Owned by the Mafia Bad Boy (Book Five) Read online

  When he didn’t answer, Kane grabbed his hair and wrenched his head back. “Answer her. She who?”

  “Davros, you’re a dead man. Every member of the family will want your head when you leave here. Too bad you won’t live to see what the man who buys her gets to do to her.”

  Without warning, Kane stepped back, pulled the pistol David had given me out of his waistband, and fired three shots into Hadler’s head. The agent’s body twitched violently, then hung limp. “Shut up.”

  I’d turned my head while he convulsed, but not fast enough to miss the blood and brain matter that splattered the wall behind the agent’s body. Or the lifeless way he hung there, like one of the slaughtered pigs I’d seen in my dad’s barn.

  Bile scalded my throat and I held my stomach until it settled. I wouldn’t throw up in front of Kane. Not now.

  “David.” Kane turned and handed him the gun, face alarmingly stony. David holstered the pistol. “There should still be utensils in the kitchen. We need proof to bring to Gavini. Go. And find something to put it in, too.”

  David left the room and I walked over to where Kane stood, in front of the agent’s lifeless form.

  “Put what in, Kane?”

  He wouldn’t look at me. “You shouldn’t be here.”

  “We could have found out why Ferrara is after my dad and I.” I couldn’t keep the tightness out of my voice.

  “We don’t have time to let him jerk us around.” He looked at his watch. “We have fifteen minutes to meet Gavini. The drive there takes ten.”

  “You really do make it look easy.” I hated how unsettled I sounded. It wasn’t like there was another way. “Tell me it’s not.”

  “Wait outside, Anika.”

  I didn’t move. He shook his head.

  David returned a moment later and crossed the room. My eyes widened as he handed Kane a long machete. I was pretty sure they didn’t use those in meat packing plants, which could only mean it had been brought in during another interrogation. Once more, it hit me with nauseating clarity just how much of Kane’s life was soaked in blood and death.

  “Shit. What are you going to—”

  David pulled me backward before I could finish, and I realized why just as Kane stepped back.

  “Oh, fuck.” I whipped my head aside as Kane lifted the blade and swung it straight across the agent’s throat. There was a slicing sound, and something hit the floor with a heavy thud.

  Once more, my stomach gave a violent heave and I shoved the urge down. I wouldn’t allow myself to look weak in front of him. He needed a strong woman, a woman who was behind him and could handle what he needed to do. Still, how the fuck did he do it?

  As we left the factory, I made the mistake of turning to ask Kane where we were supposed to meet Gavini. Instead, I saw a black plastic bag David must have brought back, hanging from his grip, and at the bottom of it, an unmistakable bulge of a human head.

  “Oh, to hell with this.” At the door to the factory, I abandoned my pride, turned, leaned on the wall, and retched.

  Kane’s arm slid around me and I felt him holding me up with ease. The bag in his hand dropped and his other hand held my hair back. The way the bag hit the pavement, heavy like a wet bowling ball, made me nearly lose my insides again.

  “You all right, angel?” He helped me straighten.

  Nodding, I wobbled and wiped my mouth, forcing down the urge to tell him I was fine, instead letting him support me in silence. He needed it as much as me. Damn it, if only I could shut off the fears and panic welling in me. The fear that I was losing the good man I loved and the panic that I was losing my own light with him.

  At the limo, I nodded to Kane’s Porsche. “What about your car?”

  “David will come back for it later.” He nodded for me to get in the back of the limousine.

  As we headed downtown to meet the kingpin who’d put us all in this mess to begin with, I secretly prayed things would reach some semblance of normalcy, that the carnage would end before I forgot who I was and I became someone I no longer knew.

  2

  As we got into my limo, it hit me, how messed up my head had become since Anika had come into my life.

  How long had it been since I felt the rush of seeing another business deal sealed, sending the numbers in my account skyrocketing through the roof? How long since I felt the triumph of another shady company eaten up by my portions of my father’s otherwise corrupt businesses? Days. A week? I didn’t know. All I knew was that everything changed the moment she entered my life, what now felt like a thousand years ago. It boggled my mind that it was only two weeks since she’d signed my contract.

