Lawless: Mob Boss Book Three (3 page)

S
he wanted
to snap at him. To tell him she wasn't the scared girl he’d once known. But she suddenly felt anything but strong, her guard slowly slipping in the presence of his strength.

She sat at one end of the couch and was glad when he took the other end. She didn’t need the distraction. Didn’t want to smell him, to feel the magnetic pull of her body to his.

He downed the drink in one swallow and ran one hand through his dark hair. “I knew Los Angeles wouldn’t be the end of it,” he finally said.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

He stared into the fire, now devouring the wood he’d stacked inside the grate. “Dante was just an instrument.”

“We already knew he wasn’t acting alone,” Angel said. At least ten men had defected from the Vitale family — and some from other families as well — in the months before Dante kidnapped David in an effort to take over the Syndicate’s New York territory.

“We knew there were followers, disciples of Dante who wanted to see the business return to its traditions,” Nico clarified. “We didn’t know someone else was orchestrating the movement.”

“Someone above Dante?” Angel asked.

Nico nodded. “After we got David out alive, I needed to be invisible for awhile to figure out what was really going on.”

“And did you?” she asked.

“I’m not sure.”

“Then why come back?” The question sounded more bitter than she intended. Happy wasn’t a strong enough word to describe how she felt now that she knew he was alive. But she’d gotten used to her grief, her bitterness. What was she supposed to do with all of that now?

He sighed. “I spent the last four months tracing the hierarchy above Dante, trying to figure out where the orders were coming from. Then Luca heard through the grapevine that a hit had been taken out on you.”

She sat up straighter, the liquor turning sour in her stomach. “On me?”

He nodded. “And David.”

“By who?”

He turned to look at her. “By the same person who wanted me dead back when we rescued David.”

She shook her head, running through a list of names in her mind before skidding to a stop on one of them. “Raneiro?”

“The one and only,” Nico said, his voice laced with ice.

“But…” She shook her head. “Why? I mean, I know he wasn’t convinced I could handle Boston when we kicked out Frank, but I’ve followed every rule to the letter. I’ve handed over the correct percentage of our profits to the Syndicate. I’ve escalated up line when the situation has called for it.”

“Except with your first round of… eliminations,” he said.

“Frank deserved to be kicked to the curb,” she said coldly. “And so did every single person who was kicked there with him.”

“I’m not disputing that,” he said. “I’m not even saying that’s why Ranerio came after you.”

“Then what?”

“Raneiro has no reason to believe you’re any different than me. It was no secret we were involved, and no secret that you were coming at the business with a different perspective than the men who’ve run it for generations. My vision for a new Syndicate hasn’t played out to his liking. He’s done. ”

“So he was going to… what?” she asked. “Kill David and I to make sure the Rossis were done with the Boston territory for good?”

“That’s what it looks like,” Nico said. “He already thought I was out of the picture. Eliminating you would allow him to reinstate the old world model without resistance.”

“You came out of hiding for me,” she murmured.

He turned sharply toward her. “I wasn’t in hiding, Angel.” His voice was steely. “You know me better than that.”

She nodded. Nico Vitale was not a man who hid. From anything.

“I did what I did to protect you while I figured out who was really responsible for the upheaval in the Syndicate. I needed perspective. The kind of perspective that I could only gain by removing myself from the situation, by looking at it from afar. And I needed to know you were safe while I got it.”

She put down her empty glass and walked to the doors overlooking the beach. They’d traveled through the night, entered Maine as the sun rose into the sky. It felt like a lifetime since she’d been sleeping on the sofa in her office. Since she had thought Nico was dead. Too much had happened in too short a time. Her gut was still catching up to her brain.

“How did you do it?” she asked.

“I was wearing kevlar, like all the men,” he said softly. “I didn’t want to be shot, but Luca and I had planned for the possibility as a way for me to get out of the picture with minimal risk. After that it was just a little money in the right hands.”

“And you couldn’t tell me?” she asked softly. “I…” She exhaled a shuddering breath. “I didn’t know how to live without you.”

She closed her eyes as his hands came to rest on her shoulders. “But you did live, Angel. And I had to make sure it stayed that way. If you’d known I was alive…” He took a deep breath. “We wouldn’t have remained apart for long. We would have met in secret. We might even have gotten away with it for awhile. But eventually someone would have found out, and then you would have been a target again because of your connection to me.”

