Chapter 12: Wicked Fame: Chapter 12

Maria scans the broken glass carpeting the office floor. It leaves a trail all the way across the dark wood like a galaxy of stars. Torn pages and the keyboard that fell off the desk during my altercation with a member of a rival crime family show further signs of a struggle having taken place here. Ricardo and Antonio just cleaned up the body. The man’s in the basement, but spatters of his blood spot the room.

She’s a wise woman, so Maria chooses to silence her curiosity. “Did pick a bad time?”

She’s not the frivolous type, so there must be a reason for her visit.

“Did you need anything from me?” I visually check her for bruises, but she’s fully covered in a coat, black pants, and boots. “Has your husband hurt you—”

“No. I came to talk to you. Casually. It’s nothing important.” Despite doing her best, she can’t hide her shock at the scene before her. She presses her lips. “I met Angelo yesterday. He said he wants to see us married soon. But I want to get to know you better. I will not rush into this like I did with my last marriage.”

“Of course. Unfortunately, there’s an issue I’m dealing with at the moment.” I wave my hands at the chaotic state of the office. “Should be done by Saturday. Do you want to…” My teeth bite my tongue in reflex as Francesca’s invitation swims back into my head.

It’s near Woodstock. We’ll be all alone.

In my brain, there’s a version of me doing all the depraved things I’ve wanted to do with her.

All alone.

I’m imagining a rustic cabin in the wilderness where nobody can hear her regardless of how loud she is. I want to make her scream until her throat is hoarse.

A heavy need settles in my bones. The cold prick of regret stabs the back of my skull.

My body is in this room with the right woman, but my mind isn’t. Strawberry-scented lipstick coats the inside of my nostrils.

Though I stand before my future wife, my cock’s burns with the fervent need to be inside a different girl.

My time with Francesca is designed to be short-lived, so I’m determined to make the most of it before I settle down. There’s something I have felt for the heiress since the first moment I’ve met her and it demands to be explored. She makes me care deeply for her wounds, makes me want to soothe them. I eat up every haunted look of her eyes. She has no idea how much self-control it takes me to keep my hands to myself when she begs me. Even when I’m angry at her, I can’t stay angry for long. Also, since I found out she can take every dark kink I throw at her, I am dying to ravish that luscious body in all the depraved ways. A person like her, so open-minded yet beautiful and sensitive, is very hard to come by.

I’ll give her the few weeks and months I have left. The last days of my freedom. And hope it’s enough.

I drag my errant thoughts back to Maria who is breathing slowly. “I’ll let you know when I’m back,” I say.

She makes a small, affirmative gesture by crinkling her eyes. “Angelo said he was poisoned by the enemy. Does that have something to do with it?”

A resentful sign unravels from me. “They’ve been coming after our territory for a long time. I thought it was the Russians, but turns out it’s our old rival, the Bianchi family. Those rats were lying low for a while since their Don and Underboss got arrested in a drug raid last year, so I thought they weren’t a threat anymore.”

The sudden swish of cloth catches me off guard. Maria dabs her Burberry handkerchief over my forehead, soaking up all the sweat and god knows what else I got on me while I was beating that man who currently is tied up in the basement into pulp. “Am I making you uncomfortable?” She withdraws jerkily. “Seeing blood makes me…worried.”

“Not at all.” It’s nice of her to clean my cut, but her kindness seems cautious. Unnatural. Unlike Francesca who does it as easy as breathing.

“You’re busy. I’ll go.” Abruptly, she turns and saunters away.

I wind my way down to the basement where a shriek rattles the dark-painted walls. I left the questioning up to Antonio this time. Ricardo’s just guarding the man, in case he tries to escape.

Unbuttoning my sleeves and dragging them up over my arms, I cast a glance to Ricardo. “Has he said anything worthwhile?”

Ricardo’s uncharacteristically serious demeanor is the first sign of a problem. “The underboss’s son was the one who engineered Angelo’s poisoning. He fled the city yesterday. Probably knows we’re coming for his ass.”

“Where’s he now?”

“He has vacation homes in Miami, San Francisco, and Chicago. It’ll be one of those. The hostage doesn’t know which one he’s currently residing at.”

Fear rolls down my spine. He left yesterday? If he leaves the country, if they actually manage to escape…Nico will kill me for not going after them harder.

“Get out, Ricardo,” I grind my teeth as I step into the small room, violence surging up my bloodstream. “I’m taking over.”