  It felt like I’d known her for years, and yet, when I was with her, I felt like I was always learning something new about her. The adrenaline of wheeling and dealing, of making money, never compared to the rush of knowing Anika believed in me, of possessing her so completely. Being inside Anika wasn’t sex. It was being inside light. Inside heaven. Being with her was a single moment when all the horror and the darkness that was slowly eating away at me disappeared and I was perfect. I wasn’t a monster. I was a man.

  When she’d showed up with David armed with a gun, I’d been grateful for her effort to help me, but I’d also been pissed. Seeing her react to Agent Hadler’s death reawakened my anger with her for not staying out of things she had no business being involved in. What kind of a man did it make me that my woman had to see such things?

  So much for Mafia fucking code.

  That she handled the situations with such bravery was beside the point. It didn’t make my failure any less apparent. I’d make up for my error tonight. After the kingpin was nailed, good and hard, to the fucking wall.

  After putting our grizzly proof of Agent Hadler’s demise in my trunk, as far from Anika as I could, I slid into the limo beside her, letting David shut us in. In minutes, we’d be meeting Dominic. The thought sent protectiveness buzzing through me and I pulled Anika close to me.

  Every time we’d gone near him, that bastard kingpin had made it clear he wanted her. Given the chance, he’d take her from me and destroy her, tearing her up in whatever sick fantasies he had. The last thing I wanted was to allow her near him again, but cutting her out of this meet was not an option.

  “Are you all right?” I buried my face in the top of her soft red curls, holding her tight.

  “I said I’m fine, Kane. I am.” She sat too stiffly against me. I rubbed her tummy, trying to help settle it.

  “I know what you said, but your stomach’s been extra twitchy lately. You aren’t pregnant, are you?” A bolt of hope streaked through me, and I crushed the alien sensation fast. Not the first time I’d had it since I’d met her, damn it. I neither wanted, nor could afford a fucking kid. Especially not with a woman who was supposed to be a temporary possession that I knew full well I had to let go of at the end of her six month contract.

  Anika’s muscles tightened as if my words electrified her. She squirmed to get out of my arms. “Don’t be silly. I told you I’m protected.”

  Her sudden prickly demeanor bothered me more than it should have, and I released her sharply. The familiar excitement that always hit me when she got uppity made its presence known, and my own muscles tensed as if cuing up for a long-absent fight.

  “I don’t like seeing you so shaken up like this. David should never have allowed you to come here. He will be dealt with later. And you’re going to suffer for disobeying me.”

  With the partition up, David wouldn’t have heard me, but I knew if he had, he would have just continued to drive, headed for the nearby Chinese food restaurant Dominic had chosen as the meeting place.

  “Hey.” Anika turned in her seat, her eyes like chips of dark blue ice. “I was trying to help you, Davros. I think I’ve proven I can handle it. Would you rather I let you die?”

  Ohh. There it was. That barb-wired spunk, the side of her that made me torn between wanting to hammer fuck her into my bed and strangle her all at
once.

  Since the night at my father’s, I was sure her feelings for me had changed. She was more accepting of the violence and carnage my life demanded. But now there was a new prickliness to her. She was ticked, but why? I had a feeling her anger went deeper than my asserting my authority.

  No, it didn’t matter why. Her annoyance with me would make it easier to keep the distance between us I knew was best for both of us.

  I drew in a slow breath and resisted the urge to shove her face down into the seat and tear her pants down, claiming her hard, and hot, and fast, right there. That sick, twisted part of me wanted to throw the walls up between us, treating her like nothing more than property, slicing up any emotions she might feel for me. Anything to protect her. And myself. Instead, I slipped a crooked finger under her chin, locking her eyes with mine.

  “Still got that mouth. Good. It’ll make it easier to punish you.”

  “You’re seriously going to punish me for trying to protect you?”

