, who runs Amboy?” he asked, sticking me on speaker.

“Amboy is those Strand brothers. But the older one was pulled in a few months back. Younger seems to be losing grip on the area.”

“Who would take it over? That’s who has Cinna. Maybe a woman,” I added.

“A woman?” Rico repeated as I heard them all moving out onto the street.

“Just… think. She had reason to believe a woman was running things.”

“Fuck, um…”

“What about that Miller bastard’s widow?” Saff asked. “Around that area. Cinna was the one who had him offed.”

“I can’t think of anyone else,” Rico admitted.

“You got a location for her?” Renzo asked Saff.

“No, but it’s gotta be around there somewhere, right?” she asked.

“We’re five minutes away,” Renzo said, and I heard the warning in his voice.

A warning I had no intentions of listening to.

“I’m not waiting,” I said, cutting off my phone.

With that, I scanned the street.

“What way did it go?” I asked the kid.

“That way,” he pointed, and I took off at a dead run, wishing I had more weapons on me. I had a gun. Some extra ammo. And a knife in my pocket.

It would have to do until backup arrived.

The area around Amboy had a lot of house complexes and none of them felt conducive to kidnapping, torture, and murder.

So I kept running, my gaze frantically searching the surroundings, trying to locate the van, or any building that seemed like it could be used to hide someone.

It had been hours since they took her.

How much had she endured since then? Was she still alive? Did she wish she wasn’t?

A growl escaped me, my vision going red around the edges.

So much so that I almost missed it.

A black fucking work van with a the goddamn sliding door still thrown open, parked in a way that it was half-hidden by a dumpster.

Of an apartment building.

An apartment building?

I didn’t really stop to rationalize that.

I just ran up the block, then across the street, trying to slow my breathing, so they didn’t hear me coming with all the heaving breaths as I stared at the building.

It had to be the basement.

Nothing else made sense.

Even if this crew was running the area now, what were the chances that every person in the building would stick their heads in the sand and act like they didn’t hear a woman screaming and being tortured?

True, I didn’t have a lot of faith in human beings, but someone would have been upset enough about that to call the cops.

Basements, while not exactly soundproof, provided some sound protection. And there was a whole floor above without apartments as well.

“Open the door for me,” I demanded to one of the teens hanging about, not looking like they were working, just slacking.

“The fuck are you? No,” he said, making a face toward his friends about me.

“Open the fucking door,” I snapped, feeling the darkness seep in, start to take over, as I did something the normal, sane side of me would never do. Raise a gun to a kid’s head.

“Whoa whoa,” he said, hands up, body tense, but his words were casual. “No need to go all fucking psycho, man,” he said, going to the door, and slipping in his key.

“You see a group of men coming down this street, you tell ‘em that Dav is in here,” I demanded.

“Yeah, whatever,” the kid said, trying to be cool for his friends, but his hands were shaking.

I could feel like shit about that later.

Not now.

When fuck-knew what was happening to Cinna right below my fucking feet.

I moved away from the elevator, not wanting anyone to be alerted to my presence until it was too late for them to do anything about it.

I made my way to the stairs, cringing as I carefully closed the door, then paused for only long enough to slip out of my shoes before continuing down.

A cold sweat had broken across my skin as my stomach felt like a fucking washing machine, spinning and sloshing with each step downward.

I didn’t remember the last time I stopped to give God a passing glance, but I found myself praying like I never had before as I kept descending.

For Cinna’s safety.

That she walked away from this, even if I didn’t.

I came to the lower door, ducking low to not be seen through the small glass cutouts, but trying to lean against it, to listen.

I wanted to charge in.

Gun going off.

But Cinna’s chances for survival were better if I reined it in, if I forced myself to be smart.

All that flew out of the window, though, when I heard a long, high, cry reach to me from far away.

Fuck calm and collected.

Fuck every rational part of me.

That was my girl in there.

Being hurt.

If ever there was a time when I could let go, could let the dark side of me take me over completely, this was it.

I tossed my jacket onto the floor, not wanting it to get in my way, then slammed my hand into the door release bar, hearing the click like gunfire in my head.

“What was that?” I heard someone ask from a distance, even as the door slammed closed behind me. “Go, idiot,” the voice demanded again.

Not five seconds later, footsteps were rushing toward me, guns in their hands. But down by their waists.

By the time they could even raise them, mine was aiming and shooting.

Once, twice, on the first guy, then a clean headshot to the second.

Lackeys, I decided, because I could hear men’s raised voices from somewhere in the back corner of the basement.

The real bad guys.

The ones hurting my girl.

My teeth ached from my jaw clenching as I rushed across the space.

The basement was a maze of stacked boxes, creating hidden spaces. For men to hide and jump out at me. For them to hide Cinna from me.

An arm appeared in front of me, outstretched ahead of someone’s body.

I aimed lower and shot, hearing a howl of pain as the bullet sliced into somewhere in the fucker’s stomach, his gun falling in shock as he tried to press his hands against his wound.

His distraction was his downfall, allowing me to place my gun close to his face, squeeze the trigger, and watch half of his sorry fucking face get blown off, his body wobbling on his feet for a second before he crumbled to the ground.

“The fuck is going on?” another voice snarled.

“Over here!” Cinna’s voice, small, breathless, called out to me, making me change directions and make my way toward her even as she let out a grunt as someone struck her again.

“Shut the fuck up,” a woman’s voice snarled at her.

“You come over here, and she will take a bullet to her head,” the woman called, voice calm and collected, despite already losing three of her men.

But she’d just been distracting me, dulling my senses by tugging at my heartstrings like that.

Because I felt the muzzle of a gun press into my temple.

“Put it down,” a cold voice demanded.

I did, even kicking it away from myself.

He made a fatal calculation thinking I needed a gun for this, though. By not realizing that the animal side inside of me preferred to fight without one. Liked the feel of hot, sticky blood covering my hands, enjoyed the pain of beating someone’s face in.

It had been a long time since I let more than a small sliver of my dark side creep out.

I was going to enjoy the fuck out of this.

I played along for a moment, wanting him to take me to Cinna, wanting a moment to assess the situation, see how I could get her free and safe while also getting revenge for her.

“This motherfucker killed Nick, Roy, and Eddie,” the guy behind me said, landing a kick to the back of my knee as the rest of the people came into view.

Including Cinna, zip tied to a chair.

Bloody.

Sweating.

Eyes wild.

My gaze took it all in, memorized it, because I wanted them to pay for every punch, smack, cut, and whatever else the fuck she’d endured.

Standing to her side was a man with a pleased smirk, his fingers still inside a set of brass knuckles.

Behind her chair was the other woman I’d heard before.

She was older than I’d anticipated. Maybe in her forties with a short crop of blonde hair, icy blue eyes, and a svelte frame in a hideously ill-fitting navy blue pant suit.

And that dark patch by her sleeve?

I suspected that was Cinna’s blood.

My gaze slid back to Cinna, watching as her gaze slipped down twice quickly, begging me to follow.

When I did, I saw that my girl hadn’t been idle.

Her wrists were bound back behind the chair, widening her chest, making her arch back painfully.

But something wasn’t quite right.

Because the hand I could see was holding onto the chair rung, blood slipping down her hands and fingers.

Her sleeve was down, but I was almost sure she had that wrist free, but knew she couldn’t move because her other wrist and her ankles were still bound. Someone would be able to overpower her before she could get herself fully free.

But I did have my knife on me.

I just had to get it to her.

“So,” I said, tone lighter than my mood was feeling. “You’re the bitch who made me drive all the way out to Bumfuck, Nowhere Jersey to get rid of a body.”

I didn’t know who this Chet guy was, but clearly, he meant something to this woman, judging by how her focus fully went to me instead of Cinna.

“And you’re the one who’s been hiding her from me,” the Miller widow said, pinning me with those shark eyes.

“I gotta say, it’s a specific kind of evil for a woman to order men to try to rape another woman,” I said, getting myself a hard kick from the man behind me.

I let it make me fly forward onto all fours, getting me close enough to Cinna to pretend to use her chair to pull myself up while I carefully slipped the knife under her thigh closest to her free hand.

“Get up,” the Miller woman snapped, making the man grab me by the back of my shirt, hauling me back.

I made eye contact with Cinna then, letting her see all the rage, all the bottomless darkness I usually kept so carefully contained.

