Montero Villar POV “Yes?” I said cautiously. I knew where I’d recognized her from—the pictures in Aryana’s apartment. But how the fuck did she know who I was? “Who wants to know?”“Me,” she said, making me feel like the dumbest student in the class again. “When I find out that three bloody men show up on my doorstep, I make it a point to find out who they are.”Oh shit. “You’re the one who owns the house Aryana and that nurse were staying at?”“Yes.”“My compliments on what you’ve done with the place.” It was a crappy thing to say, but couldn’t she at least have torn down that ridiculous wallpaper?She glared at me, but I saw a small crack in her façade that she didn’t like living in a place that looked like a cross between a nursing home and a National book store any more than I would. “I’ve been on tour. I haven’t had much time to do anything with it.”More pieces fell into place. She was a singer. Now that I thought about it, I’d heard a thing or two about her. She sang at restaura
Montero Villar POVAs expected, my words made her hold her head more rigidly upright. But as I massaged her scalp and occasionally tugged on those soft strands, she grew more relaxed.Eventually, she did let her head loll backward. Her hair on my bare chest felt amazing. When I looked down, I could see her face now. Her eyes were closed, and she was biting her lip.I smoothed her hair away from her ear on one side. Cupping the back of her head with one hand, I supported her while I dipped my head. She moaned softly when I bit her earlobe. “Still think I couldn’t get you to seduce me?”That got her riled up again. She jumped away from me, whirling around. “You’re a bastard, Montero.”“Never claimed I wasn’t.”“And in the fucking mob.”I didn’t deny that either.“And a liar,” she concluded.That was where we differed. “No, I’m not.”Her eyes flashed. “You told Zeny you’d stay away from me.”“I did. You’re the one who showed up on my doorstep today, not the other way around. Are you here
Craig Gomez POV“Save it.” She whirled around to face me. “It shouldn’t come as a surprise. I know what you guys do. And you should leave. I’ve got a lot of work to do.”Shit, fuck, damn. “I’ll leave after you hear me out.”“I’ve heard enough,” she said stubbornly.“No, you haven’t.” I grabbed her arm and pulled her down to the end of the hall. The noise from the bar seemed distant here. “You want to know who blew up that car and why?”“I’m not sure I do. Like I said, you should—”“It was me,” I said, out of options. She clearly thought we were just a gang of mindless thugs, bent on maximum destruction. The truth was a lot more complicated. “The driver had the bomb, and he was outside. Heading here. If I hadn’t stopped him, this place would’ve had a lot more damage than a few broken windows. People would’ve gotten hurt—maybe killed.”“What?” Her mouth gaped open, and she seemed at a loss for words.“He wanted to bomb the bar?”Shock turned her face white, and I regretted that she had
Rocky Ace De Luna POV“Where’s the pretty lady, Daddy? Why won’t she come play dinosaurs with me again?”Matthew had been repeating those two questions more often by the day.I could tell Aryana had made an impression on him. In his young mind, she was an ideal playmate. Naturally, my boy had his reasons. He’d told me over and over how fun it was to play with Aryana. How she voiced the various dinosaurs. How she colored with him. How they’d read a book together before bedtime.My son hadn’t had much experience with a woman doing those kinds of things with him. The sixteen-year-old who sometimes babysat was on her phone a lot, Matthew had told me. After school, when he stayed with the neighbor, he mostly played with her grandchild while she prepared dinner. And he barely remembered his mother.So yeah, he’d enjoyed having Aryana here to play with him and read to him. And, well, he was his father’s son. I suspected he liked the way she looked, in an age-appropriate way.Couldn’t fault h
Aryana Santini POV Our bodies swayed apart before he smashed up against me again, pinning me to the wall once more. My legs spread further apart, and Craig eased his hand between us, his longer fingers hovering at my core. When he palmed my mound, I took one hand off it and used it to cover my mouth. The last thing I wanted to do was to wake the little boy sleeping in the other room.Shit.There was a little boy sleeping in the other room.Sure, his door was closed, but this was wrong. We were in Rocky’s apartment. I was here at Rocky’s invitation.So what the hell was I doing with Craig?Unlike me, Craig knew exactly what he was doing. Literally, his fingers glided over my heated slit, and I moaned in spite of myself. His thumb nudged my clit, he positioned a finger at my entrance.“You’re going to come.” He said it as a fact, and I believed him. I wanted to. I was close. But… the damn voice in my head wouldn’t let up. The one that said this wasn’t right, no matter how good it felt.
Craig Gomez POV“I don’t like having to do this,” Ace said. We were drawing closer to Conrad’s place and hadn’t spoken much up until now.The thing was, I knew what Ace meant. We knew Conrad Benet. He’d been on the family’s payroll since before we were even born. Getting information from him would be tough as hell. On the other hand, we’d get that information from a reliable source. If there was one person in this world who knew the Bernardino Family secrets, it would have to be Conrad Benet.But just because I didn’t like it didn’t mean it wasn’t necessary. “You said it yourself. Conrad will know why Bernardino put out a hit on Aryana. What else can we do? Ask his housekeeper? Or break into his fucking house and look for clues?”“Emilio Bernardino used to love Conrad Benet, man,” Rocky Ace reminded me of the relationship between those two. “The first money I ever made in the family? Conrad gave it to me. It was Emilio’s of course, but it was the first time anyone ever told me they we
Rocky Ace De Luna POV“Don’t speak ill of the dead, child.” An old granny at one of my short-lived stays with a foster family had said that. She’d been an ornery old bitch, but she had a point. The dead were somehow blameless. It was the living that caused all the problems. Few of them were decent, and even fewer gave a crap about anyone else.I’d thought that Emilio was one of the good ones. After we ran away from our final group home, we’d lived on the streets. Begged in the park. Robbed rich kids in their prep school uniforms. Emilio had taken us in. He had put a roof over our heads. The man filled our stomachs with food and gave us purpose. He’s saved us. He’d saved me. By teaching me about my heritage. And about the kind of man I wanted to be.But you know who else had a crappy childhood? Aryana. And he’d left her and her mother to fend for themselves.I couldn’t get past that part of it.During our time at Conrad’s house, it crossed my mind to ask him to show me that will. I jus
Aryana Monteverde Santini POVMy lip’s part, waves of fear washing over me. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came out. It didn’t matter, though. A guy came up behind me, his fingers covering my mouth. His accomplice was quick to grab me by the wrists. Yanking them back, he tied my hands over my lower back. In seconds, they were dragging me toward the street.I thrashed around, trying to get away, but it was useless. In that tight hold, my screams drowned out by that thug’s hand.“Don’t fight it, babe,” a low, raspy voice said. “We’re not going to hurt you.”Yeah, right.In the dark, I didn’t see the curb, so I stumbled at the sudden step down. Strong hands grabbed me just before I slammed into a black sedan. The trunk popped open, and I dug my heels in, trying to keep them from dragging me toward it.But the two men easily lifted me off the ground. They put me in the trunk on top of an old musty blanket. Beyond that, there was the faint smell of gasoline.I wiggled around, my