The cheesecake taunts me. Why did I have to buy the goddamn thing just because it reminded me of Francesca? It’s like my subconscious mind already decided to go to Woodstock even before the rest of me caught up.

The bartender blinks at me curiously.

“Rough fight?” he asks, scrutinizing the unhealed cuts and wounds tattooed on my face.

“This week was a fucking nightmare,” I reply.

I must sound sufficiently violent because he puts a stop to his friendly small talk immediately. Staying a safe distance away behind the bar, he begins pouring the other guest’s drinks. For a Saturday night, this place isn’t very crowded.

I sip my beer, eyes roaming the crowd for a specific blonde.

The good news is, I finally captured the idiot who poisoned Angelo after a pointless trip to Miami and then Chicago. After getting him to confess, I put him out of his misery. Then killed his associates and sent Nico footage of their corpses.

Nico replied with a one-line message.

Sorry for doubting you were a Russo.

Now the bad news: I don’t care. Not about Nico, nor my glorious return as a hero, nor about the ridiculously expensive party that Angelo is planning, not even for the fact that Nico suggested he’d make me the underboss when he becomes the Don.

When I set foot in the backroom of our casino in Queens, the place where all the capos and senior members hold meetings every week, a venue I’d been in more times than I could count, it felt empty. The cheers rang hollow, the praise didn’t calm my unease. The alcohol tasted like an expensive luxury I’d lost the ability to appreciate.

Not even Nico’s warm welcome could make the place feel like home anymore.

All I could see was the distrusting man who had been in my apartment that night. Something had broken between us, and nothing could put it back. The sense of security, the sense of rightness I’d always felt being a part of this family was gone.

I didn’t belong there, which was ironic, given I’d sacrificed my life to prove to everyone that I did.

You’d be a great chef. Your cooking’s phenomenal.

Francesca’s suggestion from that morning whispered to me like a mirage promising a path out of the endless desert.

To me, growing up in uncertainty, home meant a permanent roof over my head, a clear source of income, and a group of familiar people who cared for me and whom I could call my own.

But is home a safe place or one that your heart is pulled to, even when it makes no sense?

My vision blurs, eyelids begin to droop, but I fight to stay awake. The past few days have taken everything out of me. The fear of losing the enemy, and the devastating consequences if he fled, made sleep an impossibility. I drove myself hard every second.

And all that to ultimately end up here? Life’s ironic sometimes.

The moment she enters the bar, my instincts flare to life. I smell her strawberry scent before I see her.

Without fail, every single head—both male and female—turns in her direction. The heiress is very pretty, but in this case, it’s her outfit that’s drawing all the attention. Designer, as always. In a blue tweed miniskirt and jacket co-ord set, showing off miles of silky smooth skin. It’s always blue with her. It must be her favorite color or something.

If I’m a dog that knows the scent of its master, she’s a hawk that knows the sight of her prey.

Her bare legs fold under the counter as she slides into the stool next to mine. All I’ve seen in the last few days is the ugly mugs of Bianchi men, so her angelic face is a welcome change. I stare at it like it’s Mona Lisa.

“Never thought I’d find you drinking alone at a bar.” My ears tingle at the brush of her voice. “Any reason you picked this specific one, hundreds of miles away from where you live?”

“So I could run into you.”

“Seriously?”

I raise my half-full glass of beer. “This is the nicest place in this town and you’re still you. You need to numb the pain. So, how’s your art coming along?”

The last question is simply to irritate her. Sometimes, her eyes look so cold and lifeless, anger is the only way to breathe fire into them. That’s why I banter with her. Annoy her. Force her to think up witty retorts instead of wallowing in her misery.

“I think I want to die,” she declares, her voice scratchy.

I hold her hand and guide her up my thigh, loving how her skin flushes and she leans in closer. Until her fingers register the bulge of metal at my side. “My pistol’s at your service, in that case.”

“You’re joking, right?”

“I’ll give you three seconds to guess the answer.”

“You sound mad.”

“Here’s a tip, Francesca: next time you invite someone to your studio, text them the fucking address instead of hoping they’re a psychic.”

“Shit. I’m sorry. I thought….” She groans. I notice that the usually flawless strands of her hair look dry. The whites of her eyes are meshed with red veins. “I’m out of it nowadays.”

Between the two of us, I can’t truly say who looks worse. I look like I ran into a truck and she looks like she ran into an artist’s block.

Removing her hand from me, I deposit the box of strawberry cheesecake on her lap. “A souvenir for you, all the way from Chicago.”