I saw the appreciation on her battered face as the devilish smile tugged at my lips.

And then I was swinging back and under, grasping the hand with the gun with both of mine, yanking until I heard a crack and a howl of pain, then taking the gun for myself, cocking, and sending a bullet flying through the fucker’s chest.

Turning back, I shot out the knee of the bastard who’d been putting his hands on Cinna, watching the blood spurt, seeing his leg give out as he cried.

“I don’t kill women,” I said, turning on the widow.

“But I do,” Cinna said, popping up out of her chair, catching the gun I threw out at her, and turning on her captor.

Cinna was okay.

She could handle the woman.

Now?

Now it was time for me to have some fun.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Cinna

I didn’t know what was in the needle, or how they were so accurate with their administration of it, but the shit was heavy, making it nearly impossible to keep my eyes open in under a moment.

Then, well, then it was all inky blackness.

Consciousness came back to me in bits and pieces. Snatches of garbled conversation. The feeling of something cold and hard against my face and side. My own erratic heartbeat, speeding up and slowing down, then speeding up again.

My eyes felt too heavy to lift my lids, and I didn’t fight it for a long time, some part of me pulled to the darkness, to the peace in the unconsciousness.

It wasn’t until someone kicked at my foot hard, sending a jolt of shock, but no pain, through my system, that I seemed to start to clear the haze of that abyss.

“It’s no fun to play with her when she’s unconscious,” I heard a voice say. “How much of that shit did you shoot her with?” he grumbled, giving my foot another kick.

“You didn’t see her in that warehouse,” the other voice said, familiar, but my brain was too soupy to place it. “She took down all three of us. Believe me, you want her ass drugged.”

“Not this much,” the other guy grumbled, and I was aware of him moving around me, then bending down to slap my cheeks.

I couldn’t say if it was the lingering effects of the drugs, or my own grim determination that kept me from flinching, but he got no reaction, then moved away from me, bored.

Left alone, my face pressed against something cold and gritty that I decided must be a warehouse or basement floor, I forced my breathing to stay slow and deep even as panic—new, but getting alarmingly familiar—started to build.

But as long as they thought I was unconscious, I wasn’t being beaten or assaulted. So I needed to milk this as long as I could.

I had no idea how much time I’d lost already, but I kind of hoped it was an hour or so. Long enough for that Lip kid to maybe call the cops. Or for someone to miss me.

We did have that important meeting at Renzo’s today at some point, and my absence would be noticed. If by no one else, then by Dav.

Good, caring Dav who wanted nothing but to help me, and I kept fucking pushing him away at every turn. If I had waited for him to hit the streets today, maybe none of this would have happened.

That mindset wasn’t going to help anything right now, though.

I just had to hope he would think it was weird when I didn’t show at the meeting, and would start looking around for me.

Though, what were the chances he would get to me before the bad shit started happening?

I couldn’t rely on him.

I had to focus.

Stay calm.

And try to get myself out of this.

I’d done it once before.

The difference now was I had some time to think, to plot, to listen to my attackers and learn from them.

There was constant chattering from what seemed like far away, muffled voices of two or maybe three men. Men I had to assume were armed.

Then were the two closer voices I heard.

At least one of them rang familiar. The ringleader from the warehouse attack. The one whose words dripped with malice.

Look at the mighty Cinna now.

I had to imagine the other two were present as well, ready to enact revenge for the throat punch and ball kicking.

Given the brutality they’d forced on me before with no provocation, aside from being a woman and existing, then I knew it was going to be bad the moment they knew they could get a reaction out of me.

Pretending to be unconscious would only last so long. Even the best drugs only stayed in your system for a while, and slowly lost effectiveness before they were gone.

I wondered if groggy would be enough reason to leave me alone for a while.

“She’s still unconscious?” a woman’s voice called, mingling with the click of chunky heels on the floor, stopping right in front of me.

If I wasn’t so outnumbered and out-weaponed, I could reach out, grab her ankles, and yank her onto the ground. With luck, her head would whack off the floor, and she would be one less person I had to worry about.

But I would have men on me in seconds if I tried. And as confident as I was about my abilities, I knew there was no way I was staving off that many men. Especially if they were armed.

So I kept playing asleep.

“How much did you give her, Brett?” the woman asked.

This had to be the Miller widow.

I had a vague memory of her. Short blonde hair, light eyes, a permanently pinched, unhappy expression, and a skinny frame.

Funnily enough, her husband John, was similarly tall, skinny, and always kind of looked like he’d smelled something bad.

It was like when people started to resemble their dogs. Except with spouses.

If we were being technical, I hadn’t been the one who’d wanted him dead in the first place. There’d been a turf war between the Millers and the Strand brothers. The Strands, being loyal to me, and offering the better kick-up, had been granted the offer to handle their turf war by any means necessary. Which meant the death of John Miller.

It wasn’t personal.

It was the life.

Something John, and his wife, knew when they’d decided to try to push the brothers out. But, clearly, the widow was now taking it personally.

If there was one thing I’d learned working in this world, it was that when women let power go to their heads, when they let it chisel out any goodness in their hearts, they were ten times as cruel as any man could be.

I mean you were a whole new kind of evil to be a woman and order men to not only beat—which I could overlook because, hey, I knew the risks I was taking in this life too—but also rape another woman.

Would she stand by and watch as her men tried to do that to me now? That thought made me want to say ‘fuck the consequences’ and take her out now.

“It was a lot,” Brett admitted. “But I didn’t want her waking up in the van or on the way down here. She’s stronger than she looks.”

Down here.

So it was a basement.

Which was the worst of the two. A warehouse meant many exits. Doors and windows. Ways to get away even if you got hurt in the process.

But a basement likely meant no windows, or ones too high to get to, and too small to crawl out of.

That meant there was exactly one exit.

A staircase.

That was likely heavily guarded.

Great.

So the best bet was to take one guy down, get his weapon, and shoot my way out.

Not ideal.

But I would do whatever it took.

“Fuck it, help me drag her to the chair,” Brett demanded, likely facing down the disapproval of his boss, and wanting to get the show on the road.

I forced my body not to cooperate. Dead weight was hard to move, let alone lift, even for two men.

I waited until they had me upright, my head deceptively lolling to the side, before I made my move.

I knew the second my eyes opened, though, that I likely wasn’t going to get away, no matter how hard I punched, or how quickly I moved.

There were too many of them.

By the time Brett wiped the blood off of his lip, the chattering guys from further away rushed over, four men wrestling me onto, then holding me against, a chair as Brett slipped zip ties around my wrists.

At the last possible second, I arched my wrist outward, creating just the smallest bit of space between it and the zip tie, knowing that I could work it looser. It would hurt and get bloody, but I could do it.

My shoulders screamed at the awkward position, but that was the least of my concerns as Brett moved in front of me, a wicked sneer on his lips, and a dark anticipation in his eyes.

“You’ve been difficult to find lately,” he said.

“Then you haven’t been looking very hard,” I shot back. “I mean, that Chet guy found me, of course,” I said, nodding. “But he never made it back to you, did he?”

“Enough,” the Miller widow snapped, walking forward to backhand me across the face, her face all splotchy with her anger.

“Pegged you for a woman who let the men do all their dirty work for them,” I said, staring her down.

“I can handle myself when the situation arises,” she said, voice as tight as her expression. “But the point of leadership is I don’t have to. Something you wouldn’t know anything about. Why don’t you have some fun?” she asked, looking at Brett. “I’ll be over there,” she said, waving toward the other end of the basement.

With that, we all waited for the sounds of her heels to retreat before Brett turned back to me, wicked delight clear in his face.

“While it’s not as fun when you aren’t writhing around underneath me,” Brett started, “I think I can still find a way to enjoy myself for a while.”

I slowly pulled in a breath, telling myself I would do everything in my power not to scream. No matter what he did to me.

At least he wouldn’t be raping me while tied to a chair. And if he valued parts of his anatomy not being bitten off, he’d be smart to keep them away from my mouth.

The first strike came quickly, harder by far than the widow’s, making my lip split, and the taste of blood trickle into my mouth.

“Get her good,” the other idiot cheered as Brett cocked back and swung again.

I focused on my breathing as the hits kept coming, on covering up the way I was working one wrist free by pretending to fight against all of my binds, feeling the plastic strips cut into my wrists and ankles, but none worse than the one I was working on as the skin burned and broke, then bled.

