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“Oh, we’re good. I forgive you for what happened with Lola,” I say.
“Lilah, if I get out, I’m good, right?”
“I don’t know, Johnny. I’ll have to ask my dad, see what he says.” There’s not even a hint of humor in my voice when I say it, cold venom in the words.
He knows I don’t mean Shane Turner.
He knows I mean the father he murdered in cold blood at the command of a sick fucking man.
Dante gives me a smile and shakes his head, but Johnny is yelling.
“Are you fucking kidding m—”
And then the line dies.
Time’s up. Good thing I got what I needed.
“Let’s go,” I say, hanging up the phone. “I’m cold.” Dante pulls me into his arms, wrapping his jacket around me and pressing his lips to my hair.
“A fucking queen,” he says, and then he walks me toward his car, ready to move on with our plan.
TWELVE
-Lilah-
The family meeting is the next day and I’m dressed for the occasion.
And, possibly, to make my damn husband crack.
It’s been seven days since Dante fucked me, and I’d be lying if I said I was happy about that.
But I’d also be lying if I said it didn’t give me some kind of sick joy to be playing this game.
In my head, it’s not even related to stupid fucking Angela, not really. I know if I said jump, Dante’d be looking for a bridge, and if I said, No more Angela and didn’t turn it into this little game, she’d be gone.
I also understand the purpose of her. We spend a lot of time together and Dante pushed my working and living with him and then he pushed marrying me onto Paulie. If he were single, it would be a giant red flag waving, saying that something wasn’t right to anyone who could put two and two together.
Angela coming to events as his date gives us some kind of cover to hide behind.
So that’s fine.
I just don’t want her hands on him.
And I also want to make him suffer while we play this game.
Hence why I’m wearing an outfit where the skirt hits a few inches above my knee, but it’s absolutely skintight with a slit on the side ending not far below my hip. The top is a tiny, spaghetti-strapped tank that doesn’t quite hit the top of the high-waisted skirt, leaving a sliver of tan skin.
Honestly, I could probably wear it as a dancer or server at Jerzy Girls and make good money in it. I added a loose, oversized, trendy blazer to cover up and make it more baddie attending a family meeting appropriate. But in its own way, I feel like it only adds to the sexiness of the outfit—the idea of unwrapping layers, of imagining that blazer as some man’s that I’m wearing after a long night . . .
And I know it worked when Marco rolled his eyes and shook his head when I met him in the hall for him to drive me to the building where the meeting is to be held. It’s a nondescript building with little to tell you about it from the outside. But last night while we lay in bed, Dante told me it’s been in the family for decades and helps to organize and house the above the board businesses: HR and the sales side of the disposal company, investments, and holdings.
It’s also where family meetings happen, in a dim cinderblock basement, conveniently too deep below ground for cellphones or bugs to work.
And when I walk in, my heels clicking on the floors, all eyes move to me.
Ten men—the Capos and the three Carluccios—all stare at me.
I smile when I realize not a single one of them doesn’t have a hint of that hunger in their eyes. A win for the outfit.
