Still, I won’t text Nicky again yet. I don’t like chasing. Part of the reason I’m staying at the bar is to give him cover, since I don’t think his Boss would appreciate him hooking up with me tonight any more than mine would.
Last time we banged I said something dumb about him being the best lay I’ve ever had. It was dumb because he saw what I really meant. What I was thinking. Feeling. It was dumb to let the truth escape my eyes when I didn’t have to, and I’m hoping another go around might screw the memory right out of his head. Might get him out of my system faster. But when I look over again at Nick, he’s deep in conversation with a member of the Giuliano Family.
It’s always business first with these guys. Just another reason he prefers no strings attached, I guess, and I’m the same. I work long hours and I don’t have time for a relationship. It’s why our booty calls work so well. Nothing long term.
Unfortunately, the only other man to approach me at the bar tonight is my father, who gives me a glare from under his shaggy gray brows and demands in a tight, fussy voice, “How much have you had to drink?”
“Not enough to make this shindig fun,” I retort, but when I slide off the bar stool I don’t land steady and I have to grab the bar to stay upright. It kind of undermines my insolence.
Papa gives a sneer of contempt. After all these years, though, it’s lost some of the power it had once to make me cower. “Don’t forget you’re representing the firm while you’re here,” he snarls. “Go sober up.”
“Fuck you,” I tell him with a sweet smile, but he’s already walked away and doesn’t hear me.
It’s probably just as well. My father’s old-school. Even though I hit thirty recently, he thinks it’s his duty to keep me in line. These days he can’t threaten me physically, but he still knows how to make me hurt when he really wants to.
The bartender comes back, and I turn to him with my most charming smile. “How about we compromise, and you give me the rest of the bottle here and now?” He obliges without any hesitation this time. I must look really pathetic tonight.
And then I wander off outside to the balcony that stretches around the whole second story, trying to get some fresh air and a bit of distance between me and the entire population of New York mobsters.
God. What a fucking life.
I lean over the balcony railing, looking over the well-tended gardens. Apart from Nick, I don’t have friends here, and Nick doesn’t really count, either. My friends—“friends”—are the usual Manhattan set; the stockbrokers, the actuaries, fellow lawyers, the politically-adjacent—all rich workaholics like me who don’t have the time or the inclination for deep conversations. In fact, apart from Nick, I don’t think I’ve ever said a word outside business to any of the people here tonight. And evenwithNick, it’s been more moaning and grunting than really having aconversation, although last time I did let slip that I fucking hated my father.
He laughed at that. Said, “I don’t like your father much, either, so we have that much in common.”
“Is that why you always ask for me when you need a lawyer?” I asked him. He looked at me a beat longer than I expected before he shrugged and told me he just preferred to work with people he knew he could count on.
Not exactly deep conversation. And yet there’s something about Nick Fontana that keeps me interested. Normally I would’ve moved on about eight fucks back. Not this time. This time, I’m intrigued. I know his reputation and I know the charges I’ve had to defend him against, and when he talks, everything he says sounds like a threat, even when he’s encouraging me to suck his dick harder. All of that together suggests a very violent and dangerous man with limited empathy for others.
And yet.
And yet, I find myself coming back to him despite the danger to my career, to his, to the balance between the Morellis and the Bianchis that has been carefully cultivated over the last forty years.
There’s some part of me that thinks all those risks might be worth it. Worth…something.
He seems to like me, which is more than most people in my life do.
The door to the balcony opens behind me, but I don’t turn. I’m pretty sure I know who it is and I don’t want him to think I’ve been standing out here just waiting for him to approach me. But I can’t help smirking into the darkness, just in self-appreciation for how I’ve managed to tempt him to follow me.
But when a hand closes hard on my arm and whirls me around, I see I’ve made a mistake.
“What the fuck did you think you were doing in there?” Ray Gatti demands. “Shaking your dick at me in front of everyone, huh? I oughta cut you open for being so disrespectful.” And then he grabs my throat.
Shit.
Chapter Four
Nick
Carlo replied almost at once to my first text, and I made up my mind then and there: I’d dive dick-first into him tonight. Remind him that I’m the best he’s ever had, according to what he said mid-fuck the last time we hooked up. I believed him, too; it wasn’t just something sexy to say. He told me right before I nutted, so I didn’t have much to say in reply.
But it’s been on my mind.
We texted back and forth, just a few lines, and then he made the offer:Come to my room later and find out what’s under these pants.I should’ve left it at that, agreed and looked forward to it, but I couldn’t stop myself making some comment about Gatti. Make myself sound like some jealous little bitch. He called me out on it right away, smug little shit, and then the little bouncing dots told me he was saying something further, so I waited to see what it was.
But then the waltz started up, the dots stopped bouncing on my phone, and a Giuliano Capo waved to get my attention from the next table. People were moving around, Luca asking Finch to dance, just to piss everyone off that little bit more, so I went over to see what the Giuliano wanted. It’s Vinnie Frangello, and for a Gee, he’s middling, though he never had a problem with me when I ran with the Giulianos, back before I knew better. They’re a bad bunch all round, the Gees, and I found that out fast in my younger years. These days they’re worse; no restraint and a new, younger Don who likes the sight of blood even more than the last one did. Wonder how much old Jimmy Gee liked the blood when it was his own spilling in Chicago?
That former Giuliano Don died thanks to the same problem we’re trying to solve tonight at the meeting, and all us Morellis are under orders to make friends, bepals. So I go over to talk to Frangello, who has urgent questions about whether we’ve had any trouble again from the Families out West. “Feds are squeezing hard on Family nuts, there’s too much infighting, they’re all messed up,” he moans. “It’s not good for supply lines, you know what I’m saying?”
