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In the end, one girl remained who stood blowing bubbles with her gum, waiting for Sebastian to beckon her. Without meaning to, I turned to look at him. He was swiveling in his executive chair, scanning the stripper’s body. Our eyes met for a brief second before he nodded at her.
I glanced at my feet, trying hard to ignore what was happening around me. For the rest of the evening, I busied myself with flipping through the old magazines on the coffee table. I had never felt more uncomfortable and livid than I was then. Sebastian was taking care of another woman in my presence.
Fucker.
9
Sebastian
At eleven,we concluded the meeting and I finally got rid of my guests. It had taken intense persuasion from my end to convince them to sell me a share of their New York territory and when they finally did, there were strings attached. My brothers, Sparky and Milo, were going to be satisfied that everything went smoothly—thankfully, they had no idea about Marinka or I’d never hear the end of it. They’d wanted me to go after the Italians, so here we were, although I still wasn’t sure if this was a good idea. Gino and his people, Vinny included, were insanely dangerous and always so unpredictable. The fact my ‘wife’ was Russian, and the stunt she’d pulled, only served to heighten their suspicions.
At least, with the Russians—thanks to Russina—we’d had an unspoken truce despite the bad blood between our people. And with me preferring a safe bet, I’d have gone with the tried and true. I had no idea why my brothers wanted to rock the boat—except that they got too greedy and wanted to extend our reach. To move on to newer, bigger things. Which was fine, but there was a smart way and a stupid way of doing this.
I didn’t like feeling stupid.
I should never have listened to them.
These Italians were not fooled by the kiss I shared with Marinka for show, Vinny especially. Besides, she was stiff like wood when I was trying to devour her stupid mouth. She did attempt to awkwardly kiss me back, but felt like an utter novice, and clearly that wasn’t the time to teach her how to do it right. I kept wondering if she had ever been kissed before? She couldn’t be so innocent. She just didn’t have much experience with men.
Fuck, this girl needed so much more training, she acted like a brat and a teenager. Despite having an extremely active social life, Vinny was most inexorable out of the four. His incurable paranoia made him impossible to negotiate with and he was always ready to execute someone at the first sign of danger. I was lucky I saved that stupid girl from getting shot.
After that incident, he watched Marinka like a hawk the entire evening. He would attempt to get her to join our conversations, but she gave him half answers and then went back to reading her magazine. She acted like she didn’t care and that was more in Russina’s character. Besides, I liked seeing Vinny irritated. She was probably still shaken from the scene earlier.
“We will be in touch.” Vinny had said, smiling, then got into the limo with his cohorts. In his vocabulary, that was a polite way of saying, “I will be watching you.”
I nodded and waited until the cars disappeared in the distance before marching back to my office upstairs. I kicked the door open and the moment I spotted her seated where I left her, admiring her chewed nails as though all hell hadn’t almost broken loose, awakened the devil inside of me.
A ridiculous air of calm surrounded her and that’s what pissed me off the most. She didn’t fucking understand how she’d almost ruined a deal that had taken me months to set up. Every muscle in my body tensed.
How could she sit there so still after the hell she put us through? She had no clue how precarious the situation was. We could all be six feet under by now, dead and buried. It seemed to me she didn’t care about her life at all.
But she was going to learn today.
“Shut the door, Marco, and leave us alone,” I ordered my bodyguard. She finally raised her gaze to me, and shifted on the chair. Nervous.
Good.
“Sebastian, I am—”
“What the fuck were you thinking?” I asked. “Were you actually thinking at all? You were supposed to entertain him. It was a simple job.”
I was beside her before she could even realise what was happening, clutching her suit lapels and pulling her to me. She yelped and looked up with scared eyes, her eyebrows pinching together. Finally, she was fucking acknowledging my presence, but her silence was driving me insane.
“Do you have any idea what they would do to you if they knew you are Milo’s daughter?”
She stared at me blankly, her lips trembling, and in that moment, I truly wanted to shake her. She was fucking infuriating with her defeating silence and arrogance. I should have put her in her place in the beginning, but I turned soft for some reason I couldn’t fathom. She probably still thought this was a game to her. The period of grace had to end; she needed to pull herself together and act her part. She needed to be reminded her life was short and now, I was the one who controlled it.
“Answer me. Are you fucking deaf? Your inability to follow simple instructions makes you look stupid!” I shouted, moving my face closer to hers.
Flinching, she tried to free herself from my grip but she was no match for someone my size. I clasped her arm, my fingers digging into her flesh to the point that I was sure I had blocked any blood flow. The heat from her small body radiated through to my skin. This sudden desire mixed with fury was slowly consuming me.
“It’s not my fault that this happened. You haven’t told me anything. You haven’t prepared me!” she said, sparks in her eyes now. Her expression turned accusing. Bold. Angry. “Was I supposed to read Vinny’s mind to know he was expecting a freaking lap dance? Or for me to show him my tits? I only did what was expected of a wife of a business partner, not a stripper! Who does that? Who expects a wife to do shit like that!”
She trembled in my grip, but not from fear. Not this time.
The nerve. I wanted to avert my gaze but forced myself not to. A mere slip of a girl would not bring me to my knees. I’d never show weakness, or let her know she struck a chord. If I had a heart, maybe I’d have felt guilt, too.
I inhaled sharply, loath to admit she was right.