My face felt like a big bruise, and I was worried about the integrity of one of my back teeth, seeing a trip to the dentist in my near future, getting another implant drilled into my jaw.

Problems for another day, though.

“Why don’t you have some fun?” Brett asked the other guy who’d been standing around watching. “Maybe her ribs could use a little attention,” he suggested, moving away to flex his sore knuckles.

I hinged as much to my side as possible, ignoring the objection in my opposite shoulder, trying to protect my ribs, and force him to hit my stomach instead.

I was just about to yank my hand fully free and just… try to grab a weapon to use in a seated position until I could try to break the chair, and free my ankles.

When there was a click.

Then a slam.

Making the men pause as they ordered others to investigate.

Was it just the super?

Or anyone who would care and help?

Not that a normal person stood a chance against these fucks. Especially as they produced guns.

The widow came running back, voice higher, more frantic. As much as she liked to boast about her leadership, she clearly didn’t have the temperament for it.

She moved behind me, pulling out a gun.

The shots rang out, making my breath catch, sure that whatever help might have come was gone.

But there was more cursing from the men, giving me hope.

“Over here!” I called.

“Shut the fuck up,” the widow snarled. “You come over here, and she will take a bullet to her head,” she warned.

There was a moment of eerie silence, making my stomach curl and slosh around ominously.

But then, figures were moving forward.

And there was Dav.

With a gun pressed to his head.

Calm and collected.

But with that blackness in his eyes.

I’d seen glimpses of it before. Many of us who fought side-by-side with him had.

This was different, though. This blanked out everything else, leaving none of that usual lightness on his handsome face that I was used to.

Just the rage.

“This motherfucker killed Nick, Roy, and Eddie,” the man with the gun declared.

“So,” Dav said, voice deceptively light, given the look on his face. “You’re the bitch who made me drive all the way out to Bumfuck, Nowhere Jersey to get rid of a body.”

I tried to get his attention, to show him that I was only partially bound, that if he had a knife, I could get myself free while he distracted everyone for a minute.

“And you’re the one who’s been hiding her from me,” the Miller widow said from behind me.

“I gotta say, it’s a specific kind of evil for a woman to order men to try to rape another woman,” Dav said, repeating my thoughts from before.

He’d been trying to piss them off, I learned, when a second later, the man kicked his knee, and he dramatically fell forward toward me, then pretended he needed to use my chair to get up. When what he actually was doing was sliding his knife under my thigh.

We shared a look for a split second, both silently agreeing that this was it, then he was swinging around toward the man behind him while I yanked my hand free, grabbed the knife, and got to work when the widow was distracted by the chaos Dav was creating.

“I don’t kill women,” Dav said, turning back after shooting out Brett’s knee, something that brought me more pleasure than was probably called for, despite what he’d done to me, and what he’d planned to do to me, if given more time.

I saw Dav start to lift the gun as I shot up off of the chair.

“But I do,” I said, watching the gun sail to me, grabbing it by the muzzle, then sliding my hand to the handle as I turned on the Miller woman whose hand was shaking too hard to get her safety off.

“Must suck to have your reign cut so short, you evil fucking bitch,” I snapped, emptying the rest of the gun into her body, watching as she jolted with each bullet before falling to the ground, blood blooming across her ugly suit.

There was the sound of feet rushing down the stairs then, making me scramble toward the widow’s gun, grabbing it, sliding off the safety, and rushing behind a row of boxes to half hide from their reinforcements.

Until my gaze caught sight of a flash of blue hair.

Blue hair?

Saff?

Even as I thought it, I saw her profile, then her face as she whipped toward me, sensing my presence.

“Thank God,” she said, rushing toward me, making the others turn as well. “Dav?” she asked.

“I… he…” I said, but then we all heard it.

A deep, animalistic cry of pain.

“Uh oh,” Saff said, wincing.

I fell in at Saff’s side as she followed the others through the maze of crap gathered in the basement. Until we passed by the widow’s body, then the chair where I’d been captive and tortured for what felt like forever.

And there, just a few feet away, Dav was straddling Brett’s body.

No more than two feet away was the other one who’d been hitting me, the one from the night when I’d kicked him in the balls.

His head was cracked open like a watermelon, blood, skull, and brain matter scattered like a halo all around him.

My stomach rolled as I glanced away, but I found my gaze landing on an equally horrific sight.

Dav driving his thumbs into Brett’s eye sockets, making his wails fill the whole room as his body jolted like it was being electrocuted.

We all knew Dav had darkness in him, had a side that craved violence, but I’d never seen that side of him so fully unleashed before.

“No! Please!” Brett begged as Dav grabbed both sides of his head, lifting him off of the floor.

“Would you have stopped if she said no?” he asked, then slammed Brett’s head to the ground.

“Christ,” Elian said, gaze sliding away at the sound of another crack. Then another, this one wetter as his skull broke open, as the insides spilled out.

“He’s dead,” Renzo called, starting to move forward, but the second his hand touched Dav’s shoulder, trying to stop him from slamming the head more, a deep, guttural growl escaped Dav.

I’m not exactly proud of this part, but the sound of that sent a jolt of desire through my system.

“Cinna, no,” Renzo said, trying to stop me as I moved forward. “You don’t want to see—“ he started.

“He’s not going to stop if someone doesn’t stop him,” I told Renzo, yanking out of his hold, then moving forward, resting both of my hands on Dav’s shoulders.

“That’s enough,” I said, voice small, hoping something softer and sweeter might be what broke through all that rage. “He’s gone. He can’t hurt anyone again.”

Dav’s hands froze, holding what was left of the head off the ground.

“Cin?” he called.

“Yeah,” I said, fingers sliding up his neck, teasing over his sweaty skin.

The head fell from his hands, landing to the ground with a sick wet thunk.

Then, just like that, all the tension left Dav’s body as he whipped around, grabbing me, pulling me down onto my knees, and wrapping his bloody arms around me.

“I thought I fucking lost you,” he said, low enough for only my ears.

“Nope. Still here,” I said, feeling a wave of unexpected emotion rise up through me, making me squeeze my eyes shut.

“Huh,” I heard Renzo say from a few feet off, likely watching us, reading into it.

This was exactly what I had been dreading since things got physical with Dav. Everyone finding out.

Somehow, though, in this moment, I couldn’t care less. All that mattered was we were alright. That we were together.

“This is one of those ‘told you so’ moments,” Saff said, coming closer. “And as sweet as it is and shit, I think we might want you guys to stop kneeling in the blood and brain matter of the bad guys.”

Her words made Dav’s body tense as he pulled back, horror playing across his features, watching me like he expected to see that mirrored back at him.

I mean, no, I wasn’t exactly keen on seeing him ever sink his fingers into someone’s eyes or bash their heads into the ground until they were unrecognizable again, but I understood the only reason the darkness won out in him this time was because of me. Because of how he felt for me.

I couldn’t exactly be horrified by that, now, could I?

“What do you want from us?” I asked, careful not to move, to spread any evidence around.

“Who touched you?” Renzo asked, eyeing my face.

“The three right here,” I said, gesturing around us. “The ones over by the doors did put me on the chair, but there shouldn’t be any more of my DNA on them.”

“Okay. So those are the bodies we’ll leave. No one touch them. Or be stupid enough to step in their blood,” he added. “The others, we have to get out of here. And get rid of the chair, the zip ties, the blood on the floor.”

“There’s totes over in the back,” I offered, having seen them when I’d hidden from their approaching footsteps.

“Totes?” Renzo asked, brows raised.

“Trust me,” I said. “They’ll work.”

Renzo watched me for a long moment.

“I think we need to have a long fucking talk when we’re done here,” he said.

“Yeah,” I agreed. There was no use lying to him. Not now. He was involved. They all were. We had to let them in finally.

“We’ll take the black van,” Rico said. “Easy transport. Saff, Elian, go get some supplies,” he said, already slipping into work-mode. “And some extra clothes,” he added, looking at the two of us kneeling in blood.

We stayed put, waiting for Saff and Elian to return as the others started to gather the bodies, slipping them into totes, literally scooping up brain matter with bits of cardboard boxes, and dropping it into the plastic containers before moving them out of the way.