“Cheesecake?”

“Rose cheesecake. I don’t know, it reminded me of you. Since you’re into beauty, art, and stuff.”

My heart pounds in my ears as her passive expression shatters into something unidentifiable.

I curse at myself inwardly. Why did I say something so cheesy? That’s not like me. The words poured out before I could contain the warm, cozy sensation that gripped my chest the moment she sat next to me like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Like it was exactly where she belonged.

She didn’t need to think about it for even a second.

Things are changing between us. We’re growing closer, despite my desire to push her away. That, combined with my own dissatisfaction at not being happier after my great conquest of the Bianchi family snowballs into a hot surge of displeasure. What’s wrong with me all of a sudden? Just a few weeks ago, I was so secure in my place in the world, so sure of my future with my perfect wife, and now all my dreams are ash I don’t want to swallow.

Francesca runs her fingertips along the paper bag the box is in. “Were you always this sentimental? No, wait. I remember you telling me I need to learn self-control and turning me down just a few days ago.”

I scowl. “Let’s say the warm Miami sun made my cold heart melt a little.”

“Why were you in Miami?”

“Business.” I almost want to confess I killed two men and maimed three, just to see those juicy lips parting open in shock, but I resist.

“I’m assuming it’s best not to ask about the kind of business?”

“You assume right.”

It’s too much to hope that she’ll drop the line of questioning. “Your face looks like a mess. Are you sure you shouldn’t be lying in a hospital? Is it safe for you to move?”

“Don’t judge a man’s state by his appearance,” I say. “I can still throw you over my shoulder and carry you out of here before you finish taking your next breath.”

“I see you’re wasting no time with foreplay.” Francesca tugs at my arm, pouting in the direction of the door. “Consider me charmed by your dirty talk.”

I clear my throat, not budging.

“Order your drink,” I say. “I’ll even be generous and pay for it.”

“I’d rather go home now.” Her hot exhale kisses my jaw. “There’s so much we can do together when we’re all alone.”

“I know you wanna quit, but it’s better to reduce your intake slowly. One glass won’t set you back.”

“I already had two in the morning.”

Of course, she did.

“And how many in the afternoon?” I ask.

Pink stains brighten her cheeks. “One.”

“In that case, let’s get out of here,” I say, afraid she might be tempted by all the free-flowing alcohol if we hang around longer.

As we stroll out with her arm curled around my middle and mine around her shoulder, I wonder what the people around us think of us together. There’s no mistaking what we are—a thug and a polished princess. We look wrong together.

When she squirms into the driver’s side of a pickup truck parallel parked in front of the bar, my confusion deepens.

“What’re you doing? Get in,” she says.

“You can drive? Then why did you make me your personal chauffeur?”

“Because I’m always drunk, high, or hungover. I don’t want to get into an accident or kill anyone.” She unfastens her seatbelt and hops out of the car, handing me the keys. “Actually, it’s better if you drive right now. I have a headache.”

“You just saw me drinking,” I remind her.

“Half a glass of beer. I’ve had more. We’ll be breaking the law either way.”

If there’s anything I’m a pro at, it’s breaking the law, so I get behind the wheel without further protest. There’s no better way to relax than to drive on empty rural roads where I can drive as fast as I like.

Francesca has adapted to my reckless driving over the last few weeks because she doesn’t even comment when I nearly crash into somebody’s fence.

“You said I remind you of roses.” Her sweet voice rises over the low hum of the radio. “You remind me of a knife.”

“A rose and a knife. That’s a weird picture. Those two don’t belong with each other.”

Neither do we.

This craving, lust, whatever we’re experiencing, exists in the sliver of time between irresponsibility and recklessness. We’re playing with fire knowing it’ll burn us but hoping the burn will be good enough to make it worth it.

Francesca said it herself. It’s just sex. Just physical. She won’t cling and neither will I.

At the end of the day, she’s a rich heiress desperately seeking an escape from the brutality inside her own head. Someday, her illusions about me will be shattered. When they’re all gone, she’ll leave me. Just like my mother did.

My grip tightens around the wheel. I have to remember that.

“Those cuts look deep.” She caresses the bumpy, broken skin over my cheekbone that the doctor stitched back together roughly. “Who did this?”

“He’s dead so don’t worry about it.”

Her lips pucker in distaste. “You killed someone in Miami.”

“He’s not the first man I’ve killed.” And he won’t be the last.

