Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 90252 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90252 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Of course I do. I was all over the news a few years back. Everyone heard about my disappearance. Before shit went down, I was at the top of the Lisanti family, one of the biggest mafia families in the country. The whole world was laid out before me. I was rising higher and higher. But then I fucked up. Badly. So badly, in fact, I had to leave that life. Permanently. And when a body washed up on the Jersey coast with my family ring on its finger, everyone knew the worst had happened to me.
I can never go back. If the families were to find out I was still alive … I shake my head and sit on my bed, then rest my head in my hands. The war inside me rages on. I need that redhead. I need her on her knees right now, my cock in her mouth as I give her every inch.
“No.” I stand and pace. “Let it go.”
“What are you letting go?” Charles leans on my doorframe.
“Nothing.” I shrug.
He sighs. “The redhead?”
“What?” I roll my shoulders. “No, of course not.”
He smirks. “These women. I don’t get it, not even a little, but it’s like they were made for us.”
“Daphne is not made for me.” I say it with so little conviction that even I don’t believe it. I want her, and I’m not hiding it very well if Charles’s skeptical expression tells me anything. “Look.” I cross my arms over my chest. “She’s a journo, okay? If she finds out who I am, how long do you think it’ll take her to whip up a blog post outing me? And after that?” I throw my hands up. “I’ll have killers beating down the doors to get to me first.”
“I got to you first,” Charles reminds me.
I take a deep breath as memories from that day ripple through my mind. “You spared me.”
“Dumb on my part.” Charles gives a low laugh. “You’re a pain in the ass. Then again, you did pay me double the contract price, so it was a win-win.”
“Everything was going so well. Until those women showed up.” I pinch the bridge of my nose.
“Believe me when I say things have never been better.” He gets a half smile on his face, clearly thinking about his woman, Clover.
“Look, the three of you have your love lives all straightened out. That’s great. But I can’t get involved with anyone, especially not that redheaded devil out there.”
“All right then.” He gives me a knowing smile as he turns to leave. “We’ll see.”
I stalk over and slam the door behind him. “Fuck!” I bang my forehead on the wood panel.
This is ridiculous. I have to snap out of it. A turn around the lodge will help me. Checking the perimeter out in the cold might also do something to help the fucking hard-on that plagues me whenever I get a glimpse of that red hair either in real life or in my mind.
I head down the hall toward the living area of the lodge, then slow as I hear voices in the kitchen.
“—can’t stay here forever.” It’s Daphne.
“You can stay as long as you need.” One of the other women is in there. I think it’s Aurora.
I ease closer and flatten myself to the wall just outside the door.
Daphne sighs heavily. “When the piece I just published hits the blog, it’s going to explode.”
“Shit. Did you name names?” Aurora’s voice is almost a whisper.
“If I said yes, would you think I’m crazy?”
There’s a long pause before Aurora says, “No, I’d think you’re brave as hell.”
“But you’re also in danger,” Bells adds from farther away, perhaps in the pantry. “The men you outed for being predatory assholes? They’ll come for you. And I’m not talking lawsuits or cease and desist letters. These men have empires to protect. Hell, one of them has his own island where he keeps his own personal brothel of barely-legal girls.”
“I know. That was in the piece. The drugs he feeds them, the conditions, the things they’re expected to do. I’ve been inside and out of all of these monsters, seen their wives who look the other way, the spoiled children who don’t know half of the evil their fathers commit, the women and girls they all leave in their wakes. That’s why I did this. The victims. For them. No one stood up for them. But I will.”
Fuck, she’s got backbone. Daphne speaks with such conviction that I find myself leaning closer, wanting to be near her. If she’s published an article with names and facts she can back up with evidence, she’s created a shitstorm of epic proportions. The men she’s talking about aren’t the sort to take this lying down. Hell, back in my youth when the tabloids came after me, I paid some visits of my own. Solved the problem with violence, the only language I knew. I know better now, but there are plenty who don’t. And those men will be sent to hurt Daphne.