“Alright,” Rico said, taking the bag from Elian. “Stand up and strip,” he demanded, all business.

“Here,” Dav said, grabbing me around the forearms as I winced when I moved to stand. “Your ribs?”

“They’re okay. It’s more my stomach,” I admitted.

Then we stood there in the basement surrounded by our colleagues and friends and stripped down to our underwear.

“Damn,” Saff said, coming over to me to scrub at me with baby wipes. “I always knew you had great tits,” she said, shooting me a smirk. “But, damn. Congrats,” she added with a smile over her shoulder at Dav whose face was being wiped down by Elian.

Once we were reasonably clean, we slipped on simple black sleep pants.

Saff’s lips were twitching as Dav pulled his shirt down.

Please remember to spay and neuter me it said below an image of assorted dogs.

“Really, Saff?” he asked, shaking his head at her.

“It seemed appropriate, you hound,” she said with a smile as I pulled on my plain white tee.

“Alright,” Rico said, gathering our clothes and baby wipes, and shoving them into a black bag. “I need you two to go home and scrub. You know the deal,” he said.

“We can help,” I insisted.

“I can help,” Dav corrected.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re beaten to shit again.”

“Again?” Renzo growled, shooting a dark look at both of us.

“It’s not that bad,” I told Dav. I could deal with Renzo’s anger later.

“Both of you,” Renzo snapped. “I want you out of here. I’ll deal with you later. Do what you’re fucking told for once.”

Not wanting to make shit worse, we both silently moved out of the basement, carefully sidestepping the bodies and blood, trying not to touch anything on our way out.

If anyone heard the shooting or saw the comings and goings of strangers, they showed no signs as we walked down a few blocks before hailing a cab.

We sat silently in the back, each lost in our own thoughts as we made our way back to my apartment.

“Wait,” I said as we got onto the street, watching the cab pull away.

“What?”

“Lip.”

“He’s fine. Tried to call the cops for you, but they thought he was nuts.”

“I need to—“

“We can talk to Lip later,” Dav said, turning me, and leading me into my building. “I think we need to do what Renzo wants from us right now,” he said.

“We’re in a world of shit, aren’t we?” I asked as we slipped into the elevator.

“Probably. But there’s nothing we can do about that,” he said, wrapping an arm around my waist, and pulling me against his chest, his lips pressing into my hair. “I’m fucking sorry, Cin.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I said. “I was the one to go off on my own.”

“No, I’m sorry you had to see that,” he said, squeezing me a little tighter.

“I’m not,” I told him. “I’m not saying I want to see those particular things again,” I admitted. “But I understand why you did it. I probably would have been just as unhinged.”

“Yeah?” he asked, hands sliding up and down my spine.

“Yes.”

“Woulda tore through a fucking army with my bare hands to get you back, Cin.” His lips pressed into my hair again. “Don’t ever do that to me again.”

“I’m going to be in dicey situations again,” I reminded him.

“Yeah, but you have to let me be there with you.”

This was everything I told myself I could never promise him.

But the reason had always been because I didn’t want the family to find out.

It was too late for that.

So why the hell did it matter now?

Why couldn’t I have this?

“Okay,” I agreed.

“Okay?” Dav asked, leaning me back to look in my eyes, asking a different question.

“Okay,” I agreed, offering him a small smile as the doors chimed and slid open.

I’d just barely reached for the doorknob before all the locks were sliding, and the door was being yanked open.

“Where have—“ Joel started, voice raised, panicked, before his eyes fell on me. “Oh.”

“It’s been another day, kid,” Dav said, moving us inside.

“Nice shirt,” Joel said, smirking at Dav’s rescue shelter shirt. “You okay?” he asked.

“I’ve been worse,” I admitted, but with the adrenaline draining out, I was starting to feel all the punches, the soreness from being in a strained position for so long, the burn of the cut around my wrist.

“I’ll get the kit,” Joel offered.

“Wait,” Dav said. “We need to wash off first,” he said, looking down at his fingers, his gaze going far away, likely remembering where he’d stuck them not long before.

“Oh, right. Yeah,” Joel said, nodding and letting us walk off into the bathroom.

We peeled off our clothes in silence, then stepped under the spray in unison, both just standing under the water, letting it wash away the fear and pain and gore of the past several hours before we focused, soaping up, scrubbing every inch of ourselves, making sure there was no evidence left, before we finally climbed back out.

“I’ll grab clothes,” Dav offered, leaving me alone to finally see my own reflection.

The bruises were dull still.

They’d settle in over the next day or so.

My lip was split and swollen.

And I had that wiggly tooth to worry about.

But it was okay.

I’d heal.

And I’d never have to worry about these fucks again.

“I’m suddenly glad you aren’t the girly sort,” Dav said as he came in, handing me a pile of clothes, and keeping a pair of oversized men’s sleep pants and a hoodie for himself. The pants were floods on him, and the hoodie that was loose on me was snug on his bigger frame, but it would do for the time being.

I got into the sweatshirt and sleep pants he brought me, ran a brush through my hair, then let Dav treat my wrist before we heard voices in the common room.

“Renzo?” I asked, brows scrunched.

“I don’t think so,” he said, carefully moving out, still paranoid, but his body relaxed as he reached back for my hand, pulling me into the hallway.

To see Joel talking to Lip.

“What’s this?” I asked, looking between the two of them.

“He has your phone,” Joel said, tone accusatory.

“I know,” I said, walking forward toward Lip, and taking it from his hands.

“You… oh,” Joel said, the wind leaving his sail.

“How’d you know?” Dav asked Joel.

“He called it earlier,” Lip explained. “I picked up. He told me where to bring it, so…”

“I appreciate it. It would have been a pain in the ass to get another new one,” I told him. “We were just going to order some food,” I told him. “Want to stay?”

“I…” Lip said, looking down at himself.

“We just cleaned up if you want to too,” I invited, waving toward the bathroom.

Joel looked at Lip, then me, then back again, sussing out the situation quickly. “I’ll loan you some clothes,” he said.

“I can’t—“

“Sure you can,” Dav interrupted him. “Trust me, you’re not gonna win against this one,” he said, wrapping an arm around my waist, and hauling me closer. “Better to save yourself the grief and just do what she wants.”

Lip’s cheeks went red, embarrassed for things that were out of his control, but nodded. “Okay. Thanks,” he said, walking toward the door Dav gestured to, and slipping inside.

It would probably be his first real shower in weeks. Months, even. I hope we left him enough hot water to really enjoy it.

“I’ll be back,” Joel said, looking a little fragile as he headed toward the hall to go back into his parents’ apartment for said clothes.

“You know,” Dav said when we were alone, heading toward the coffee pot, “I think you have two kids now,” he declared, making me shudder at the implication.

Yet, somehow, I found myself more intrigued than terrified by the prospect.

“It’s cool,” he said, shooting me that playboy grin of his. “I think I might have a thing for hot moms.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

EPILOGUE

Dav - 1 Day

I woke up early, wincing at the light streaming through Cinna’s windows thanks to some awfully placed cracks in her plastic blinds.

I stifled a grumble as I climbed out of bed, cursing her lumpy mattress as I ached in places I didn’t know could be sore.

Then again, some of that might have been from the whole going batshit crazy and bashing two guys’ skulls in thing.

The memories came back, and I tamped them down, not wanting those thoughts on my mind first thing in the morning.

It wasn’t that I regretted them. I didn’t. I would do it all again and more to save Cinna. I just didn’t want to focus on the dark shit when there was so much bright now.

Because while we hadn’t exactly made heartfelt declarations, Cinna and I had come to an agreement. We were doing this. To hell with the consequences.

Life-or-death situations, it seemed, really show you what’s fucking important in life.

Like whatever it was growing between us.

And waking up before Cinna, so I could make coffee that was halfway tolerable.

I made my way out to the common area, finding Joel out cold on the couch, his arm thrown over his face to block out the morning light coming through the open blinds.

Lip was on the floor using the couch’s back cushions as a bed. And, fuck, it struck me as I looked at him curled up tight in a ball like he was fighting off the cold of the streets, that this was likely the most comfortable bed he’d had in months. The safest sleep he’d had in longer.

I had a feeling that now that these kids were here, they were never going to leave. And as much as you would never look at Cinna and think she was the maternal sort, I thought they likely couldn’t ask for a better parental figure. She was loyal, fiercely protective, stable, and didn’t get too riled up about small shit.