  “No. For forgetting your role. You shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t have seen what happened to Hadler, and you shouldn’t see me blowing people’s brains out.”

  “Oh, come on.” She twisted away. “After what I did to that guy who almost shot my father, don’t you get it? I can take more than you think.”

  “But that’s just it. You shouldn’t be having to slice up mobsters and watch your man take lives. You’re going in too deep for me, Anika. You should be home with your loving father, waiting by the phone for some perfect, good guy to call you.”

  She stared. “Damn you, Kane. I thought you’d been shot.”

  “Protecting me is David’s job.”

  She shook her head, making a pissed off sound. “You’re unbelievable.” But she didn’t argue anymore. She’d accept what I did to her, even if she hated it. I fought a smile at the progress this implied. She was learning.

  “Deal with it, girl. You’re not getting out of this.”

  She pressed her lips together and then turned her face to the window. I could visibly see how hard it was for her to submit, not to mouth off. I almost chuckled, my cock pressed against my slacks, hardened almost to the point of pain. I focused on the far more dangerous task at hand—dealing with our friendly neighborhood mob boss—until the pressure in my cock eased.

  “I’d take you back to the hotel, but Dominic should see my ownership of you, especially now.”

  She looked up at me. The questions in her eyes clearly needed to be asked, and weren’t with the intent to backtalk.

  “What?” Permission to speak.

  “It just…we have him, now, right? If he does anything, we expose him. So, what does it matter if he knows we’re together?”

  Together. A smile tried to pull at my lips at the implication in that word, an implication that sent all sorts of crazy images through my thoughts. White weddings and growing old together, Anika growing big with my child. Forbidden images I knew full well could never happen. The thing was, her belief there was more between us than there could safely be only reminded me what I had to do when it came to her. She was safer thinking our relationship was strictly business. Now wasn’t the time to remind her of that, though. I’d have to soon, no matter how much it gutted me. I folded my arms and kept my face like stone.

  “It’s safer if he still thinks you’re my slave. Anything can happen to turn the tables in his favor. The less he knows, the better.”

  She nodded, slowly, taking in what I said. Then she opened her mouth as if to speak. The partition between the front and back sections of the limo wound down, and she closed her mouth as David looked over the seat at us.

  “We’re almost there, Mr. Davros.” He handed a fancy looking watch with an expensive, large face to me. It looked just like the kind I usually wore, with a gold band and diamond studs around the face. “I’ve looked over the contents of the flash drive on my computer. It’s legit. There’s file after file of recorded sessions between Gavini and the director of the FBI’s gang task force, with him turning on dozens of high ranking mobsters. The flash drive is in the back of the watch. Not a place he’ll look if he searches you.”

  I nodded and put the watch on my wrist. “Neat trick. More FBI secrets?”

  David smiled without answering and turned the car into the large, empty lot of the restaurant. The two-story structure was a shadow against the night, the red dragons that ran along the curved oriental roof standing out blood red in the black.

  Beside me, Anika tensed and David gave me a solemn nod.

  We were here. Game face time.

  Moments from now, when Dominic showed up, and even after he was gone, I would worry about keeping Anika at a distance, and not just because of him. The thicker the walls between us, and the colder I was, the less she’d care about me. And the less she cared for a monster like me, the greater the chance I could keep her alive long enough for her to go back to her normal life when the contract ended. Yet here, with just us, I had a few more minutes to be what she needed. The man who wanted so much more than our contract allowed.

  Anika’s throat worked hard. I slid my hand into hers, squeezing it hard. A silver of warmth for her streaked through me when she squeezed back. It was probably a reflex, nothing more than a twitch, but for now, I’d pretend it was so much more.

  A long black Rolls Royce pulled up into the lot and stopped beside us. David started to open the door, but stopped when two men got out of it, both with guns in hand. Dominic followed.

  “Kane.”

  I gripped Anika’s hand tighter on the seat between us, resisting the urge to hold her in a protective embrace. Dominic might see. “It’ll be alright, angel. I expected this.”

