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Just as suddenly as our kiss had started, Matt pulled back, his thumb caressing my swollen lips while his gaze was set on them.
“Everyone surrenders,” he said, releasing me and stepping back, leaving a trail of desire all over my body. I stood there, a mixture of overwhelming lust and anger flaring up inside me as he turned his back to me and left.
Just. Like. That.
Coldly, not a word uttered after almost sucking the life out of me in that earth-shattering kiss. I felt a raw need first. Then shock followed as I finally settled for rage.
“You shouldn’t turn your back on an armed woman,” I shouted out towards him, my paintball gun back in my hands and aiming straight at him.
“It’s okay, I trust you.” He shrugged, not bothering to look back and face me.
“You shouldn’t. Even the devil was once an angel!” At that, I fired the gun aiming for his ass and hitting the bullseye right on his left butt cheek, watching him flinch and cuss upon impact. It wasn’t a real bullet, but it hurt enough to make my point.
Still, he carried on towards the trail, leaving me alone in the woods with a new set of demons to fight and a renewed hate towards my future husband. How could he compare to the stranger who had my blood rushing hot with nothing but a kiss?
He simply couldn’t.
Matt
Three weeks ago
Family is everything to us, but that doesn’t mean we are always at peace.
It had taken me over ten years to find some kind of truce with my father. Or at least a middle ground where we both left our demons in the closet and tried to get along. He overlooked the part where I was striving to become a Mafia Lord, following my grandfather’s footsteps, much to the great Adrian Dornier’s displeasure. My concession was accepting that he had a different view on life than what I did.
He disregarded the fact that I was a criminal. And I turned a blind eye to the fact that he’d cheated on my mother and dragged Alison, my baby sister, through the fallout of their marriage. He ignored that I had legally changed my last name to Battaglia and threw Dornier in the trash, while I pretended I didn’t know there was another Dornier who never got invited for Christmas dinners.
Hypocrites? Maybe. I tried to look at it as accepting the good along with the bad.
He was my father, after all, and I’d still give up my life to save his. So I made a damn effort once he started doing the same. Which led me to be standing outside the Guggenheim, ready to celebrate one of my father’s victories.
It was a clusterfuck waiting to happen, and I absolutely had to be here for damage control.
“No guns tonight.” My father said as we shared one of those man hugs made of more pats on the back than actual hugging. He could try to warn me all he wanted, but there was no way I’d be standing in the middle of 5th Avenue, waiting for another family’s mafia princess and her entourage, without a piece tucked under my tux and half a dozen men on the lookout.
My brother Liam was bringing a special guest tonight, even if reluctantly. After some major fuck up a few months back, he’d been forced into a marriage agreement with Enzo Amato’s niece. Enzo was the Detroit mafia Don who held a seat at the big boy table.
He was one of the five Lords of The Commission, alongside my grandfather and three other big names in the Cosa Nostra. They had set the sentence, and Liam was expected to follow through or else.
That’s what being on top of the fucking food chain meant — kings to peasants in nothing but a blink.
Francesca was to marry Liam as a peace settlement between the families, some kind of old-school quick fix to ensure no unnecessary, retributive slaughter took place.
But as I looked at Jamie’s pale face and dejected expression, it was more than clear that the slaughter had already begun, only it didn’t bleed onto our hands, just onto her heart.
I knew my brother had found the love of his life, and from the protruding collar bones on this girl, she’d taken the news of his engagement as well as a shotgun wound to the chest. But the mafia didn’t have love on its agenda, so breaking them up was the lesser evil between pain that could heal in time or wounds that wouldn’t have time to heal.
So, apart from celebrating a huge fucking deal for AD, today was a parade for the watching falcons that needed reassurance about my brother’s commitment to the cause. They’d be watching and ready to strike, so of-fucking-course I’d be holding onto my Beretta.
“If everyone’s on their best behavior, we won’t be needing any, will we?” I smiled, knowing it would absolutely reach my eyes even though the sentiment wasn’t really there. But that’s who I am. My façade is seamlessly curated to hide whatever brewed under the surface, much like the paintings of whatever exhibit the museum held this week. They could hide cracks and fissures, and we’d just never know.
“Shall we go inside?” My father asked, offering his arm for Jamie to take while Alison locked her arm on mine.
But before we could take more than a couple of steps, one of our black SUVs parked on the curb, and Liam came out the back door. What I didn’t expect was the breathtaking creature that followed behind.
Fuck me. It can’t be!
She’d left the combat boots and camo behind, swapping them for a black satin dress that showed so much more than I was ready for. Her raven hair was tied, slicked back into a high ponytail that I could see myself using as a damn reign to hold and pull at will. Red, fuckable lips, pouted as if she had no interest in being here at all while her eyes darted around the perimeter, making sure there was no immediate danger in the vicinity.
