I picked up the resentment in her voice, but her posture flagged with relief. I followed Sage into the house, giving Connie Rosetti an appreciative smile as she closed the door behind us. She walked ahead, veering into the kitchen while Sage stopped just short of the doorway.
“Do you need help?” he asked.
“I know how to make a steak.”
He huffed out an offended breath of air before guiding me down a hallway and toward the stairs. Sage didn’t say a word to me, but his discomfort and unease telegraphed through every tight muscle in his back, through the veins that popped out on the side of his neck.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, leaning toward his ear and whispering.
“I don’t like this,” he mumbled.
“Because you can’t control it.”
Sage pulled me up the stairs, his palm sweaty against mine even as his grip remained unwavering and sure.
“Is that it?” he smirked at the top of the stairs and waited for me to come alongside him.
“That’s it.”
He sighed. “My father is…old fashioned.”
“I get it.”
“Be polite,” Sage said, his eyes quietly begging me to control myself.
“I am polite.”
“Golden.”
I dipped my chin and brought his arm around my back, sliding it down toward my ass to remind him of how polite I would be.
“I’ll be polite,” I promised. “I’m too horny to mouth off anyway.”
Sage’s mouth twitched in the corner as his fingers felt out the flared base of the plug between my ass cheeks. He gave it a gentle push, then stepped back, schooling his features.
“I’ll just introduce you and then we’ll go back downstairs,” Sage said, smoothing his hands down the front of my shirt. He was trying to make sure I looked presentable, and the whole normalcy and domesticity of it had words catching in my throat.
“Sage,” I croaked.
He licked his lips, cheeks turning pink.
“Come on.” He took my hand and led me down a short hallway. There was a closed door, and he rapped his knuckles against it, waiting for a reply.
“Come in,” a voice called, and Sage twisted the knob.
“Padre,” he greeted, guiding me into the room. “This is Foster.”
I stepped onto the plush carpet of Sage’s father’s office, giving the room a quick scan before my eyes settled on a tall and lean man tucked away behind an ornate wooden desk against the far wall. When his stare landed on me, he moved so quickly I almost missed it.
His chair slammed against the wall behind him, he pulled open a drawer in his desk and he had a gun leveled at me from across the room before I could finish exhaling.
Sage stepped in front of me, arms outstretched.
“Get out of the way, Sandro,” his father snapped. That was when I noticed the way his hands shook, the gun wavering as he pointed it at us.
“What the fuck?” Sage growled.
I watched the way his body heaved as he breathed. I fucking hated that I’d agreed to leave my gun in the car because the number of men who had pointed a gun at me and lived was already two people more than I liked the total to be. I was not keen to add another.
