Being

C H A P T E R F O R T Y T W O

I lay on my stomach as Ace trailed his warm fingers over my bareback. The back tickles felt lovely. I was sated and sleepy, warm and safe, cocooned under Aces protection. But it wasn’t real, none of this was real, we were playing a game of house. Holding ourselves up in this little festive bubble, sooner or later we be both knew it needed to pop.

“Sometimes, when you fuck me it feels really intimate.” I spoke my thoughts aloud and his finger stopped moving against my skin.

“Is that a bad thing?” His brow furrowed.

“For us, maybe.” He sighed and moved his hand away completely, I held the sheet around my body and rolled over onto my back.

“Is this about what I said? ’Cause I didn’t mean it like that I just meant - I -”

“No.” I shut him down, never wanting to bring that up again. “It just feels, deeper than sex sometimes and that’s really scary for me because I’ve never had that.”

“I know, I feel it too.” He confessed. “I’ve felt it for a long time, ever since that first lap dance. I just figured it was because nobody ever looked at me. I didn’t allow it. But you looked right into my eyes and there was just this - I don’t know - this -”

“Connection.” I helped him out.

“Yeah. It terrified me. But then I told myself I was just attracted to you. I hadn’t been attracted to anyone in a while and you’re a beautiful girl. I figured if I fucked you I would get it out of my system but then fucking you made it a thousand times worse.”

“I thought-” I stopped, feeling awkward with my honesty. He would think I was weird or broken or something.

“What?” He cuddled closer into me. This whole conversation felt intimate, invasive but comfortable.

“The first time we fucked, it felt intimate. There were so many feelings and I couldn’t process them. It was like beyond sex, like we made love. It left me confused and I just told myself I only felt that way because you were the first ever guy to give me an orgasm.”

“Wait, I was?” I nodded and he smiled, proud of himself. “Then I was a jackass and dangled those girls in your face because I got scared that I felt something more for you than just attraction. I wasn’t used to that. I’ve never had an adult relationship or even an adult hook-up so I acted in the only way I knew - like a pathetic teenager.”

“Yeah, you were a dick.” I confirmed and he laughed.

“After we fucked, I couldn’t stop thinking about you. I was driving myself crazy. I would watch you from across the club and my dick would twinge, constantly having to readjust the hard on in my pants before someone noticed. Every time I fell asleep I would dream about fucking you. Sex with you is fucking mind blowing, it’s all I could think about.

But I knew - I knew you were dangerous for me but I think I’m addicted to you. I don’t want to let you go, I can’t kill you and I think - I think the feeling is mutual.”

I backed away from him, unhooking myself from his arms.

“You’ve had chances Red. You’ve had your gun pointed directly at my head and still not pulled the trigger. You could’ve snapped Graces neck when she took you to see her vegetable patch but you didn’t.”

“It’s all part of a bigger plan.”

“No Red, it’s not.” I opened my mouth to speak, to deny my feelings again but I closed it.

“You killed my family.”

“That is all part of a bigger plan.” He used my own words against me.

“You bastard.” I held my hand out to slap him but he grabbed my wrist and stared at me dangerously.

“The death of your family was always going to be on my hands. We knew that.” My eyes sharpened on him. ”You knew that before you jumped into bed with the enemy.”

“That was supposed to be a little bit of fun.” I admitted, exhaling deeply, “so where do we go from here?”

He paused, thinking quietly to himself.

“Nikolai is alive.” My lips parted as I breathed. “He’s in hiding but I have my suspicions where. He wants to get his hands on Grace, he knows about her existence. You’re the leader now, you make the decisions. Work with me.”

“It would be the ultimate betrayal.” I offered quietly. “My family hated you, they wanted to break you before they killed you. You killed them first and now I must avenge that.”

I pulled the sheet off my body and showed him my scar. His thumb traced over the indent in my flesh and he clenched his jaw in anger.

“Your family is responsible for every bad thing that has ever happened to mine and therefore, I have no loyalty towards helping you protect yours. Blood must have blood.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought you’d say.”