“That doesn’t smell strong enough,” Cinna accused in a soft hush, even though Lip was used to sleeping on the noisy streets, and Joel had been sleeping over the sounds of his parents’ screaming matches for his whole life.

“I am looking forward to not having heartburn,” I told her, wrapping an arm around her waist, and pulling her in at my side as we waited for it to finish dripping.

“I can’t let him go back on the street,” Cinna said, gaze on Lip.

“No, you can’t,” I agreed.

“And I can’t make him go back to his shitty parents either,” she said, glancing over at Joel who was grumbling in his sleep.

“No,” I agreed.

“But I don’t have enough room here for kids. I don’t have the disposition for motherhood.”

“I’m pretty sure they don’t need to be sung to sleep and have you kiss their bruised knees, love,” I reminded her. “They just need an adult looking out for them. Think you’re more than capable of that.”

“I know you didn’t want—“ she started, getting cut off by a knock at the door.

She winced, looking over at the boys, but they were still out cold.

“It’s Renzo,” the boss called through the door, making her break away from me, and rush to unlock the door.

Renzo moved inside, his thumb snagging Cinna’s chin, and turning it side to side to check out the damage, before glancing around.

His gaze went to Lip, then Joel, and finally me before landing back on Cinna.

“Seems like we got more to talk about than I realized,” he said, moving toward the kitchen.

“You want some coffee?” Cinna asked, and I suddenly remembered her lack of a third cup.

“From you? No,” Renzo said, shaking his head. “What’s with the kids?” he asked.

“Strays,” Cinna said. “Joel,” she told him, waving toward the couch, “is a neighbor. You should hear his parents wake up and start screaming at each other any minute now. And Lip was the homeless kid who helped you guys find me,” she told him.

Renzo, a man who picked up strays himself, Cinna included, just nodded at that.

“Alright. Well, shit is handled at the apartment building. We decided to take all the bodies. Better not to have cops sniffing around, since we don’t know who that crew was talking to about what. It was a long night. You owe Rico a nice meal,” he said, looking at Cinna.

“Thanks, Renz,” Cinna said, sucking in a deep breath.

“Now why do I get the feeling two of my most trusted capos have been lying to my fucking face about more than just fucking each other?” he asked.

Cinna was not a woman who blushed. But her cheeks went pink at that.

“Renz,” I started.

“I’ll get to you. I want answers from Cinna first,” he said, giving her unnerving eye contact.

Renzo was a fair boss. But he wasn’t going to let you off easy when you fucked up.

“It’s a long story,” she admitted.

“And I got time. So you better start fucking talking.”

“I was working one night,” she started. “And three guys came out of nowhere. Chased me into an abandoned warehouse. And beat the ever-loving shit out of me. Tried to do worse,” she said, making Renzo’s jaw tense. It wasn’t like he was naïve to the risk that the female capos in his organization were taking that the men never really had to consider. But he didn’t like realizing shit like that got close to happening.

“They… almost killed me,” she admitted, face twisted like those words tasted bad in her mouth. “It was pure luck that I managed to get away,” she added. “And I… I went to Dav,” she said, leaving off whatever thought process had her making that choice.

A muscle was working in Renzo’s jaw, the only proof of his emotion. But he wasn’t going to let his feelings make him soft.

“And the reason I didn’t get a fucking call?”

“I honestly don’t think she could have,” I piped in, watching as his gaze slid to me. We had an entire silent conversation then, wanting to spare Cinna the embarrassment of having me tell the boss how wrecked she was.

“Alright,” Renzo relented. “Then why the fuck didn’t you call me?” he asked. “If it was as bad as all that, seems like there would have been a long recovery time where one or both of you should have been fucking contacting me.”

“I begged him not to,” Cinna admitted, making Renzo’s gaze shoot to her.

“You? Beg?” he scoffed, shaking his head.

“Yes. I begged, Renz.”

To that, Renzo sighed. “Why?”

“Because I didn’t want anyone to think less of me,” she admitted.

Renzo stood with that for a second. “It wouldn’t be the first time a capo got their ass handed to them.”

“This was different,” Cinna insisted. “It was bad.”

“Even so.”

“Renz,” I said, shaking my head at him. “It’s… different,” I reminded him.

“You think any one of my men would look down on you for getting hurt? Would think it had something to do with you being a chick? Unless you are fighting with your pussy, can’t imagine how that has jackshit to do with this. Everyone knows you can handle yourself, Cinna. You were outnumbered. That’s all it was.”

“Maybe,” she said, not willing to fully concede. I had to imagine that there were things Cinna understood about her place in the criminal world that we could never grasp.

“So, what, you hid out with Dav while you recovered, then the two of you finally gave in to the tension sparking between you for years?”

“Something like that,” I agreed.

“And, what, you decided to continue working this case without bringing me in?” he asked, looking at Cinna.

“Right,” she admitted.

“Christ, Cin, the fuck am I supposed to do with this shit? I can’t have my fucking capos running around like they don’t have anyone to answer to.”

“You could bench me,” she said, sounding a lot calmer about that possibility than I knew she was. Cinna lived for the job. It would kill her to sit home twiddling her thumbs. “Or take more of a cut. Pull jobs from me.”

“Nah,” he said, shaking his head. “You both need to be humbled,” he said, making my stomach curl. “You,” he said, looking between both of us, “now pass all your moves through Rico. He doesn’t like it, you don’t do it. Case fucking closed.”

It was a demotion in everything but title.

And he had every right to make that decision.

“Okay,” Cinna said, face tight.

“Six months,” Renzo added, softening just a little. “Six months of answering to Rico for all your moves. All good then, shit can go back to normal.”

“We can do that,” I said.

“About that,” Renzo said.

“About what?” Cinna asked.

“You. As a plural,” he said. “Officially, as your boss, I don’t give a fuck who you date or fuck or marry,” he said. “As your friend, fucking happy for you,” he said. “Now, I haven’t seen my woman all night. So I’m going home to her. Keep your fucking asses out of trouble for a while.”

With that, he was gone, and the door slamming had Joel waking up.

“That coffee smells weak,” he said in lieu of a good morning to us as he climbed off of the couch, and made his way over.

“It is,” Cinna grumbled, wrinkling her nose.

“So… is he staying too?” Joel asked, looking over at Lip.

“We can’t make him go back on the street,” Cinna said.

“You’re gonna need another couch,” he said, seeming totally fine with another new addition.

She was going to need a bigger apartment.

Preferably one with me.

But she was going to have to come to that conclusion on her own.

I would just be there with her when she did.

Cinna - 6 weeks

“Do you see it now?” Joel asked, pointing toward the paused TV where Spike was giving Buffy the moon eyes he’d claimed weeks ago that Dav had been giving me.

“I see Spike looking at Buffy like that, yeah,” I agreed.

“I say this with love,” Lip piped in. “But you can’t be that blind, right?” he asked, shaking his head at me. “That’s the exact look Dav always has when he looks at you.”

“Maybe,” I agreed, my gaze sliding to my phone for the umpteenth time since Dav walked out of the door eight and a half hours ago.

But I wasn’t keeping track or anything.

Work had been relatively tame for us for the past few weeks. Which meant that we hadn’t really spent that much time apart.

We’d been holed up in my apartment almost nonstop since the kidnapping, just letting ourselves enjoy each other. And spend time with the boys.

I was thankful for them right then, even if their obsessive need for me to admit that Dav was in love with me was getting just a little bit old.

Mainly because I knew how badly I wanted that to be true. But how scary that reality would be at the same time.

“She’s hopeless,” Joel declared, hitting the play button, so we could get lost in the fantasy world of Sunnydale for another whole season.

With no sign or word from Dav.

Eventually, I peeled myself off of the couch where Joel was already fast asleep and walked into the bedroom. Where I did not keep checking my phone. Like some pathetic, lovesick teenager.

Oh a sigh, I dropped onto the foot of the bed.

Finally unable to pretend for another moment that wasn’t exactly what I was.

Pathetic.

Love sick.

God, I loved him.

There was no other explanation for the whole swooping and soaring sensation in my chest when he was near, the way my stomach did somersaults when he laughed or reached for me.

For the way I couldn’t stop thinking about him even when he was lying beside me.

I loved him.