“Of course. You’re the big bad criminal who has killed loads of people. Are you proud of it?”

The knot in my stomach expands like a balloon with the growing creases on her face. I know she doesn’t like my profession. She accepts it because she’s blinded by the breathless attraction we share but someday, she’ll open her eyes. When she does, she’s going to hate what she sees.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” I exhale. “I did it to save my family. To save myself.”

“And is your family proud of you?”

“I hope so.” Maybe Nico’s pacified for now regarding my loyalty. But how long will it be until he begins to suspect me again? I saw the resentment on the faces of the other capos who were afraid of losing to me in the succession war. That I have more say in the organization than they do. Is that what brothers should think?

Maybe Francesca’s not the only one desperately holding onto illusions to erase the emptiness of her reality.

Maybe it’s the both of us.

“You never talk much about your family. I mean, apart from your Mom and your friend whom you killed. Is Antonio your family, too? And Ricardo?”

“They’re like my brothers.”

“Who is your father?”

“The Don. Angelo Russo. He’s a man I respect more than anyone else.”

“Wow, it’s rare to hear you talk about someone in such positive tones. I need to look up this guy. He must be impressive.” Her fingers hungrily scour Google on her phone. Angelo’s picture from years ago comes up. The time when he went to prison for tax evasion. It was a brief stint, but he was in the news for it. His hair is still brown in that photo. “Huh, he looks normal. What exactly do you respect about him?”

“That he’s fierce, but also gentle and paternal. He takes care of his people even if he has to ruin lives to do it. To me, he’s the perfect father, a pillar of strength and support. But at the same time, he’s no tyrant. It’s a fine line.”

Francesca giggles. “He’s a lot like you, then.”

Pinpricks of warmth stick to my skin. All my life, I’ve wanted to be like Angelo. He’s my role model. To be told I resemble him is the greatest honor.

“I’m nothing like the don.” My voice is low, unsure. The coldness in the air pricks my skin. Francesca is staring at me expectantly, waiting for me to tell her more. “I can’t change anyone’s life the way he changed mine when he saved me at sixteen.”

“Saved you how?”

“He found me bleeding after a gang fight and rescued me. Nursed me back to health. Gave me a roof over my head and a job. If not for that opportunity, I wouldn’t be here with you.”

The feather-light weight of Francesca’s fingers settles on my knee. “How did you almost die?” she whispers in a scared voice.

I have never told her about my brutal teenage days. But this car ride is long, and the mood between us is suitably heavy. We have time, and I don’t need to focus on the road since it’s deserted.

“You know how many times I’ve been arrested by the police as a teenager?” I start, trying to lighten up the depressing talk of my childhood with some statistics. “Sixteen. I got involved with a gang after my mother started selling her body to men to pay for her addiction. There would be strange guys over at our apartment at weird hours. Some of them were brutal. They liked hurting a young boy because it made them feel strong. Some men wanted me to stand out in the cold while they fucked her all night. And others…well they wanted to fuck me.”

She gasps.

“Is this story too horrifying for a precious heiress who grew up in a safe, perfect home?” I press my foot on the pedal, accelerating, wondering if she thinks less of me now that she knows what sort of background I come from. I’m a dirty, defiled man in more ways than one.

“I’m so sorry.” Her voice trembles. I can feel her heavy breath caressing my neck, her upturned face staring holes into me. “I never imagined it was so bad for you. Did your mother allow…those men to…do touch you?”

“She never lifted a finger to protect me, that’s for sure.” Anger turns my saliva into acid coating my tongue. “When I grew sick of being hurt, I joined a gang. At first, it was because I needed to learn how to defend myself. Fighting is not an optional skill when you have a life like mine.”

“On the night we first met you told me you were a fighter,” Francesca says, squeezing my knee in sympathy. “It breaks my heart to know you were forced to fight. That you weren’t given a choice.”

“Life is not about choices, Francesca. It’s about making the best of the limitations imposed upon you.”

Her breaths are coming in shorter waves, cascading hotly down the side of my face. “I still wish it was different. Your past. If you had a happy home, a happy childhood—”

“I would be someone different. Those years, unbearable as they were, made me strong. I like knowing I survived the worst and that I can survive whatever life throws at me because of what I had to endure. Though, to an heiress like you, I guess my background sounds unsavory.”

“Gabriele.” Francesca reprimands me, pulling her body back like I’ve wounded her. “I would never judge you—or anyone—for circumstances outside your control.”

