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The three of them had been working together for a long time. They exchanged a long glance, but didn’t say anything to give away their position. My fingers itched to fidget on the table, so I clasped them in my lap and sat still, waiting for their decision.
Cormac cleared his throat, his lips twisted in frustration. “We need you to be a perfect fucking Italian wife in public from time to time.”
I grinned, understanding they had conceded the negotiating point. “I guess you’d better be ready to pay for that then, hmm?”
Rian nodded sharply. He slid the stack of papers into his briefcase, and I put away my tablet. “My lawyer will be in touch with your lawyer,” he said. “I’d like to get these signed as soon as possible. We can do a quick commitment ceremony in a few weeks after we’ve given the community time to think about our whirlwind romance.”
A bubble of laughter escaped me. “Our polyamorous whirlwind romance? Where they all think I’m a whore?”
Cormac yanked me toward him, cupping my jaw in his hand as I bent awkwardly over the corner of the table. “Aren’t you, though, darling? Ten million dollars is quite a bit of money.”
He ran his thumb along my bottom lip, holding my gaze. I sighed before flicking the tip with my tongue and eliciting a heady groan from him.
When he pushed me back toward my seat, I picked up the menu. “Shall we order?”
After givingthe waiter my order, I turned back to the table, only to discover Rian had disappeared. Hot hands ran up my calves under the table, but when I reached to twitch the table cloth aside, Cormac’s firm fingers caught my wrist. He tugged on my hand until he was close enough to whisper in my ear.
“Not a single noise, Ginevra. We wouldn’t want these good people to know what a slut you really are, would we?”
My face heated with embarrassment as I realized what was going on. Rian pushed my legs apart under the table, careful to stay covered by the long white tablecloth. His fingers walked up the insides of my legs.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked, my voice breathy, giving away more than I’d like. As humiliating as this was, it was fucking hot, too.
Rian’s teeth dug into the sensitive skin of my thigh, eliciting a sharp gasp as I struggled to keep my face composed.
Cormac’s face was sharp. “Do we need a reason to use our whore however we like?”
I couldn’t hide the hurt that shot through me. My face fell for a second before I controlled my expression. Every time I fooled myself into thinking they cared about me as a person, and not a possession, one of them managed to remind me that I was bought and paid for.
On the other hand, one of the most powerful men I’d ever met was on his knees under the table before me, his hands sliding up the bare skin of my thighs, about to offer me illicit pleasure in the middle of a crowded restaurant. So was it really that bad a deal?
As the waiter set the champagne bucket beside our table, Rian pushed the skirt of my dress up, inch by excruciating inch, exposing my legs to his hot breath. He placed gentle butterfly kisses on my skin, and I fought to keep my breath even as Liam and Cormac watched me with amusement.
The waiter poured four glasses of bubbly. When I lifted mine to toast, my hands shook.
“To the future,” Cormac murmured.
“To the future,” Liam and I agreed. Rian nudged his nose against my panties as our glasses clinked and I bit back a moan. Fuck this was hot. With trembling fingers, I gulped at my champagne. When a few drops escaped my lips, dripping down my throat and my chest, Cormac leaned forward.
“Let me get that for you,” he said, kissing his way up my flushed skin, his tongue swirling and capturing the sweet liquid.
“Slut,” a voice from another table snapped. Cormac sat up abruptly, rage in his eyes.
When I shook my head. “Let me,” I said softly, cupping his cheek with my hand.
Chloe Morelli and her mother, Tina, sat two tables over from us. Tina’s eyes were sympathetic. “Don’t be rude, Chloe,” she admonished her daughter.
“Don’t be rude?” I laughed softly. Rian stopped his seduction and instead stroked his hands firmly over my knees, reassuring me rather than leaving me breathless. “Chloe, isn’t your father thousands of dollars in debt to my father?” Thank God I’d spent the morning going over the books with Pietro and Luis.
The tables around us quieted, sensing drama about to unfold.
“And yet, he hasn’t abandoned your street to the encroaching Russians, continuing to protect your family’s businesses, even though you haven’t paid him a goddamned cent in months.”
“It’s not like that,” Chloe whispered.
“Really?” I answered, furious once again at our stupid world that worked on handshakes and gentlemen’s agreements, but used and discarded women, women like me and my sister, and one day soon, this teenager in front of me, when men didn’t feel like paying the consequences of their actions.
“No matter how disloyal your family may be, the Russos will never abandon this city. And this?” I gestured to the two men at the table. “This is the price of that. Be grateful that I am paying it, instead of you and your father.”
