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Best Friend's Daddy, Billionaire Devil 35.1
CATERINAShe’ll kill me for calling him, but I don’t know what else to do. I’ve been knocking at the bedroom door in our suite for the past hour, and she won’t let me in. I could either call hotel security and have them unlock it, or call Gianni and hope he can get through to her.“Tatiana?” I murmur while knocking for the millionth time. “Sweetie, at least make a sound and let me know you’re okay. I’m really scared and worried.”Last night, she was hysterical over Luciano kidnapping me. Tonight, I’m talking to a locked door and hoping like hell she’s alive on the other side. I’ve never seen her like this before. She’s capable of anything, as painful as it is to think about.“Just leave me alone.” It’s so soft I can hardly hear it, but her muffled voice at least tells me she’s alive in there.Think, damn it. What set her off?She couldn’t have had more than two or three drinks at the bar, so she’s not wasted. I’ve seen her double-fist margaritas all night long. “Why won’t you let me in
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“No. But I don’t want to cause trouble.” She squeezes Gianni’s hands. “Please, don’t do something stupid because of me.”“All right, sweetheart.” He cups the back of her skull in one hand and kisses her forehead again while looking over her head at Roger.Their eyes meet, and even though I’m not a mind reader, I know Christopher’s days are numbered. The thought of a murder being decided that easily, without using words, makes me shiver, but I can’t find it in me to care, not after what Christopher did to her. He doesn’t deserve to live. I wish I could kill him myself.“Let’s get you home.” Gianni helps her to her feet but gently hands her off to Roger. “He’ll take you to the garage, and I’ll help Caterina get your things together.”There goes the pit in my stomach. For Tatiana’s sake, I put on a brave face until she’s out of the suite, and I can let out the breath I was holding. Now it’s just the two of us. Nobody’s here to protect me. Nobody to keep me from throwing myself into his a
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GIANNIGod help me. I could live off the taste of this pussy for the rest of my life.How many times have we fucked today? I’ve lost count of the hours spent here in bed, only coming up for air to check on my daughter. She’s asleep now, but the time will come when accounts are balanced and everyone gets what they deserve. Christopher first.Right now, all I want is to forget reality.My sleepy little bird awakens at the touch of my tongue against her pussy lips. “What are you doing?” she asks in a thick voice before stroking the back of my head.“What do you think? You fell asleep while I was gone. I couldn’t think of a better way to wake you up.”She stretches, her back arching, while I return to my task. I couldn’t help myself, finding her lying here, naked and gleaming in the moonlight pouring through the window. An angel sent here to make my life complete.I can’t remember the last time I spent all day in bed, even when I was sick, but today felt like the most normal thing in the
Best Friend's Daddy, Billionaire Devil 36.1
“It’s taken me a lot—and I mean a lot—to consider bringing someone into my life.”“Then I’m honored that you think I’m worthy.” Coming from anyone else in the world, the line would come off corny. Forced. Calculating. I’d have no choice but to roll my eyes and tell her to get out of my bed and my life.But this is Caterina, who I doubt has a calculating bone in her body. She’s too innocent to be anything but sincere.“You are more than worthy,” I murmur. “I’m the one who should ask myself whether I’m worthy of you.”I lace our fingers together on top of my chest. It looks right; her small hand joined with my much larger one. I’m her protector, and she is my sweetness, softness, the reason I do what I do. She’s become my reason to live, the thing that balances my life.She snuggles against me, warm and happy and mine. All I can do is hold this precious thing in my arms and vow to myself that I’ll do everything in my power to keep her. Now I’ve seen what life is like with her, and I’ve
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CATERINAIs it possible to feel like you’ve been hit when nobody laid a hand on you? The pain in my gut, the way all the air leaves my lungs at once. It’s like she punched or kicked me. It physically hurts, and yet she hasn’t laid a single hand on me.“You fucking bitch.” Gianni gets up, still naked, dragging one of the sheets with him and wrapping it around his waist. “This is your last warning. Get out of my fucking house before I fucking kill you.”Sure, that’s exactly the kind of thing he would say. That’s who he is.But it’s wrong. It is not the response I needed to hear.He didn’t deny what she said. He didn’t deny still being married.He didn’t deny it.“From the look on her face, I’m going to assume she didn’t know?” Amalia—nobody has to introduce us—laughs in my face when all I can do is try to stay calm and keep the last shredding pieces of my dignity. “I bet he calls me his ex, doesn’t he?”“Caterina, don’t listen to her,” Gianni growls.“Why? You don’t want your little fuc
Best Friend's Daddy, Billionaire Devil 37.1
Before my brain can completely melt, I scramble out of bed, still wrapped in a blanket, and take off running. My feet slap against the hardwood as I race past the guards. I don’t look at their faces. I can’t. I’m too ashamed. This is something I want to end.He wants me to go to my room and get dressed? That’s what I’ll do, because I will not sit around and watch my life crumble to pieces.Lies. So many lies. About him, about her, about their marriage. Now he’s making it sound like she had something to do with Luciano coming apart like he did. Whether or not that’s true, he could’ve told me.He should have told me.If Luciano needed help, I could have reached out to his parents. I could’ve done something.In the end, it’s all about him. What he wants, who he wants. There I was, telling him I’d have his baby, and he held all these secrets in his hand.It will never get better. I feel the truth of it in my soul. He will never stop being who he is. Loving him isn’t enough. Nothing ever wil
