Total pages in book: 217
Estimated words: 207224 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1036(@200wpm)___ 829(@250wpm)___ 691(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 207224 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1036(@200wpm)___ 829(@250wpm)___ 691(@300wpm)
I look up at his bearded, pierced face. “Plotting your death.” I lunge, Mum cries out, and James yells, tackling me from the side and taking me down. I land with a grunt. “Let me at him,” I demand.
“Fucking hell,” James breathes. “You’ll be telling him to put ’em up, put ’em up soon. What are you, the fucking lion who found his courage?” James stands and hauls me up, walking me back from my target.
I scowl, fighting his hold. Obviously, I get nowhere. “My mother is off fucking limits,” I yell. “You even think about touching her again, you’ll have me to deal with.”
“I’m trembling in my fucking boots, Black,” Otto grumbles, earning a smack from my mother and undoubtedly a plead not to goad me.
“Okay, I think it’s bedtime.” James directs me toward the villa. “We’ll have our m-m-meeting tomorrow.” I’m shoved through the door where I find my wife, my fucking wife, the woman who is supposed to love me unconditionally, looking at me like she’s about to slap some conditions on me. I scowl. Or I try to. And then my eyes drop to her tummy. And I smile. I can’t help it. But I quickly remember . . .
We’re not talking.
“I hate you,” I hiss, jabbing a finger in her face. Her gorgeous, lovely face. “I hate you so fucking much.” I may be steaming, but I see her shoulders drop, all fight leaving her. She’s calm. I’m plastered. And as if to prove exactly how plastered, I start rocking back on my heels, forcing James to catch me.
“Can I have a cuddle?” I ask, pouting. “Please?” I ignore the chuckles behind me and open my arms, walking to her, my efforts to remain in a relatively straight line quite feeble. “I don’t want to fight.”
“You always say that after we’ve had a fight, but you seem quite set on fighting while we’re fighting.”
“What am I supposed to do, baby? Hide everything from you?” I take her chin and lift her face to mine, closing one eye to focus. Perhaps I should hide it all. Leave her here, go back to Miami, deal with it all, and come back. Hopefully in one piece. I feel like I’ve been tossed back to the beginning of this shitshow and have to sit through the entire crappy performance all over again. Except this time, I have no fucking popcorn. Or any fucking leads. And my wife’s fucking pregnant. Fuck my life. I rest my hands on her shoulders and she exhales heavily, taking my wrists.
“I don’t want you to hide anything from me,” she says.
“Then I won’t.” Bullshit, Black.
“How’s this happened?”
I squint, thinking hard, like I might find the answer. Of course I won’t fucking find the answer, and in this moment, actually, I don’t want to. I just want to go to bed and cuddle her to death. Fuck the men. We’ll meet in the morning.
I turn, ready to instruct them all to fuck off, with the exception of my mother, of course, but find everyone has gone. “Where did they go?”
“Home, I expect.” Rose snakes an arm around my waist, and I start walking us to the bedroom. Leaning on her. Just a little. “Everyone’s been looking for you for hours.”
“I was on the beach getting drunk.”
“No shit.”
“No, really, I was.” I dip and push my mouth into her hair, just before we reach the bed, and she releases me. I fall onto the mattress. Room spin finds me immediately. “I’m rea”—hiccup—“. . . lly drunk.”
“You’re really fucking annoying, that’s what you are.” She unfastens my trousers and I look down on what I expect is a lopsided grin. Oh, yeah? I had hoped but didn’t want to assu—
“Forget it, Black,” she mutters, yanking my trousers down my legs and casting them aside before starting on my shirt.
“Did you say no to me?” I seize her wrist and still her, looking at her for an answer. The right answer. “I’m a mafia boss, baby.”
“I know,” she purrs, dropping her lips to mine and kissing me softly. I sigh happily, opening up to her. “But tonight, you’re not a hard one.” She pushes into my soft dick as she bites my lip. “And this moll is too tired after stressing out over where her mafia husband had disappeared to.”
I scowl. “I was on the beach.”
“Yes, but I thought you’d left for Miami.”
I snort. “Without James and Brad?”
“And Otto and Ringo and Goldie.”
“Otto can fuck off.” I slam my head onto the pillow. “He’s banished.”
“Tell your mother that.”
“I will.” I grab Rose and yank her onto the bed, wrapping every arm and leg around her. Or try to.
“Still hate me?” she whispers, kissing my forearm where it’s curled around her neck.
“Always, baby,” I murmur. “And forever.”
Fuck. Me. To. Hell.