She means it. I can see that in the wetness of her lashes, in the tears that are on the verge of spilling from her eyes. Francesca is a bleeding heart, so compassionate to a complete stranger who is only using her for her body and his kinks. Well, she’s using me, too.

“I have never met your don Angelo,” she continues. “But he must be a great man because he recognized your value and saved your life.”

“He taught me a lot,” I admit, resenting the fact that I’ve ended up giving one more piece of my history to her today, one more detail I’ve never told anyone but her. Angelo knows about my childhood years, but only because he did the research. “I have never missed not having a father. Angelo was everything I could have asked for in a father figure and more.”

“You know, I think you’d make a great father, too. You’re so protective.” Releasing a huge sigh, she leans back against her seat. “If only Daddy Kink was your thing, I could get to enjoy that side of you.”

A cough sputters out of me. I tear my attention away from the road to glare at her in disgust. “You had to go and make that sexual?”

“Of course. Because our relationship is just physical, Gabriele. That’s what I promised you. Unless you want this to be more than sex?” Her saucy eyebrow arch is a trick, a trap, the door into a universe I can never be a part of. She’s teasing me, but it stings.

“How can it be more?” I say. “You’re you and I’m me. We both have our place in the world. And those worlds will never collide.”

“You sounded like my ex-boyfriend Mason just then.”

“Don’t compare me to that dickhead.”

“You’re a dickhead, too, sometimes—” Instead of completing her sentence, she waves at the approaching structure outside the window. “Here. This is my cabin. Turn right.”

It’s half-blurred by trees but gets clearer as I approach it. The GPS navigation gives me my final direction.

I swerve the car, parking in the driveway.

“Finally. Home sweet home.” Francesca thrusts out her arms at what looks like an average house. It has a wooden exterior. Through the windows, I spy cozy yet tasteful furnishings reminiscent of a cabin.

“This is where you paint? I don’t see any paintbrushes.”

Francesca leads me behind the house. There’s another rectangular building here, a smaller one. It has no windows but when she opens the door, a skylight floods the room with brightness. “No, this is where I paint.”

The actual studio is in a separate building behind the house, then. It’s extremely spacious with grey walls, high ceilings, and canvases of all sizes. Broken palettes, tubes of paint, dirty, stained cloths, and wooden easels are crammed into the space.

But it’s the not-so-obvious details that my mind fixates on.

I see things that I shouldn’t. Buckets of tears imprinted on the white canvas where there should only be empty nothing. The dangerous push-pull of her shattered mind as she played with the paper-knife now resting on the edge of the table. The depth of her passion for art in the huge number of artworks stacked in the corner and the collection of rough sketches on paper pinned to a board.

I know too much about her, details that make her my Francesca rather than just a warm body with a pleasing face.

I hate that my real addiction is discovering the broken parts of her psyche, unraveling her mysteries, and penetrating deeper into her heart and mind than anyone ever has. Making her give me parts of herself, especially the fragments that nobody else ever had the privilege of seeing.

I lie and tell her it’s her body I’m into, it’s her tight cunt, her pretty lips. But the question that she asked me earlier, the one that I evaded, still lingers in my head.

Unless you want this to be more than sex?

I cannot answer that yet so I point to the collection of canvases full of color that are leaning one in front of another like a stack of dominoes waiting to collapse. The ones in the front have a thin layer of dust, but underneath it, they’re all vivid splashes of color. Beautiful, mundane sights are elevated into magical experiences through a soft and romantic style of art.

A brook with flowers blooming beside it.

A bouquet of roses on a table.

The nightscape of a town as seen from atop a hill.

“How many years did it take you to finish all of this?” I say.

“Six,” comes her instant reply. “But most of them are terrible.”

“Which one is your favorite? Show me.”

“So you can tell me how childish it is?”

“I’m just curious. Besides, I don’t know a thing about art so how can I judge if it’s good or not?”

She considers this, nodding.

Her ass cheeks bounce up in the air as she bends to retrieve a small painting from the back. It’s the image of two koi fish swimming around each other in water painted in bright, vivid colors. Their orange spots are hard to miss even from a distance. The greenish-blue water has been rendered sparkling and transparent through some sorcery that I will never decode. Even the small weeds under the water’s surface are visible. It’s easily one of the most gorgeous images I have looked at in my life.

“This one’s from when I was fourteen. Took me a week to complete. I was so proud of it, I hung it in my room and boasted to all my friends. Until I couldn’t stand to look at it anymore.”

