Page 14 of Forbidden Pregnancy (The Buffalo Italian Mob Family #2)

Chapter Ten

Michael

Present

S he curls up in my bed and falls asleep sobbing to herself softly.

Either that, or Myra was having some other outburst. I can’t blame her.

I had a crazy fucking night myself. But the day won’t wait for my sobbing – or for me to catch up on sleep.

I have to meet Peter and my cousin Luigi at the gym.

When I leave, I lock Myra in her room and use my more advanced security system to lock CC in her room too.

I promised her I wouldn’t use the advanced security measures anymore, but after that stunt with Myra…

I’m starting to suspect she hacked her way through the door and cameras to sneak out and that her efforts to get me to reduce the advanced security measures were merely to lull me into a false sense of security about her intentions to escape.

Of course CC wants to escape our family. I can’t exactly blame her when I’m part of the problem.

I think I’m hiding my feelings well, but Peter and Luigi are both walking on eggshells around me throughout the lift.

They don’t even tease me over the last Sabres game when they both warned me not to end my parlay with a bet on the local team over Colorado Avalanche.

It’s all iron, pain, and sweat until the end.

Luigi hands me a bottle of water from his gym bag.

“Everything okay, Mikey?”

“I’m fine.”

“He’s got a bug up his ass,” Peter mutters as he hooks his lifting belt to his gym bag. He says it quietly enough that I can pretend I don’t hear his ass making the disrespectful comment.

“Go home, Peter.”

My brother cracks a smile, eternally entertained whenever he can get a rise out of me. I don’t want him finding out about Myra. He never knew about her the first time I had her, and I don’t want him to know she’s at my house now.

“Can’t. Dad wants a meeting with me.”

“About what?”

“I don’t fucking know,” Peter grumbles. “It’s dad. He’s a control freak.”

Luigi and I both nod. Our fathers have always been demanding. We all understand how their traditional Italian values made us stronger and prepared to handle the challenges of our family inheritance, but that doesn’t make dealing with our fathers any easier.

“It’s not that,” Luigi says, shaking his head and offering some hope to Peter. “Pittsburgh is under control.”

“Might be related to family business,” Peter says. “Ever since Carmine’s funeral, dad’s phone has been blowing up constantly.”

Family business. I don’t want to betray my discomfort. CC pulled her little stunt right there in Belladonna’s. What if there was someone watching? What if Myra and I aren’t safe?

“Could be,” Luigi says pensively. “I’m wondering about Cosima?”

I become prickly instantly. “What about her?”

“She’s with you, isn’t she? I’m inquiring about her health,” Luigi says. He gives me a strange look, implying inherent paranoia on my end. I am paranoid, but I don’t want him to see it. I can’t act suspicious.

“Yes, of course. But you don’t want to talk about Angela, right? She’s family, but she’s a pain in the fucking ass.”

“At least you don’t have to take care of Ruby.”

“I shouldn’t have to take care of anyone. I’m single for a reason.”

“Women are afraid of men with one eye?” Luigi suggests.

He’s just teasing, but I have to pretend it’s not a sore spot for me that I didn’t just lose my eye, but I have a scar that transformed my face from the one that feels more like Michael Corsini’s.

I’m not a handsome young man anymore and the older I get, the more that reality prickles.

“Yes. It must be that,” I grumble, fighting the urge to say something more cutting in response. I need Luigi’s advice now more than ever.

I strike it lucky, which is more than I can say for my parlays.

“Whatever, I need to get the fuck out of here. Can’t be late or dad’s gonna beat my ass.”

I don’t think dad can do that anymore, but inciting dad’s wrath is the last thing either of us want. Luigi hangs back as Peter hurries off to his Camaro. He has good instincts.

“What’s on your mind, Mikey?”

“I can’t talk to Peter about it.”

“I gathered that.”

Luckily, Peter’s meeting with dad has him too preoccupied with whatever potential shitstorm our father could want to rain down on him during their meeting.

“CC did something… fucked up.”

“Did she now?”

“I need your discretion.”

“We grew up together, Mikey. What do you need?”

I walk Luigi over to his new dad-van – a Mercedes passenger van – the latest in his stable ever since Delphine gave birth to his twin babies, Gio and Leo. He leans against it, waiting for me to confess my great sin.

It hurts me to confess the truth, so I start with the small irrelevant details, circling around the issues between us. “CC snuck out last night.”

“The way you helped Angela sneak out?” Luigi responds unsympathetically.

He knows good and well that Angela and CC are two entirely different creatures.

Angela might be a little cuckoo, but she still maintains some traditional values.

CC doesn’t care who she hurts and her choices are fueled by deep anger that I couldn’t ever fix.

“No,” I growl at Luigi. “It’s something worse.”

“What the fuck happened? I just had kids, Michael. So it had better be manageable.”

By Luigi’s standards, I’m sure this will be very manageable.

“I chased CC down to Belladonna’s, and found her talking to… an old flame.”

“Who, Brittany?”

My cheeks flush. I haven’t thought about that one night stand in ages. I’m not happy about the last place I stuck my dick, but I was desperately horny. I don’t feel good about using a woman for sex.

“Not Brittany.”

“Taylor?”

“Not Taylor.”

“Madison? Wait… Was it Brooke?”

“Can you stop listing women I fucked?”

“You fucked Taylor?”

I honestly don’t remember who Taylor is…

“No. Of course I didn’t.”