  Walking over to my car, Dominic buttoned up his dark blazer while his two lackeys flanked him. Both bodyguards looked like walls of muscle shoved into suits that fit so tight they’d rip if either one flexed. One of the giant thugs slammed his fist into David’s door with a meaty thump.

  “Out, Jeeves.”

  David opened his door slowly and got out. Looking deliberately harmless, shoulders slumped, slouching.

  “Open the door.” The same man nodded to my side door.

  Silent, David obeyed and then stepped back, letting Dominic slide into the seat opposite Anika and myself.

  Pushed over to the window, Anika slouched, head down. Submissive. I slid on my ice-cold mask of indifference. David shut the door, closing us in with the head of one of New York’s most powerful crime families.

  Here we go.

  Theoretically we had him, but Dominic Gavini hadn’t become the head of the family without having a fuck of a lot of tricks up his sleeve. If anything went wrong, it would be over. I’d lose not only the closest thing I’d ever had to a best friend, but also the best thing that could ever happen to a bad guy like me.

  It’s amazing, you know. Amazing, what a good dose of fear will do for you.

  Kane was right, I was going in too deep for him, but that didn’t stop me from loving him. Neither did knowing he was still a Davros, that, his whole life, he’d been programmed—by his father, by the mob—to do whatever he had to do to survive.

  He’d break me if he had to; he’d said as much. He’d cut me out of his life without a second thought to protect me from the monster that always lived inside him, waiting to play its part. None of that mattered to my traitorous heart. It still ached for him. Still wanted to save him.

  Which is why his reaction moments ago cut me far deeper than I’d ever admit. When I’d talked about us being a couple, I’d seen that distance enshroud him like a cloak. He didn’t say we weren’t together, but his body language, the hard look in his eyes, shouted it loud and clear. The way he’d stared me down, a predator aware of his total ownership of me, was unmistakable. I was his property, nothing more. It stung, but he was just trying to protect himself, right?

  Right?

  Emotions were dangerous for him, deadly weaknesses he couldn’t afford to have. I understood that now. He w
as simply protecting himself from the repercussions of them.

  Then Gavini had showed up. He’d climbed in the car, and a cold chill washed over me, as if I’d been pulled out of a lake of ice. All I could feel was the singular sort of terror that came with being within a foot of this man, this dark-haired devil in a suit who ruled New York.

  This man who could order my dad killed and myself put in real shackles with a nod.

  “Davros.” Gavini shifted, getting more comfortable in the seat like he owned the limousine. I shrank smaller under his gaze, trying to look afraid. I hated that I didn’t have to entirely fake it. “Where’s Montrose?”

  Without flinching, Kane tapped the window with his knuckles. David walked to the back of the limo. I could just make out the shadow of him through the tinted window. One of Gavini’s men aimed his gun at David’s head and followed him. David opened the hood.

  “He’s in the trunk?” Gavini wrinkled his nose. “Ha. I love it. You’re a cold bastard, Davros.”

  My heartbeat thudded in my ears. What would he do when he found out what we had for him in that bag?

  Saying nothing, Kane waited for David to open his door and hand him the plastic bag. When he took it, I caught sight of the bulge at the bottom of it and covered my mouth, turning away.

  “Wow.” Gavini whistled. “You know, when I said I wanted his head, I didn’t necessarily mean it literally.” But I could hear his grin.

  Still, Kane said nothing. I made myself watch Gavini as he took the bag from him and opened it, looking inside. His face twisted with anger and confusion—and, a hint of alarm—as he dropped the bag with a thud.

  “What is this?” he snapped.

  Several things happened at once. Through the open door, I saw David whip around to the two men on him. In one move, he’d somehow snatched the guns from both of them at once, thwacked one with his pistol across the head, and then pointed both pistols at the men. The one guy fell to the ground and the other backed up, hands in the air. At the same time, Gavini reached into his blazer, obviously for a gun of his own, and Kane leaned back, throwing his foot hard into Gavini’s throat.