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“ B oss? We found Freddy,” Gio said, pushing his cell phone into his back pocket.

It took a few days longer than expected, but I was closing in on the motherfuckers who sent Frankie and Vic D’Amato after me.

I sucked in a deep breath and rolled my healing shoulder.

It still felt tight, but Doc had done a bang up job with the stitches, and I was on the mend thanks to her.

Fuck. I missed her.

I mean, I really missed her.

That wasn’t something I liked admitting, even to myself.

In just a few days—only hours, really, where I’d been truly conscious—Michelle had managed to get under my skin in a way I didn’t see coming.

She wasn’t loud about it. Wasn’t forceful or pushy. And she damn sure wasn’t conceited like some people were.

Michelle was genuine. She was real.

Somehow, that careful, brilliant woman had left a mark on me—quiet but indelible, like ink staining paper from the inside out.

Men in my position prided themselves on being untouchable, on not needing anyone.

Independence wasn’t just a trait. It was a badge. A survival mechanism.

Maybe I wasn’t ready to say I needed her—not yet. But the silence she left behind was loud enough to feel like a void, one I hadn’t prepared for.

I told myself it was the circumstances—unusual, intense, fleeting—that had me so fucked up over it.

I mean, it was her, too.

The woman was fucking beautiful.

Michelle had to be a foot shorter than me, curvy and petite with a banging body that was just so fucking sexy.

Christ, I couldn’t get her out of my head.

The way she opened up for me. The way she let me in.

Her pretty eyes locked on mine, just a shade darker than her smooth brown skin, her tight pussy squeezing my cock—I’d never felt or seen anything better.

Michelle Davis was one of a kind and those hours I’d spent with her were the best of my life.

I tried to walk away. To tell myself she was better off.

But I didn’t believe it. Not really.

Still, how could this woman fit into my life? My business was complicated. Untangling myself from my father’s old cohorts was proving more difficult than I’d thought it would be.

All his power had been pretty much gone. The money had dried up. His contacts moved on. At least, that was what I’d thought.

My father had been dead for over a year now, and the company I’d started a decade ago had only just taken off when he got the news the cancer was terminal.

He’d been disappointed I didn’t want to follow in his footsteps, but he respected my choices. At least, I thought so.

When he’d asked me on his deathbed to bring our name back to its former glory, I didn’t go about it the way he might’ve wished.

Nowadays, Bottarelli was synonymous with success and quality. Hell, we were even featured in Forbes just last month.

Things were good. Or they had been until I got shot.

Clearly, I hadn’t cut enough ties with my father’s old associates. Something I was working overtime now to rectify.

Michelle wasn’t from my world.

She was better than me. A doctor, so I knew she was brilliant before I ever spoke to her.

But I hadn’t been counting on her sense of humor or that hint of vulnerability that slipped through when she allowed her shields to drop.

Michelle was complicated. Intriguing. Of course, anyone would feel something for the sweet, generous, absolutely beautiful woman that she was.

I sure as fuck did.

But the truth tugged at me, stubborn and unwelcome.

Maybe it wasn’t just the moments we shared that made me feel this way.

Maybe it was simply her and had nothing to do with me.

Considering the possibility that what we shared meant nothing was not easy. It was the hardest fucking part of all.

See, I was sure I wanted Michelle Davis the first time I ever laid eyes on her.

But now that I had spent the night with her, well, I yearned for her even more.

Hell, the truth was, I craved her with a fury I never felt before.

Desire like that was a dangerous thing.

People could get lost in it. They could get sloppy. They could stop paying attention to what was important.

I couldn’t afford to do any of that.

I had a business to take care of and a fucking mutiny on my hands.

Fuck the goddamn D’Amato brothers.

Freddy, too, that piece of shit.

Someone was pulling their strings, had to be.

Someone who didn’t want to see a Bottarelli rise from a hood from a broken crime family, an insignificant runner of bookies, to a globally respected businessman.

That person could fuck himself for all I cared.

Nobody was going to tell me what I should do or what my place was.

Anyone who tried was going to see a side of me I’d worked goddamn hard to bury.

I had no business daydreaming about the sexy doctor while I had all this shit going on. But even the threat of death couldn’t dampen my desire for her.

Michelle was inside me now.

Her perfection was ingrained inside my fucking soul.

Love at first sight wasn’t something I ever thought about. But now, after her, I was starting to think there was something to it after all.

I mean, love was a big word for a guy like me.

Obsessed might be healthier.

It didn’t matter.

Obsessed.

Infatuated.

In Love.

Maybe all three. All I knew was I wanted her, and I was a man who took what he wanted.

“Ready, Boss?” Gio asked.

“Yeah. Let’s get that sonovabitch,” I replied.

Impatience fueled me, and I was already planning for what was next. I’d been away from her for too long.

I needed to see my woman.

Just the image of Michelle flashing through my brain was enough to conjure a hard on like arousal the likes of which I never experienced for anyone else.

Grabbing my cell, I checked in with the team I had surveilling Michelle over the past few days, and I frowned at the incoming report.

Looked like the little doctor was tired of waiting at home. She’d gone out dancing with her friends.

What the fuck is she wearing?

I frowned and zoomed in on the picture one of the team sent me.

She looked like sin personified. All decked out in tight, black denim, red boots, and a matching shiny top.

I adjusted my dick, expelling a long breath afterwards. I needed to calm the fuck down.

Killing a guy while sporting a boner wasn’t exactly something I wanted to gain a rep for.

And Freddy needed killing.