I sat up a little and swivelled my body to face him.

“Why is Nikolai so interested in Grace?” His eyebrows raised.

“Isn’t that obvious?” I shook my head. “Grace is Daria’s daughter, Nikolai’s granddaughter.” And suddenly it all fell into place. The strawberry blonde hair, the bone structure; they looked alike.

“So Nikolai has always known about Grace?” His lips tightened.

“No, he only recently found out. Daria hid her pregnancy from everyone, she wanted to keep Grace at one point and we agreed to keep her pregnancy a secret.

We were teenagers, she thought she loved me and when I offered to put her into a safe house and stay with her she complied.

But when Grace was born Daria text me and told me to meet her at the park. When I got there Grace was left alone on a picnic bench in a car seat. Daria didn’t want her anymore.”

“That’s really sad.”

“Grace wasn’t made out of love Red. I was destined to marry Daria to merge our two families. My dad wanted it, Nikolai wanted it. But I didn’t love Daria and I didn’t respect her.

I was this asshole, arrogant teenager who felt more powerful than I actually was. I didn’t take the business seriously at all. We got given a year of engagement and I told her I wanted to fuck her before I got trapped in a marriage with someone who was shit in bed. She was a virgin who agreed with my terms but I wasn’t sweet to her. I didn’t make it special. I bent her over the very same park picnic bench and took her from behind.”

“Jesus Ace.”

“I know. I’ve grown so much since then, I was seventeen. Just a horny teenager looking to get his dick wet. But when I laid eyes on Gracie it all fell into place. Nothing mattered, only protecting her.

I decided to kill Daria because she knew about her. But when it came down to it I couldn’t. She was her mother. She had given me the most precious gift in the world and one day Grace would ask me about her and I don’t want to have to tell her that I killed her.

So I made Daria take an oath, I made her swear she wouldn’t tell anyone. I paid her a shit load of money to stay away and she is so frightened of disappointing Nikolai so I figured she’d keep my secret if I took full blame for calling the wedding off and destroying any of hope of merging.

But lately Nikolai has been popping up, he wants Grace. He tells me she belongs to him. I don’t know why he wants her, I figured he wanted her because he’s her grandfather but then I learned about the child sex ring and my fears have run riot.”

“But Titus controlled the ring when he was alive, wouldn’t they have just kidnapped her then, as a baby?”

Ace exhaled deeply, “My dad never knew about Grace, until one day Daria came clean and told him everything.

She claimed she loved me, she thought she could win over my heart if my dad forced us to be together. He was so mad at me for hiding Grace. He wanted to meet her, started talking all this shit about teaching her the mafia ways. So I tampered with his helicopter and killed both my parents, burying them close by.”

“In the vegetable patch?” He smirked at me. “So you killed your own parents?”

“Red, I’ll kill any threat to Grace. I need Petrov eliminated. When I learned he joined forces with Alessio to take me down I pretty much knew I was fucked. The Valentino’s have always brought big threat. They’re clever, strong and they have a lot of man power backing them.”

I smiled, the way Ace spoke about my family made me immensely proud to be a Valentino.

“And then there’s you.” My smile fell. “You know about Grace. You have a friendship with some of my men, you’re in the Valentino family and you have a loyalty to Petrov. You, Red are my ultimate threat because I have feelings for you that I can’t avoid. I can’t kill you and that makes me vulnerable. It leaves Grace open for danger. What am I meant to do with that?”

My heart did flutters at the ask of that question. Stupid butterflies chased one another around my stomach. But then my mind reaccustomed itself and disappointment seeped in.

I had no answer for him, I had no idea what my intentions were anymore. Being Willa or Gabriella I lost myself. I had no idea who I was besides my fathers killing machine. But being Red, I was finding myself. Who I wanted to be, who I wanted to be with.

Ace spoke again “I’m choosing to trust you Red. I just hope my feelings for you aren’t clouding my better judgment.”

And then, my brain answered his question by uttering one word; fool.