I was sex on two legs, and that, more than the SOG Salute mini folding knife strapped to my ankle or the small pocket pistol attached to the garter in the gap between my inner thighs, was my weapon.
And I needed a weapon that night because we were going into the lion’s den.
Giuseppe di Carlo owned a small, quiet restaurant in the Bronx that wasn’t featured on any Zagat guides or travel sites. Even its name was scrawled in dark grey paint on a black wood awning over the blacked-out windows. It did not invite the patronage of people who didn’t know exactly what they were walking into; a modern mafia den.
“They’ll search us,” Alexander had warned from the kitchen as I finished putting on my face in the bathroom, “but not as thoroughly as they might because it’s an open table and the kind of men enticed to play aren’t the kind of men who feel comfortable without their weapons.”
Not for the first time since we’d planned this outing to confront the di Carlo family crime boss, I wished Dante was there. If anyone could help us with the ins and outs of a night with Made Men, it was the Camorra capo himself. I bit my lip and thumbed my phone where it lay on the sink basin, wishing he would answer any of the fourteen voicemails or innumerable texts I had sent him in the past twenty-four hours.
“We can do this without Edward,” Alexander said, reading my mind as only he could from where he suddenly appeared in the doorway behind me.
“We can,” I agreed. “I just wish we didn’t have to.”
His lips thinned, but his eyes were hot with more than impatience when they moved down my body. “Come here, topolina.”
“Don’t mess me up,” I said, holding out my hands as if that would stop him. “I need to be just right tonight.”
“You are always enchanting,” he told me. “But tell me again not to mess you up, and I’ll be sure to paint your backside as red as wine, is that understood?”
I shivered at the authority in his voice, moving toward him before I could stop myself. “Yes.”
He arched an eyebrow as I pressed into his chest.
“Yes, Master,” I corrected with sass in my eyes, but breath from my lips.
I wanted to be stronger than my desire to submit to him, but then again, I also didn’t.
Xan cupped the entire side of my face in one of his big hands. “Tonight, I am your Master. Whatever I tell you to do, you will do it without question. This and this alone is the only reason I am allowing you to come with me tonight because I know just how sweetly you will obey me. If you step out of line for one instant, not only will I have Riddick take you home, but I will also tan your arse and then fuck you senseless for hours without letting you come as punishment for your noncompliance. Is that understood?”
My legs swayed, eager to collapse into the kneeling position that made me feel whole. I steadied myself with a hand over his suited heart and nodded. Not because I had to say yes, but because I understood the gravity of the situation if I deviated from his plan.
There was no doubt that with one wrong move, we would die.
“Understood,” I agreed.
I understood just how profound Alexander’s trust in me was; if I put myself in danger, I was automatically doing the same for him because he would step in front of a bullet if it meant keeping me safe. It was up to me to be smart enough to keep us both from harm, which meant obeying Alexander as he knew much more about navigating a situation like this than I did.
The den of inequity one might conjure in conjunction with a mafia outfit was not what we walked into after being patted down by blank, scar-faced bouncers. Nothing was dark or macabre, slick and old-fashioned like something out of The Godfather. Instead, it was bold and modern, a large expanse of basement transformed into a stark black and white gambling hall. The roulette wheels were matte black and silver, the poker felt was dark garnet, the floor polished concrete, and the chairs black wood topped with black velvet cushions. It was sumptuous and striking, a beautiful place to indulge in all kinds of sins.
Only the men who already sat around the large poker table in the middle of the room were not so beautifully presented. There was a huge, square-faced man with blunt fingers and greasy skin who rubbed his rotund belly until he belched. Another was handsome in the way of the wicked, sharp, hard features honed like implements meant to extract female admiration. He was dark, with dripping black curls that kissed his shoulders, a short beard over his jaw, and a suit the same startlingly icy blue as his dark-ringed irises. When we locked eyes, he smiled, and it was one of the most sinister expressions I’d ever witnessed.