“I was a target anyway,” she said, looking at his reflection in the glass.

And I had to live without you every day
.

“I know.” She felt the hard press of his thighs behind her legs, his chest as immoveable as stone against her back. “And I’m going to kill the bastards responsible.”

She should have been scared by the promise in his voice, but that Angel was gone forever. Now she could only feel relieved. He would fight to keep her and David safe, and she would fight with him.

She turned in his arms, lacing her hands behind his neck, pressing her body against him. “Take me to bed, Nico. I don’t want to talk about them anymore.”

S
he didn’t have
to ask him twice. He lifted her into his arms and headed for the stairs, relishing the feel of her in his arms, her hair soft against his chin. He’d imagined this moment for the last four months, and he kept his eyes on hers, afraid she would disappear like a dream.

He walked past David’s room and continued to the master suite. He used his foot to close the door behind them, then deposited Angel on the floor next to the bed. She stood there while he opened the curtains and the doors leading to the balcony. He wanted to see her clearly while he took her, wanted to relearn every inch of her body.

When he returned, he saw that she was shaking, and he put a hand on either side of her face, lowered his lips to hers, swept her mouth tenderly with his tongue.

“It’s okay,” he said when he pulled back. “I’m here.”

He held her gaze while he unbuttoned the blouse she’d been wearing since the day before. The red silk slid off her shoulders and onto the floor, and he slipped the fleece pants they’d bought on their way to Maine past the curve of her hips. Rage filled him as he lingered over the scar on her stomach. He wanted to kill the man who did it all over again, and he said a silent prayer of thanks that Angel’s bullet had done the job on her way down. He gently kissed the scar, then drew in a ragged breath at the sight of her.

She stood before him in nothing but a bra and panties, two scraps of scarlet lace standing between him and nirvana. She had been the object of every dream, every desire, during his exile. Now he didn’t know where to start. His cock strained against his jeans, begging for the release that only she could give him. He wanted both to claim her quickly and to savor every moment. Wanted to rip off the panties and plunge into her, and wanted to lick every inch of her body, explore every secret place to make sure it still belonged to him.

As if reading his thoughts, she reached behind her and unhooked the bra, throwing it to the floor. She took his hands, placed them on her breasts, full and heavy, her nipples pale and pink and already hard.

“I’m here, too,” she said, her voice hoarse with desire.

He groaned, burying one hand in the hair at the back of her head while the other snaked around her waist, pulling her tight against him. He tugged at her hair, just enough to give him better access to the pale expanse of her neck. She moaned, and he lowered his lips to the hollow of her throat and kissed his way up her neck as she breathed fast and heavy.

“Nico…”

His name on her lips was the best kind of aphrodisiac. His cock pulsed between his legs, and he heard her gasp as he ran his tongue along the tender spot behind her ear, then kissed his way to her mouth. He was riveted to it. Couldn’t take his eyes off her swollen lips. Couldn’t stop thinking about how it felt to kiss her while he drove into her, how it felt when her lips were wrapped around his shaft, taking him all the way to the back of her throat, owning him like he owned her.

He cupped her face with his hands, ran his thumb along the corner of her mouth, drawing out the moment before he would really taste her. And then his mouth was on hers, her lips opening for him, pulling him into her warmth while he stroked her tongue with his. He swept and parried, his mouth falling back into the rhythm of tasting her like no time had passed.

This was his Angel. She belonged to him no matter what.

She slipped a hand between them and undid the button on his jeans, closed her hand around his cock. He groaned, pulsing in her hand while she sank her teeth gently into his lower lip. He couldn’t take it. She was going to make him come before they even got started, and there was no way that’s how this was going down.

He pushed her back on the bed and got rid of her panties with one quick tear. Then he hooked his hand behind her knees, pulled her ass to the edge of the bed, spread her legs until she was on full display for him.

Glistening, wet, swollen.

He kneeled in front of her and kissed his way up her shapely calves, her soft thighs, delaying the moment when he would close his mouth around her pussy. She writhed on the bed, her breath coming in short bursts.

“You want my mouth on you, baby?” he murmured against her thigh.

She lifted her head to look at him. “I want all of you everywhere, Nico. Everywhere.”

Her words set him on fire, and he brought his mouth to her pussy, dragging his tongue through the moist folds of her sex on his way to her clit. Her hips came up off the bed, and he grabbed tighter to her thighs, keeping her in his grip as he buried his face in her, relishing her sweetness on his tongue. He closed his mouth tight around her clit and sucked until her body bucked under his mouth.