Best Friend's Daddy, Billionaire Devil 38
PART IICaterinaAs I open my eyes and look up at the popcorn ceiling, the shock from my father's confession still lingers.Gianni murdered Mom.I didn’t expect to wake up with anything else on my mind after the revelation Dad dropped on me last night. It’s not something that’s easy to forget or move past.The whole situation makes no sense. Despite spending hours cleaning the house last night—trying to channel the restless energy after putting Dad to bed—I couldn’t answer the most pressing question: Why?Why would Gianni want to kill my mom? She wasn’t anyone extraordinary—just an average person. From what Dad told me, she had no connection to his world. They didn’t know each other, and Tatiana and I didn’t even meet until years after Mom passed away. I’m frustrated trying to find any connection that would make sense.My muscles ache as I sit up, stretching my arms over my head. I’m regretting trying to sleep since I spent most of the night tossing and turning. I might have had a few
Best Friend's Daddy, Billionaire Devil 38.1
He's obviously not going to say anything about Mom, and I haven’t built up enough courage to. That's a can of worms I don't feel like cracking open.It’ll lead to so many other questions, too. Like why he never told me how Mom actually died. Would he bother to tell me the details now? Or am I still too young to know?The aggravation these questions stir in my head gets me out of my chair. “I'm going to unpack my things, since I was too busy around here last night to do it then.” I make a big deal about leaning in and giving him a sniff in passing before waving a hand in front of my face. “Maybe you should take a shower, Detective. How are you supposed to sneak up on the bad guys when they can smell you from a mile away?”“Very nice,” he grumbles wryly while shooing me away. “That's exactly where I planned on going.” Good. Maybe he can soak his head under some cold water for a while and start thinking clearly.It's better to be away from him, upstairs in my old room with all the certif
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When I try to send a text in response, it goes undelivered. The number comes up as ID Blocked. No surprise.“I'm wondering if we should have brought more men,” he grunts, swerving around a slow-moving minivan. A glimpse at the passenger side mirror reveals the car behind us, matching our speed, following Roger's every move.“Between the five of us, if we can't handle it, then we have bigger problems.”“What if this is all a way of drawing us out? Whoever is behind this would know I'd come on the run.”“Do you want to take that chance?” He glances away from the road to stare at me for a moment. “We can always call for more backup.”“By the time they get there, what point would it make?” We're already halfway there as it is. “I don't want to wait for them.”Besides, this doesn't feel like an attack is imminent. It feels more like the attack has already taken place, I'm afraid. I don’t want to think about what we might discover when we arrive. Don't let it be Caterina. Don't let it be Ta
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GIANNI“You can tell summer's winding down.”I look up from the spreadsheet Roger insisted we compile—always organized, which I suppose I should be grateful for even if a Friday evening spent poring over spreadsheets isn’t my idea of a good time. “What do you mean?”“It's already starting to get dark, and it's barely past seven o'clock.”Sure enough, a look out the window confirms this. “I wonder how long the girls will be out.”“You know how it gets sometimes. Crack open a bottle of wine or two, and time melts.”“I don't think they'll be doing that tonight.” When he lifts an eyebrow, I break the news I've been waiting all week to share. “This stays between us, but Caterina is pregnant.”Now both brows lift. “Oh. I... congratulations?”I can't help but grin. “Yes, congratulations are in order.”“And she's happy about it?”“You know. Things are still complicated.” I'm trying to be kind toward Charles for her sake, but I can't pretend his bias against me isn't a real pain in the ass at
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Something snaps inside my head. No, no, this isn’t happening. Not to me. Not to my baby.Every self-defense lesson Dad ever taught me comes rushing back. I can’t breathe in if I want to stay conscious, so I hold my breath while stomping a foot against his instep with all my might. He grunts in pain but doesn’t release me. In my frenzy, I reach out, sinking my nails into any flesh I can touch, then I drive an elbow into his ribs.“You bitch,” he growls before slamming me headfirst into the trunk of my car. Everything goes dark and foggy. My body slumps when I lose control of it, and I can’t help but breathe in.My baby. My baby…I don’t lose consciousness, though. Not completely. It’s more like being sedated; my brain still works. I hear everything, but I can’t make my body move. I’m floating in a dream-like state, but this is all very real. A living nightmare.“Get moving,” one of the men snarls, shoving me into the car. I can’t open my eyes. My head is pounding.Tatiana’s body slumps