Damnit.

“What are you growling about?” Dav asked, making me jerk and straighten, too caught up in my confusing feelings to even hear him come in.

“You,” I admitted, gaze sliding over him, looking for any injuries, but finding none.

“What are you growling about me for?” he asked, shooting me a bewildered smile as he started to peel off his shirt.

“Because I love you, you jackass,” I blurted out, making his brows rise before his eyes went all gooey.

“Yeah?” he asked, coming toward me.

“Yes. I’m not exactly happy about it,” I told him, getting a little chuckle out of him as he dropped to a squat in front of me.

“No?” he asked, shooting me a soft smile. “‘Cause I’m fucking thrilled about it,” he told me, reaching out to grab my knees, giving them a squeeze. “I think I’ve been a little bit in love with you since I first laid eyes on you.”

To that, I snorted.

“You just liked my tits.”

“I mean…” he said, gaze sliding to my chest. “They’re definitely a part of it,” he admitted, making my lips curve up. “But it’s not just your looks, though we both know those are fucking killer. It’s your strength and independence and your annoying inability to ask for help. It’s that gooey heart of yours, and the way I’m the only one who knows about it.”

“What about the thing you say about the way I make coffee?”

“I’m… working on that,” he said, smile spreading enough to make his eyes crinkle. “I fucking love you, Cinna. And I feel really lucky that you love me back,” he said, leaning up, and sealing his lips over mine.

But right before that?

I saw it, damnit.

The Spike looking at Buffy glance.

I guess I owed Joel and Lip an apology in the morning.

Cinna - 5 months

“I swear to god if you don’t start throwing your clothes in the hamper instead of on the floor beside it,” I grumbled, tossing the clothes into the aforementioned hamper that I bought expressly for that purpose since having three extra people around all of the time meant the laundry situation was absolutely out of control.

“Who are you yelling at?” Dav asked as I walked back out of the bathroom, tying my wet hair up into a ponytail.

“Where are they?” I asked, looking around the living room that had been full just twenty minutes before, but was now suspiciously empty.

“Went down to get the mail, apparently,” Dav said, looking as confused by that as I felt.

I mean, it wasn’t weird that one of them had ordered something. After a solid month or so of settling in, they both kind of… became the kids that life hadn’t let them be before. Making messes, arguing with each other and us, asking for things without looking like it was killing them to do so.

I was almost immediately glad that Renzo hadn’t chosen to financially punish me, because these teens were expensive as fuck.

It didn’t help that neither of them had… anything. Sure, Joel had some clothes and shit in his parents’ apartment, but it got more and more clear each time he needed to do so that he dreaded going back in there. So I finally just gave him some cash to go get new clothes and shoes.

And Lip, well, he literally had nothing but one or two sentimental items he had with him while living on the street. He needed an entire wardrobe, personal care items, electronics, a couch to sleep on, the whole thing.

I mean, the couch was temporary.

It was better than the cushions on the floor, which were better than a box on the street.

But I wanted the kid to have an actual bed. Both of them, actually. In a room, or rooms. Preferably situated a safe distance from my bedroom, so I didn’t feel weird about sharing a bed with Dav, and possibly being overheard.

It was just, you know, a process.

When I’d found some private moments, I’d been looking at listings for apartments or condos that would have enough room for all of us. I even had some flagged to go do a walk-through of.

I just didn’t know how to approach the topic with Dav.

Sure, we were practically living together now. But practically living together and actually living together were completely different things.

And there was also the issue of, you know, taking Joel with me out of this building. Which could, essentially, be seen as a sort of kidnapping.

I’d looked into that as well. Having his parents sign over their rights. But it was complicated. It involved court. And that would mean someone might figure out who I was and what I did. Then no one would let Joel near me.

There was just… shit to work out.

“What’s got you looking so—“ Dav started, but the door flew open, and the boys were making their way in, looking a mix of excited and nervous as Joel brought the box over and handed it to me.

“For me?” I asked, surprised.

I mean, we’d been through a holiday together. And both of the kids had picked up gifts for Dav and I. But that was, you know, what you did on a holiday. This was unexpected and sweet.

I handed the box to Dav, feeling oddly nervous myself as I pulled open the top, then moving some of the packing peanuts out of the way to pull out a mug.

It was white with red blood splatter and little crushed bullets and bullet holes around the words scrolled across it.

Not the worst mom.

“The mug lady triple-checked to make sure we wanted the blood, bullets, and holes,” Joel admitted as, to my utter humiliation, I felt my eyes go all glassy.

“We’re still always a mug short,” Lip added.

I wasn’t exactly good with expressing emotions. Especially of the warm and squishy variety. And warm and squishy were definitely how I was feeling right then with these two kids I was starting to see as mine giving me a gift calling me, of all things, Mom.

“I think we broke it,” Joel said when I let out this strange, strangled sound.

“That’s her ‘trying not to cry’ noise,” Dav supplied just as I practically tossed the mug at him, so I could wrap an arm around each of the boys.

They were equally as awkward with the show of affection, and our mutual ineptitude made it a whole hell of a lot less awkward.

“Thanks boys,” I said, giving them one last squeeze before moving away.

“Now make your coffee,” Dav said, passing the mug to me. “We have a busy day planned.”

“We do?” I asked, looking between the three of them.

“Two open houses and three private showings,” Dav said, nodding.

“Wait… what?” I asked, stiffening. “That wasn’t… in the immediate plans.”

“All the good shit is gonna pass us by if we keep waiting,” he said as the boys moved off toward the living room.

“Dav, we can’t,” I whispered.

“Why not?”

“Mostly because of Joel,” I told him. “We’d be… kidnapping him.”

“That’s kind of the beauty of the ones I have picked out,” he told me. “They’re in the neighborhood. One is right across the street. He could still drop in from time to time, so they know he’s around.”

I had to admit that seemed like a solid compromise. And we genuinely were bursting at the seams here. The one bathroom situation alone was a nightmare. I took for granted how nice having a bathroom all to myself was. I would never, ever take it for granted again.

“It won’t hurt to look,” he reasoned.

“Okay,” I agreed. “But I don’t want the kids getting their hopes up if it’s not the right time.”

“They’re big kids. They’ll manage their disappointment if it comes to that.”

“I guess that’s… wait,” I said, turning to look at him. “There’s no apartment building across the street.”

“There’s… a building,” he said, looking all mischievous.

“Dav…”

“Look, I’ve been needing to open a legit business to wash more of my cash through,” he said, holding up a hand when I opened my mouth. “That building is as good as any. Plus, it had empty space above that could be converted to a multi-floor condo.”

“Dav, no.”

“Why not?”

“It’s one thing for me to rent a new apartment. Or even buy a condo. It’s another for—“

“For what?” he cut me off. “For us to move in together? Even though I’m already living here? I get that we are, technically, new, but it’s not like we’re strangers who started shacking up, love. We’ve known each other for a decade.”

“I know, but—“

“Your stubborn ass is going to dig your heels in about this, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I admitted, almost smiling at his exasperation.

“Fine. Then if we both like it, I buy it. You rent the apartment from me. That’s a win-win to me. You’d have a landlord almost anywhere you moved. Why not have it be me?”

“That’s… not a terrible idea.”

“Careful, Cin. You’re dangerously close to agreeing with me.”

“It’s… a rational plan.”

“And you don’t even know the best part yet.”

“What’s that?”

“You’ll get to live out all of your DIY renovation dreams.”

That wasn’t exactly true.

Since in my DIY renovation dreams, I was picking paint swatches and deciding what kind of built-in cabinets would look best. Not trying to map out a floor plan, figure out where walls would go, and dodging sparking electrical wires.

In the end, though, Dav had been right. The building across from my current one made the most sense. It worked for Joel. It made life easier while we worked on renovating to be able to just walk across the street to go home, and having a business a floor below was smart fiscally, legally, and even from a safety standpoint.

We ended up not making any of our other appointments.

We knew it was the one as soon as we walked inside.

Dav - 2 years

No matter how much money you’re willing to throw at a project, renovations in the city were notoriously slow and frustrating.

Our conservative estimate of getting in before the end of the year I’d bought the property had been pushed back time and time again as things got ‘backordered’ or the crew was ‘short on staff.’

Eventually, we’d had Renzo himself lean on the crew to stop jerking us around, and get the damn place done.