“Oh god, Nico…”

He ran the flat point of his tongue against the engorged nub, fighting the urge to put his fingers inside her, to feel her tighten around them. Driving into her was a kind of occupation. And nothing was going to occupy her but his cock. Not this time.

He moved off her clit, ran his tongue through the crease of her pussy before fucking her with it. His cock didn’t need to be inside her to know she was close to coming. He could feel it in the tightening of her thighs, the way her hips moved with the rhythm of his mouth.

He hooked her knees over his shoulders, opening her wider for him. Then he doubled down on her clit, wrapping his mouth around it, sucking as she lifted her hips to meet his mouth. When he sensed her balancing at the precipice, he lapped harder and faster, waiting for the moment when she toppled over, her cries an echo of the waves crashing onto the rock below the bedroom. He kept stroking the tiny bundle of nerves with his tongue as her body shook, the orgasm going on and on as she shuddered against his mouth.

Finally, she lifted her head, looked at him through desire-clouded eyes. “Fuck me now, Nico. I need you inside me.”

He growled, moving closer to her so he could position the thick crown of his head against her opening, slick with her come. He took hold of her hips and pulled her to him as he drove into her in one swift movement. Then he put one of her legs on his shoulder, using the position to angle deeper, wanting to own every bit of her, to remind them both that she was his.

“Fuck, Angel,” He looked down at her face, the face he’d dreamt of every night since the last time he’d seen her. “You’re so fucking beautiful.”

Her eyes fluttered open, and he was pulled into their depths, drowning in them as her sex clenched around him. He dragged the length of his shaft in and out of her, the sensation too good to rush. Too good not to. He was already climbing the peak, brought to the edge by the feel of her coming under his tongue, her tight body under his. And she was right there with him, her pussy already gripping him, hips rising off the bed to meet him, hands clenching his ass as she tried to pull him in deeper even as there was nowhere else to go. He already filled every inch of her, felt the tip of his cock hitting the top of her channel, her clit rubbing against him with every thrust.

“Nico…”

“That’s right, baby,” he said. “Come for me.”

The words seemed to set her off. She moved faster, her breath catching in her throat, a soft blush spreading over her body as she climbed with him.

She opened her eyes. “I’m going to come, Nico.”

“You are going to come,” he said looking into her eyes. “And I’m going to come with you.”

She cried out, digging her nails into his hips and arching her back as she shuddered against him. He let go then, pouring himself into her, making her his all over again.

They lay in bed afterward, her head on his chest. He stroked her hair, listening to her breath turn regular as she drifted off to sleep. It was early afternoon, but she was obviously exhausted, and not just from last night. He’d been so worried about leaving her alone — even with Luca as her bodyguard — but he shouldn’t have been. She’d risen to the occasion like the warrior she was. Had stepped into her father’s position, cleaned house at Rossi Development and the Boston arm of the Syndicate. Had put aside her grief to do what had to be done.

And there had been grief. He’d been nearby during some of her most vulnerable moments, had seen her break down, bite on her fist to keep from letting someone hear her sobs. That had almost killed him. Every muscle in his body had wanted to go to her, to wrap her in his arms, haul her to his bed where he could make sure no one would ever hurt her again.

Except this time he’d been the one to hurt her. He’d been right when he told her there was no way around it. No way to stay in the picture and keep her safe. But that didn’t mean he was off the hook. He had been the source of her tears, her heartbreak. Maybe she could forgive him for it, but he wasn’t sure if he could do the same. And what did the future hold for them? Would they ever be free to live without looking over their shoulders? Could they find some semblance of a life together?

They were questions without answers, and he kissed the top of her head, breathing in her scent. It wasn’t over, and this time he was under no delusion that she would let him go without her. She would demand to go after Raneiro, to finish the job she’d started with the men who had betrayed him. He would have no choice but to allow it. As much as he wanted to lock her high in a tower — or even here on the island — she was a fighter. She’d find a way to follow.

He couldn’t blame her. Her life had been obliterated by the Syndicate. He’d started it when he’d taken her hostage. He would never allow himself to forget that. But he’d given the Syndicate a chance to leave her alone when he’d played dead. Instead they’d come for her in her own home.

And that was something that would not stand.