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Instead, I ask, “Is there any reason why you haven’t settled down yourself then? Started your own family?” Because isn’t that what was most important to mafia. Their family, heritage, and the continuation of their success?
“Why do you ask? Are you nominating yourself to carry my child, Ara?”
My stomach drops at the insinuation and momentary image of us playing happy family. “Of course not,” I snap.
He chuckles as he begins to pour batter into the heated pan. “Because the only company I can stand is my own. Maybe Lorenzo and Ivan’s as well. Everyone always wants something. A child would be no different. I’d be cruel to bring one into this world. I don’t exactly scream father figure, wouldn’t you agree?”
It’s strange to pin moments like these against the same man who sent me body parts as gifts.
“At least you’re self-aware.” He offers me a “don’t test me” expression and I can’t help but break out into a smile. “What about me? You know I want something from you and yet you seem to like my company plenty.” I’m playing with fire. It’s a dangerous question. Maybe it’s how domesticated the situation feels that offers me courage.
“You, I can handle.”
“What does that even mean?”
He steps around the counter and drags my seat closer to him as he looms over me. “It means I will fuck this filthy little mouth of yours when I want.” His thumb rubs against my bottom lip. “And smack that ass of yours whenever I please. I’m going to consume you during every waking moment of your day. Because that brings me great pleasure.”
“It sounds like an addiction,” I counter.
“You’re so much more than an addiction, Ara.” He leans in and bites my bottom lip. “I’m still trying to get my fill.”
My body shudders with goose bumps and I want to mount him all over again. Yes, I want to devour this man willingly and I try my hardest to swat away the unknown shift that rests between us. It’s a palpable tension that hasn’t always been present, or perhaps I was so good at denying its existence that it’s creeping realization is cutting off any rational thought.
Luca and I can never be more than this. Whatever this was? We were using each other and yet, I’d come to expect him. As much as I voiced hating having him around, I’d become used to it. Consumed by it even. It was either because I was entirely depraved as a woman up until this point or…
I shut down the thought. I could never fall for someone like Luca Armani.
With exceptional timing my stomach growls loudly again and we both look down.
“Perhaps pancakes first,” Luca says.
37
LUCA
The moment I was advised my hounds had sniffed out a traitor, I sent Ara home with my driver and made my way to Balmere. Considering her little declaration of not enjoying violence she best not see what’s to come.
Lorenzo and I are walking past the fighting ring when he asks. “Sir, I know it’s not my place to ask…but what are you planning on doing with Miss Barone?”
I don’t even look at him. “You’re right. I don’t answer to anyone.”
“Apologies,” he says and recedes back. I hired Lorenzo when I was twenty-one and only a few months before my father’s death. He was the only one who knew my dirty secret from that night and I had every confidence he would take it to the grave or else I would’ve already put him there. However, it didn’t mean I had to answer to him especially on personal interests such as Ara.
Before I open the door, I add. “She’s a priority right now. She and her father could still be linked to the missing shipment.”
An incredulous expression crosses his features, not entirely convinced but he’s quick to cover it and simply nods. I was absolutely fixated on the woman. I always had someone following her. I’d bugged her work and apartment waiting for her to step out of place so I can punish her personally. I just couldn’t resist her. It almost felt like it was turning into a weakness one that was not going unnoticed.
Something that doesn’t settle well with me.
When I open the door my five masked hounds are already waiting in the room. One is sitting on a chair, carving another wooden creature. His leg is in a moonboot. I smirk at him and can see the hateful expression in his gaze. He’s lucky I didn’t fire his ass for the shit performance he displayed in the ring Friday night. Having been around Ara made me feel lenient. And credit was due toward Dmitri who held himself well even against me.
When I see Ricky Carton in the chair, I’m disappointed. “So you’re the grand mastermind behind the interference with my transfers?”
His eye and lip are already swollen, and his eye has swelled beyond the point of being able to open. He’s worked for me a few years now. Not exactly the brightest of my men either. But he was loyal- to his family. He was working on the streets to try and support his mother and daughter when we first employed him. He’d been hard working and grateful for the consistent money flow. The only reason he might find to betray me was if someone else offered him more.
A mastermind he was not. All of this back and forth and not yet finding the person responsible for organizing this was wearing on my patience. Not only did I have a traitor but most likely they’d be attempting to deal or off cart it somewhere else. To pull something off like this multiple hands had to be involved and I was only getting the lackies.
“Yes, sir,” he drawls out, disoriented. I don’t buy it.
