It’s notuntil after my set that I find Corrado waiting for me right outside the dressing room. I haven’t seen him all night, he didn’t even watch me dance, and now he’s standing crooked, leaning heavily against the wall, reeking of expensive whiskey mixed with Cherry’s cheap perfume.
“Did you suck Tony’s dick?”
Heat rips across my chest and my stomach drops. How could he ask me that?
I shake my head, not trusting myself to speak.
“I didn’t think so,” he chuckles. “Because you suck cock like a pro and if you did Tony, he wouldn’t be able to shut up about it.”
Tears sting at the bridge of my nose, burn at the corner of my eyes.I suck cock like a pro.
I guess he does think I’m a whore.
“You know I’m not in love with you, right?” he asks, laughing, and the world falls out from underneath me. I don’t know how I’m standing still. I don’t know how I’m not running away. Or slapping him.
“But it’ll keep you alive.” He stumbles backward. “You should have left. I gave you enough. Eighty grand was a lot.” He laughs louder, his words slurring all together. “Eighty grand’s the most I ever paid for a blow job. But man, like you’re really…you’re a pro.”
He staggers away, leaving me with the wall holding me up, and the rest of the dancers and cocktail waitresses running back and forth past me like my heart just didn’t crash down and shatter all over the floor.
Chapter 10
Corrado
Ibring the stale cigarette to my mouth and inhale. I don’t know why I still keep this pack hidden on the deck, it’s a disgusting habit, but I needed one. I needed something.
I still need something. I need something that will take my mind off what I had to say to Felony to push her away. But what other choice did I have? She was on her knees in front of my uncle, looking up at me like I could be her goddamn hero.
I’m nobody’s hero.
I gave her enough money to leave and start a whole new life somewhere else and she didn’t leave. She stayed here for me.
Here, where the Russians are picking the Italians off one at a time. Mutilating and gutting us out in the open. Tony’s been talking about a retaliation; a big one. But he doesn’t know whom to trust.
Thing is, I don’t know whom to trust either. And the things that Tony said about Felony—the way he treated her in front of me—that meant he didn’t trust me either. He was trying to see what I would do. Going against a boss over a woman, it’s not happening. I’m hoping I got him to see I’m still trustworthy.
And I’m hoping I can get her out of here. I just don’t understand it. She’s not getting anything out of working for Tony, she’s not working the parties or renting her pussy out, so why is she still here?
My cellphone vibrates on the table next to me.
It’s a group text message from Junior.
“What the fuck does he want?”
I swipe open the message and an image pops up. It’s a picture of Junior. His throat slit open from ear to ear.
Jesus.
I glance quickly at the numbers of the people in the group text. Me. Tony. Enzo. Salvatore. Carlo. They’re all getting this text the same time as me. They’re the names of the rest of the guys that made up Tony Fretolli’s crew.
How are the Russians getting so close to us?
I zoom up on the picture of Junior and the shock of what I see makes me physically ill, bile threating and bitter at the back of my tongue.
Junior’s throat isn’t slit; it is completely severed from the rest of his body, propped up by a blood-soaked pillow, with a cigar shoved in between his clenched yellow teeth.
Junior was a big guy. What kind of a man or group of men would do this to him? Could do this to him?
I click out of the picture, and there just underneath are three little balls, happily bouncing up and down. Someone is writing a message.