All said and done, though, it was worth the often frustrating wait.

Above the storefront on the street level, there were three floors of space. The first contained the kitchen, dining, and living rooms as well as a half bath and a guest bedroom.

The second was Cinna’s suite, essentially. Except, of course, it was both of ours, just not on paper. There was a large primary bedroom with his-and-her closets, a seating area, then a bathroom complete with a soaking tub, a walk-in glass shower big enough for five, and two separate toilet rooms and sink cabinets.

Because, apparently, Cinna was hellbent not to ever have to wait for a bathroom again.

On the third floor were three more bedrooms, a full, and a half bath, and a small seating area for the kids to hang out in.

It was the first time in Lip’s entire life he had his own bedroom.

And, we learned after Lip admitted it, that Joel had also been sleeping on a couch in his parent’s place. Right there in the center of all their constant arguments. It was no wonder Cinna used to find him passed out in the hall instead.

As for his parents, well, they mostly forgot they had a kid. Save for when tax time came and they wanted the write-off. Never mind that we paid for all of his clothes, food, electronics, interests, and medical care.

Not that his parents mattered for much longer anyway. Joel only had another year before he was free of them for good.

Both of the boys had started working in the convenience store I’d opened at the street level, learning a little responsibility, and giving them a taste for making their own money, with the hopes that it would motivate them to eventually figure out a career for themselves.

I didn’t have the heart to tell Cinna, who believed both kids were destined for college and shit like that, that both Joel and Lip were showing a fuckuva lot of interest in the family business.

“Do you hear that?” Cinna asked, holding up a hand as I walked into the bedroom.

I paused, listening.

“I don’t hear anything.”

“Exactly!” she said, flying off of the bed, and rushing toward me, fingers pulling at clothing until it was in a pile at my feet. “We’re actually alone,” she added, reaching down to fist my cock, stroking me impatiently.

I pulled at her clothing then too until they were heaped next to mine.

Some part of me wanted to take full advantage of an empty house. To get lost in each other for hours.

The other part, though, knew that the sanctuary could be ended at any moment, leaving us needing to try to be quiet, not be overheard.

Sliding my hand down Cinna’s back, I sank my fingers into her ass, pulling upward until she was wrapping her legs around my waist. Then I was turning, walking her backward, and slamming her back against the wall, then surging inside of her, both of us gasping at the sensation.

We were pure feeling then, hands sliding, grabbing, lips crashing, tongues teasing as I fucked her hard and fast through one orgasm before she was demanding I take her to the bed, where she climbed on top, riding me as I enjoyed the view as she bounced and writhed and cried out as she came.

“More,” I said, grabbing her, and rolling her onto her side, facing away from me as I thrust inside of her again, my hand slipping across her throat, applying just the right amount of pressure to increase the sensations as I drove her up and through another orgasm that had her body shuddering hard as she cried out my name.

“I can’t,” she gasped as she came back down, finding me still hard inside of her.

“Yes, you can,” I told her, moving onto my knees, and pulling her onto all fours, reaching into the nightstand for a bottle, then pouring a small bit of lube over her ass, then teasing her with one finger, then another, loving the way she wiggled and whimpered at the sensation.

“Dav, please,” she pleaded, voice a rough whisper.

“Please what?” I asked, fucking her with my fingers harder. “Please fuck your ass?” I asked, spreading my fingers, preparing her.

“Yes, please,” she begged, rocking her ass up toward me.

I fucked her with my fingers for another minute before adding more of the cool liquid as I eased my fingers out, then pressed my cock in, feeling her tightness close around me as I eased in.

Cinna was sucking in deep breaths as her moans got louder, more ragged, as I pressed all the way in and paused.

“Move,” she begged, wiggling back against me.

I didn’t need more encouragement than that.

I fucked her slowly at first, but harder and faster as she begged for it.

My hand slipped between her thighs, working her clit as I fucked her.

“You’re taking my cock so good,” I said, getting a low whimper in response as she got closer and closer, the way her pussy was clenching making her tighten around me too. “Are you going to come with my cock in your ass?” I asked, getting another moan out of her in response just as her pussy started to spasm, the orgasm slamming through her.

“Fuck,” I groaned, thrusting through it, then pulling out, coming hard and hot on her ass as she struggled to catch her breath.

I was still sitting there holding my cock when, a floor below us, the front door flew open, cracking against the wall.

On the mattress, Cinna let out a little laugh as she rolled her upper half over, looking up at me.

“That was really good timing,” she declared, all pink and dewy from the orgasms.

And I knew right that fucking moment that this was the woman I was going to marry.

Now I probably just had to wait another decade to convince her she wanted to marry me too…

Cinna - 3 years

“Are you wearing heels?” Lip asked as I came into the apartment with a long raincoat belted tightly around my body, finding him standing in the kitchen, eating ice cream right out of the tub.

“I wear heels all the time,” I insisted. Yeah, they were heeled boots, but still.

“Why are they white?” he pressed, frowning at the damn shoes. I should have waited to put them on.

“It is a Friday night. What are you doing home?” I shot back.

“It’s only ten,” he said, shrugging.

Only ten?

I was ready for bed already.

You know, after my plans.

“Where did you go?” he asked, eyeing the bag in my hand.

“I had to get Dav’s prescription,” I told him, shrugging. “Had to go all the way across Brooklyn for an all-night pharmacy,” I added. “So he better not give me a hard time about taking them.”

“I’m sure if anyone can make him take them, it’s you,” Lip said, shrugging and moving back to the couch, blissfully leaving me and my weird outfit alone.

Still, not wanting to draw his attention again, I tiptoed across the apartment and up the stairs before moving onto the second floor, and heading into the primary bedroom.

“Where have… are you wearing heels?” Dav asked, pulling himself up in bed with a grimace.

He had a hastily stitched up bullet wound in his right shoulder, hence my trip to the pharmacy. For antibiotics I’d conned out of one of those internet doctors who asked some basic questions, then sent off a script. So long as you could fake the symptoms that would have them prescribing some broad-spectrum antibiotics, you were all set.

The pain pills were in the bag too, but those had been bought from a trusted dealer.

I set the bag on the nightstand before moving back a few feet. Reaching for the sash of the coat, I silently prayed he remembered this reference because I was going to feel really fucking ridiculous if he didn’t.

With a deep breath, I pulled the sash off, then slipped out of the coat.

Leaving me standing there in thigh-highs and a little white nursemaid’s dress. With a red bra peeking out.

“Fuck,” he groaned, his head falling back onto the headboard as his gaze roamed over me. “You even got the bra right,” he said, making my heart swoop and soar.

“I aim to please,” I said, making my way toward the side of the bed, reaching for the bag, but finding my left wrist snagged in his hand.

“And here I was thinking the only time I’d see you in a dress was on our wedding day,” he said, his finger sliding across the ring that had been settled on my finger for months now.

I’ll admit that, before Dav, I never really understood the whole wedding and marriage thing. But I found myself doing girly shit like looking at floral arrangements and tablescapes ever since Dav got down on one knee.

The whole thing was practically planned out even though we hadn’t even set a date yet.

“You know,” he said, pulling until I had no choice but to move up onto the bed, straddling his waist. “There is one major advantage of dresses,” he told me, pushing my skirt up, and teasing his fingers over the red lacy panties I put on to match the bra.

“You’re injured,” I insisted.

“Baby, if I’m ever too injured to fuck you, take me out back and put me out of my misery,” he said, yanking me in, and sealing his lips to mine.

Before showing me all the advantages of dresses.

Dav - 7 years

“I just think it’s time you let the poor guy move up from associate, that’s all I’m saying,” I told Cinna as we walked out of the restaurant and onto the cold December streets, the wind biting at any exposed skin in seconds.

“He’s a child,” Cinna insisted of Lip. Who’d just turned twenty-two.

“He’s three years older than you were when you became a capo,” I reminded her.

“Yeah, but—“ she started, suddenly wrenching away from me, and turning on her heel.

Before I even knew what she was doing, her arm shot out, grabbing the wrist of someone trying to get away from her as quickly as possible.

“Nice try, kid,” she said, yanking harder until she turned the person in a black hoodie around, revealing a young girl of maybe fifteen or sixteen with light blonde hair around a deceptively sweet-looking face with big, doe, blue eyes. But there was cunning behind them.