My gaze locks onto the picture, my eyes refusing to blink.

Breath shudders in my lungs. It’s as breathtaking as a clear stream or vast mountain, something so perfect only the divine ought to have the power to create it.

“How could a human have done this?” The question in my mind trips over my tongue.

Francesca’s smile spreads slowly across her whole face, bringing the light back to her lifeless, hungry eyes. “That might be the most extra compliment anybody has ever given me.”

I clear my throat, pulling my features back into a rougher, more intimidating expression. I can’t be going all soft and mushy around her. I’m already opening up to her way more than I open up to anyone. And every single detail she knows about me is a weapon she can use against me.

“It’s nothing like what you’re into these days,” I remark. “I can’t figure out your spring thesis but I appreciate this. It’s simple and beautiful.”

Francesca tilts her head, a frown screwing the corners of her lips. “That’s because I’ve grown as an artist. I’m trying more challenging projects, doing more abstract stuff that will win me awards and acclaim in the future.”

There it is, her desire for validation and fame. Burning a hole in the air. Burning a hole in her soul. Burning her real self to ashes in the process.

Why is she so determined to become what other people want her to be when her natural self is so magnificent? I’ll never understand. “Whatever you say.”

Her heels click in a slow drumbeat as she saunters toward me, extending the painting out to me. “Last time I was at your apartment, the walls looked bare. This matches with your couch Will you take it if I give it to you?”

She’s giving me artwork that means so much to her? A warm feeling nuzzles my stomach. What would it feel like to have a piece of her in my living room, to wake up every morning and see something she poured her heart and soul into staring back at me? To feel her invisible presence? A part of her, the fourteen-year-old who loved to draw, is forever imprisoned inside this picture.

I’ll never stop thinking of Francesca if this thing is in my line of vision every single day.

It’s both a blessing and a curse.

“I don’t need it,” I say gruffly.

“It’s free. So you might as well take it.”

“I said I don’t need it.”

“Come on, you’re offending me. Is my painting that ugly?”

“It’s not ugly. I…” My complex feelings are forming a web in my brain. This is an equation that will take years to solve, so I quit while I’m ahead. “Okay, give it to me.”

“It’s yours. I’ll hold it in reserve and deliver it to you later.”

She puts away the art piece. The dim lights work her angles, chiseling her features into a more perfect version of themselves. I follow her to the main house where the large living room is littered with books and the walls are crammed with her artworks. Once again, they’re all completely different from the work I’ve seen her doing. There’s something magical about these. I’m baffled and surprised as I take in each one.

My awestruck expression probably conveys more than flattery could. Francesca edges closer to me, her soft head burrowing into my chest.

Before I know it, her fingers are playing lazily with my hair.

“There’s only one bedroom here.” Her raspy whisper injects desire into my veins. My self-control begins to dissolve, little by little.

“So?”

I’m never seeing Heaven once I’ve done everything I plan to do with her.

She crooks her finger in a come hither motion. “I want to show my number one fan a good time.”

“I’m not your number one fan.”

“I see the way you look at my artworks,” is what she says, but her pupils expanding inside those sparkling blue eyes speak a different language. I see the way you look at me.

“How do I look at them?”

“Like you can’t believe they’re real.”

I can’t believe she’s real. So talented, so deep, yet so self-destructive. Not many people would treat a criminal the way she does. She was feeding me breakfast before I ever touched her. She was nursing my wounds before I’d ever been inside her.

She was stealing something invisible from me before I realized I was losing it.

“Do you want me to fuck you, Francesca? Is that what you’re begging for?”

Her breasts press into my chest so hard, her hammering heartbeat bleeds into my skin. “Exactly. Be rough with me. Do things only a mobster can do. Leave your conscience at the door and rail me like I deserve to be railed.”

My nostrils flare. The promise of unraveling her once more, of ripping away yet another part of her mask surges in my bloodstream. I crave the anticipation; the cocktail of fear mixed with hope as I imagine how she’ll react when I show her yet another depraved part of me.

Francesca calls out to an unconscious part of me to protect her, and another unconscious part of me to rip her to pieces. Being the asshole that I am, I want to do both. At the same time if possible.

I fit my hand around the back of her neck.

I’m a man who lives by impulses rather than principles.

And she’s always my first impulse.

Pulling her close, I crash my lips into hers, the rush of blood crawling in my ears as adrenaline spikes. Her tongue sears my mouth as it brushes over mine.

If I had to describe this feeling…it’s like coming home.