Page 121 of Don’t Say Mafia

She locked eyes with me in the mirror, and her cheeks flushed, her fingers hovering at the edge of the bra like she wasn’t sure whether to cover up or turn around and show me more.

My mouth went dry. My cock went from half hard to aching in half a second. I wanted to drop to my knees right there . . . rip the lace off with my teeth. I wanted to bend her against the mirror and fuck her until the glass cracked.

But I forced myself to breathe and to at least not sound like I was going to die as I spoke to her. “I have to talk to the owner about something,” I said, the words sounding distant even to me. “The shop rents from Paradise. I’ll be right back.”

Her face fell, and I realized my mistake—she thought I didn’t like what I was seeing.

I immediately palmed myself through my pants, obvious and unashamed, squeezing once to take the edge off the pain that had me throbbing so hard I could barely think straight. My eyes stayed locked on hers in the mirror as I dragged my hand up the length of my cock, letting her see exactly how much she was wrecking me.

“I’m dying, baby,” I rasped. “Literally dying. Keep those on, and we’re going to do something about that outfit when we get home.”

Her eyes widened, and her gaze dropped to my hand, then snapped back to my face. I gave her one last desperate look, then forced myself to step back and push through the staff door Cruz had just disappeared behind.

The door shut behind me with a soft click, and I stopped dead.

Cruz stood maybe five feet away, his hands raised slightly, palms out. In front of him, the saleswoman held a compact pistol steady, the barrel pointed center mass at Cruz’s chest. Her face was calm, but her finger was on the trigger, and her eyes were cold.

Another example of how the palms out move had never done anything. I needed to start making a record of this.

Cruz’s usual smirk was gone, and in its place was the flat, lethal calm he wore when things went bad and he was plotting.

The saleswoman didn’t turn toward me. She kept the gun trained on Cruz as though she’d been waiting for me to walk through that door. “Jagger,” she said evenly.

I snapped my fingers and pointed at her. “Claudia. That’s what you told me your name was.”

Her lip curled, and this time she did turn her head just enough for me to see the contempt in her eyes. “I told you my name was Brandy, you piece of shit,” she snarled at me . . . with an interesting new Irish lilt. Her gaze flicked back to Cruz, the gun never wavering. “But my real name is Saoirse.”

I groaned. “Do you know how insufferable he’s going to be knowing he was right? He’s going to be impossible to deal with. So thank you very much.”

Cruz tilted his head, the calm in his eyes sharpening into something else, like he’d just spotted a flaw in her armor and was already planning how to exploit it. “Well, Saoirse,” he said silkily, ignoring me, “did O’Dalaigh tell you you’d die if he sent you here? Or did he leave that part out?”

She hissed at him, low and venomous. “Shut up.”

The gun trembled—just a fraction—but we both saw it.

“It’s a simple question,” Cruz continued. “Did you come here thinking this would be a one-way ticket to his dick . . . or what?”

She bared her teeth at him. “Cormac O’Dalaigh loves me.”

For half a beat, there was silence as we stared at her incredulously. Then Cruz barked out a laugh. I followed right after him, the sound ripping from my chest. “Claudia,” I drawled, “that’s hilarious.”

Her eyes went glacial, and a second later a shot cracked through the room. The sound was deafening in the tight space.

The bullet screamed past Cruz’s ear, so close I saw a strand of his hair lift with the heat of it, and plaster exploded from the wall behind him.

Cruz didn’t flinch . . . but we both stopped laughing.

“You’re not cackling now, are you?” she asked as her gaze slid to me. “And by the way . . . Jagger,” she said, her voice turning almost conversational, “your little girlfriend isn’t so stupid.”

A muscle ticked in my jaw.

“She watches, and she listens, and eventually she’s going to start asking the right questions.”

“What did you tell her?” I asked casually like she’d just mentioned a scheduling conflict instead of a potential nuclear detonation in my personal life.

Saoirse smiled. “Just enough.”

Well, that was fun. It better not mess with my plans, or I was going to kill her and then bring her back and kill her again . . . out of spite.