And I didn’t know exactly why until she sighed and reached into her hoodie pocket.

“Fine. Here,” she said, holding out Cinna’s wallet to her.

“That was really fucking smooth,” Cinna told her, taking back her wallet.

“Not smooth enough,” the girl said, that look in her eye suddenly disappearing, leaving only a soul-deep sort of desperation.

It was then that I saw it.

The gloves with holes in them. The shoes worn halfway through the rubber. Her greasy hair. The way her jeans were sagging off of her waist and legs, like she’d lost a lot of weight since she’d originally gotten them.

“How about I buy you something to eat, and you tell me who taught you to pick a pocket that well,” Cinna suggested, that big, gooey heart of hers never able to walk away from a street kid in need.

“Fine,” the girl said, looking annoyed, but there was relief in her blue eyes as she fell into step beside Cinna.

“What’s your name?” Cinna asked.

“Della.”

“Della, nice. I’m Cinna. This is my husband, Dav. Who I will meet back at the house later,” she said, tone a bit pointed. She wanted me to get lost.

There was no way to be offended since we both understood that girls on the street might have more of an issue being around a strange man than the street boys did.

“Yep. See you there,” I said, pressing a kiss to her temple before moving in the opposite direction of them.

“I know I risk sounding fucking ancient saying this, but can you turn that racket down?” I asked as I moved into the house, hearing the thump of the base shaking my bones.

“Didn’t think you’d be home so soon,” Amaya, the only girl street kid we’d ever taken in, said as she flicked off the music.

She’d been a little older than Joel and Lip when we’d come across her. But she’d been on the street with her fifteen year-old brother as well. The now sixteen-year-old Darron was sprawled across the couch, his phone held aloft over his head, scrolling through some videos.

Amaya was tall with a lot more meat on her bones than she’d had when we’d first taken her in, always giving any food they got from passerby to her brother as she wasted away. Her dark skin wasn’t stretched over bones like a skeleton anymore, and her love of eating once she was free to do so as much and often as she wanted had morphed into a desire to open her own restaurant one day.

Which meant that, even though I’d just gotten in from dinner, I was about to try no fewer than five different dishes she had spread across the island.

“I think Cinna might be bringing someone back with her tonight,” I told her, watching as understanding crossed her face. “A girl,” I added.

“Oh, that would be nice,” Amaya said, glancing over at Darron. “There’s enough boys in this family already,” she declared.

“Listen, the next time you drop shit down the sink, figure out how to fish it out your—“ Joel cut off as he walked into the common area, holding the cross to Darron’s necklace in his hand, “Hey,” he said, nodding at me. “Why am I on plumber duty if you’re home?” he asked.

“I just got here,” I told him as there was a racket outside of the door before, suddenly, it opened and Lip came in with three bags hanging from his hands.

“Amaya, do you have any idea how hard it is to find caramel baking chips at this time of night?” he asked as he moved into the apartment.

“Since I can’t usually even find them at a decent hour, yes,” Amaya said, not apologetic at all. “But you were the one who wanted the cinnamon scones, weren’t you?”

“Fair enough,” Lip said, snagging something off one of the platters on the counter. “Weren’t you supposed to be on a date?” he asked, looking at me.

“Cinna got pickpocketed by some girl,” I told him.

“So, should I just go and make up the guest room bed now?” Joel asked.

The two older boys had moved out together a year before, wanting to, well, do shit they didn’t want their parental figures seeing.

It had been good timing, since Amaya and Darron had come into our paths just a few weeks later, needing rooms to call home.

Amaya was still explaining the importance of quality butter in baking twenty minutes later as the apartment door opened, and in walked Cinna with Della in tow, her shoulders hunched and her head on a swivel, like she was expecting some sort of ambush instead of a family gathering.

“Oh, everyone’s here,” Cinna said, closing the door behind Della. “Alright. Well, you met my husband, Dav. And these are our oldest boys, Lip and Joel,” she explained, each of the boys giving her a wave. “They don’t live here anymore, but the younger two run them ragged doing their errands for them,” she explained. “Amaya and Darron do live here. Guys, this is Della. She’s going to crash for… the night,” Cinna said, though we all knew it was never a night or weekend.

Once they came in, they didn’t leave until they were grown and ready.

“Want me to show you to your room?” Amaya asked, wiping her hands on the pretty floral apron she’d gotten as a birthday present from Lore. Renzo had, in typical mafia uncle fashion, given her a can of mace. “I can lend you some pajamas too, if you want to shower,” she said, and some sort of understanding passed between the girls then.

“Sure,” Della said, following Amaya down the hallway.

“You know,” I said, snagging Cinna around the waist, and pulling her back against me, “for two people who couldn’t have children, we sure have a lot of children,” I said, pressing a kiss to her temple.

“And we didn’t have to change a single diaper,” she declared, leaning into me.

“Exactly,” I agreed.

“Pretty fucking perfect,” she said, a smile toying with her lips.

Yes, yes we were.

XX

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

As always, I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Fern for her eagle eyes.

And also a thanks to Gabi, Ashley, Sonya, and Cherie for helping make this book shine.

IF YOU LIKED this book, check out these other series and titles in the NAVESINK BANK UNIVERSE:

The Navesink Bank Henchmen MC

Reign

Cash

Wolf

Repo

Duke

Renny

Lazarus

Pagan

Cyrus

Edison

Reeve

Sugar

The Fall of V

Adler

Roderick

Virgin

Roan

Camden

West

Colson

Henchmen MC Next Gen

Niro

Malcolm

Fallon

Rowe

Cary

Valen

Dezi

Voss

Seth

Finn

Brooks

The Savages

Monster

Killer

Savior

Mallick Brothers

For A Good Time, Call

Shane

Ryan

Mark

Eli

Charlie & Helen: Back to the Beginning

Investigators

367 Days

14 Weeks

4 Months

432 Hours

Dark

Dark Mysteries

Dark Secrets

Dark Horse

Professionals

The Fixer

The Ghost

The Messenger

The General

The Babysitter

The Middle Man

The Negotiator

The Client

The Cleaner

The Executioner

Rivers Brothers

Lift You Up

Lock You Down

Pull You In

Keep You Close

Grassi Family

The Woman at the Docks

The Women in the Scope

The Woman in the Wrong Place

The Woman from the Past

The Woman in Harm’s Way

The Woman with the Target on her Back

The Woman with the Warning

Golden Glades Henchmen MC

Huck

Che

McCoy

Remy

Seeley

Donovan

Cato

Alaric

Shady Valley Henchmen MC

Judge

Crow

Slash

Sway

Detroit

STANDALONES WITHIN NAVESINK BANK:

Vigilante

Grudge Match

The Rise of Ferryn

Counterfeit Love

Of Snakes and Men

The Survivor

Deja Brew

OTHER SERIES AND STANDALONES:

Stars Landing

What The Heart Needs

What The Heart Wants

What The Heart Finds

What The Heart Knows

The Stars Landing Deviant

What The Heart Learns

Surrogate

The Sex Surrogate

Dr. Chase Hudson

The Green Series

Into the Green

Escape from the Green

Seven Sins MC

The Sacrifice

The Healer

The Thrall

The Demonslayer

The Professor

Costa Family

The Woman in the Trunk

The Woman in the Back Room

The Woman with the Scar

The Woman on the Exam Table

The Woman with the Flowers

The Woman with the Secret

The Woman on the Jury

The Woman in the Woods

Lombardi Family

Love Him Like Water

Need Him Like Oxygen

DEBT

Dissent

Stuffed: A Thanksgiving Romance

Unwrapped

Peace, Love, & Macarons

A Navesink Bank Christmas

Don’t Come

Fix It Up

N.Y.E.

faire l’amour

Revenge

There Better Be Pie

Ugly Sweater Weather

I Like Being Watched

The Woman with the Ring

Love and Other Nightmares

Love in the Time of Zombies

Primal

Taming Scarlet

Under the pen name JGALA:

The Heir Apparent

The Winter Queen

JESSICA GADZIALA IS the USA TODAY Bestselling author of over 100 steamy romance novels featuring all sorts of twisty and turny plots, strong heroines, lovable side characters, steam, and epic HEAs.

She lives in New Jersey with her parrots, dogs, rabbits, chickens, ducks, and her bearded dragon named Ravioli.

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