“Good,” Luigi says. “That would be fucked up since I’m pretty sure we found out that night she’s your first cousin.”

Still, the name Taylor doesn’t ring a bell.

“Twelve years ago, I had a… fling… with CC’s tutor.”

It feels so fucking wrong calling what happened between me and Myra a fling.

The moment I touched her again, all the dangerous powerful emotions came rushing back into my body.

I can’t shake this woman from my consciousness and now that she’s hidden away at my apartment, my desire for her has twisted into something terrifying.

“Is that the old flame?” Luigi asks, more intrigued than I expected him to be. I must not be doing well at hiding my distress, honestly.

“Yes.”

“Get to the part that becomes a problem,” Luigi says sternly. “Delphine’s waiting at home with crying twins and I doubt my large biceps will be enough to improve her mood if I’m late.”

“I had a fling with the tutor. She… wants nothing to do with me. I don’t know what the hell was going through CC’s mind but…”

Luigi might want me to hurry through this story, but I need to pause to let all of this shit hit me. What the hell are the chances that out of all the bars in Buffalo, NY, Myra would end up at that specific bar on the night CC hatches an escape plan from my place.

He stifles his impatience long enough that I can continue my story without having to answer a probing question.

“I think CC drugged both of us and manipulated us into sleeping together.”

“Fuck,” Luigi says. His voice sounds strange, but I can’t place the emotion.

There are nerves talking to him, but I have to trust Luigi will understand. We’re loyal to each other the way our fathers are loyal towards each other.

“It sounds crazy,” I admit, prepared for Luigi’s fullest moral judgment against me.

He doesn’t respond with any outburst of emotion at all. His voice is flat, betraying absolutely nothing. “It doesn’t.”

I don’t know why Luigi gets on board with my accusations so quickly, but he nods along as if CC drugging me and tricking me into having a baby with Myra is the most normal thing in the world.

“Are you sure?” I ask him, pretty sure that my situation with CC is the least conventional way I have ever rekindled a past relationship.

I never thought I would give Myra a second chance and I don’t think I deserved one either.

The way she left me might have been cruel, but I’m old enough to have done plenty of self-reflection.

She’s the one who hasn’t changed and remains desperate to keep me at arms length.

“I believe you,” Luigi says seriously. “Why is this such a problem?”

“My father gave me an explicit warning after Delphine had the twins. I don’t want to say anything offensive–”

“I know how your father thinks,” Luigi responds quickly, matching my statement with enough defensiveness that he must have figured out that I’m referring to the most taboo subject in his relationship with Delphine.

Race. Ethnicity. Culture. However you want to describe it. Our people have always been loyal to Italians and Italian culture. I never once imagined ending up with Myra forever. If I get her pregnant, that will change. She claims it can’t happen, but she’s never encountered Corsini seed.

I know I’ll get her pregnant and it will change everything .

“He gave me an explicit warning to stay away from black women, not to touch them and certainly not to get one pregnant.”

“That should be easy. I’ve never seen you take a chick home who didn’t have the complexion of 2% milk.”

“You don’t know all the women I’ve taken home.”

“I know most of them.”

But he doesn’t know Myra. Even back then, I knew better than to expose her to my family. At forty-one, I’m a much different man – much stronger. I can handle protecting Myra from almost anyone.

“It should be easy,” I respond to Luigi. “You’re right.”

Luigi finally clues in. “You screwed up. Touched the forbidden fruit.”

Forbidden fruit. It feels fucked up to even think of Myra as something dark, forbidden and unwanted.

I always wanted her. I found her curves both soft and alluring, deeply feminine in the way she walked and leaned over the table to teach my sister.

I’m attracted to her thick, long hair. Her lips and warm brown eyes are some of her most attractive features.

The only reason she’s forbidden is foolish, backwards thinking.

But previously, it was easy to stay away from black women.

On the football team, the best way to make enemies out of your fellow players was messing around with the black women on campus.

You didn’t cross those lines unless you wanted your ass beat.

Myra was my first opportunity to lay my hands on the type of woman that always got my dick hard and my heart racing. I pounced on her the first chance I got and to this day, I’ve never been able to get her out of my head.

“I didn’t just touch her,” I say to Luigi in a low voice to ensure our conversation remains private. “She might be pregnant.”

Luigi’s next question shows that he understands my father.

“How many people know about her?”

“Me. Cosima.”

“I see.”

I don’t know what he sees. Luigi touches his beard and loses himself in thought for a few seconds before he looks me dead in the eyes and gives me his advice.

“Get her out of Buffalo and make sure nobody finds out about her until the baby comes. My advice.”

“Peter doesn’t know.”

“Keep it that way.”

“How can I leave for almost a year without anyone finding out?” I ask him.

“Can you afford for Pino Corsini to find out you knocked up a black woman that you aren’t even married to?”

“Would it be better if I married her?”

“No,” Luigi responds, shaking his head. “He’ll kill her if you marry her and we both know it.”

I kept her away from my family for good reason.

“So that’s it? I disappear from Buffalo with barely a word and expect my father to just go along with it?”

“If you care about this woman at all, you’ll get her out of here. I’ll lend you some money and put you in touch with someone who can get you a place to live.”

“She won’t agree to leave the city.”

“Don’t give her a choice,” Luigi says sternly. “She’s a black woman carrying your father’s first grandchild. Her life is in peril.”