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CATERINA“Hey, what are you looking at?”My heart just about jumps out of my chest as I quickly close my browser before turning in my chair to find Stephanie standing at the entrance of my cubicle. The way she lifts an eyebrow while folding her arms reminds me too much of my best friend—it hurts, since we haven’t spoken all week.I touch a hand to my chest, laughing. “You're like a ghost, I swear. How are you so quiet?”“Maybe you were too busy looking at naughty things to notice me coming up behind you.”“Naughty things?” The idea makes me giggle, because she couldn't be further from the truth. It was dirty things that got me pregnant in the first place. Now, I am reading advice columns and googling baby names when I should be working.“Nobody closes their browser that fast if they aren’t looking at something they shouldn't be.”“Sorry to disappoint you, but I was reading junk on Reddit.” At least it's a believable lie. “I don't want to get caught screwing around.”“Who cares?” she s
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The look of heartbreak on Caterina’s face makes me want to order a hit on Amalia at this very moment. “That you’d want me to get an abortion if you found out because you didn’t want any more children. That the last thing you wanted was to be tied down again.” The anguish in her voice slices me down to the bone.I’ll kill her. It’s as simple as that.How long have I told myself I must spare her pathetic life because she’s Tatiana’s mother? She’s never been a mother to her, anyway. I could have done Tatiana and the world a favor by getting rid of her, but I didn’t. Now it doesn’t seem to matter if she’s alive or dead.“For one thing,” I speak carefully so I don’t spook her, “Amalia does not have the first clue on how I would feel about anything. She doesn’t know me. You should know by now that she wants me to be miserable, which means making everyone around me miserable by association. Plus, she’s herself, so I’m sure it must make her jealous, knowing you’re going to have my child—a chi
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GIANNI“Patience,” Roger advises, his eyes constantly moving as he scans the area around us while we stand beneath the covered stoop in front of his cottage. “Just because I haven't found anything yet doesn't mean I won't.”“It isn't you I'm frustrated with,” I grunt, trying not to appear suspicious. There are no fewer than five guards within my line of sight, and I can't help but wonder if it's one of them.The traitor.“It's barely been two days since I installed the software,” he reminds me. “Give it some time.”“I get it, but until then, I have to pretend I trust everyone equally, and that’s frustrating as hell when you know one of your men is sharing information he shouldn’t be.”“There is another solution. It’s faster, if that’s what you’re looking for. You could just fire everybody and start over.”He recoils under the sharp glare I shoot at him. I know he wasn’t serious, but I’m not in a joking mood. “I can't afford to lose my entire team at a time like this. Not with a new de
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“Not really.” Tatiana looks me up and down. “Are you feeling okay? You look a little green.”Once we move closer to the register, the feeling gets worse. Only once the girl behind the counter reaches for Tatiana’s clothes do I realize it’s Tatiana’s perfume that sets me off. The stronger the smell, the sweatier and more nauseated I get.“I’ll meet you outside.” Nothing in the world matters more than getting out of this store. The glass doors are my sole goal, and I walk toward them as calmly as possible, even as my insides start churning. Stupid me, thinking if I never got sick like this before now, I’d be one of the lucky ones who never had to go through it.I burst through the double doors to the outside, sucking deep breaths into my lungs. The sunshine is so bright, glaring off the concrete, but there’s an awning over the wide front window, and I take shelter beneath it. A few minutes pass, and the nausea seems to pass with every breath I take. Shit. Suddenly it occurs to me that I
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CATERINA“How come you're not trying on any clothes?”Damn it. I was hoping I’d get away with it.We’ve been shopping for the past half hour, and only now has she thought to ask why I haven’t picked out anything. I was kind of hoping she wouldn't pay attention. She's having a good time trying on skirts and dresses and jeans. Now she’s frowning at me from the three-way mirror outside her dressing room stall. “Why aren’t you shopping, too?”I’m sure the response: I don't know how much longer I'll fit into anything. It would be a waste of money to buy anything in my size when I don’t have the first idea of how pregnancy will affect my body... wouldn’t go over well.“I feel bloated,” I groan, rubbing my stomach. “It's just not a good day.”“I'm sorry. Would you prefer we go back home?”I like that she thinks of it as home for both of us. “No, I’m fine. I just know I would hate myself in everything I tried on.”“You always look great, if that helps.”“Thanks. And you look hot in that dress
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“There he is, going around with all these suspicions without solid proof. I'm finally starting to understand how he must feel.” That, and how Caterina seems determined to look after me—the way she does with him.“Speaking of which, have you reviewed the list of names I compiled?”If my head doesn't fucking explode, it will be a miracle. I walked into this room feeling good, energized, confident. All it takes is a catch-up session to remember how overwhelming the past few weeks have been. Caterina or no Caterina, I've got enough on my plate to make any man want to throw in the towel.I made her a promise. I’m going to find out who killed her mother. I only hope she isn’t in a hurry, since at least a dozen possible culprits could’ve had reason to send a message to Charles.“I scanned the names,” I confirm. “And I'd like to set up meetings. Only this is touchy, so we can't make too much noise, or word might spread that I'm digging.”“You realize one of those names was Salvatore Costello.
