Page 24 of Hidden Ties (Made Men #11)

“What the hell are you doing here?” Sal asked him bluntly.

Amo was immediately offended. “Damn, what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Meaning I didn’t invite you. You don’t have a girlfriend or wife here. Who the hell told you, anyway?”

Valerie was worried all hell was about to break loose when Amo stood defiantly. “I’m not at liberty to say …”

Sal turned to give dirty looks to all the men in the room, wondering who the hell had invited him, but not a one dared to tell the truth.

Amo wasn’t the playboy Sal had called in as a last-ditch effort to bribe the men into breaking up girls’ night. That one had yet to show and was much more dangerous for Valerie to meet. If he was lucky, he could get everyone to leave before that person showed up.

“Well, party’s ove—”

“But I haven’t gotten to play Mortal Kombat yet.” Amo stopped him from closing the door in his face when no one else took Sal seriously that the party was, in fact, over.

Sal was about to slam his fingers in the door when Valerie stepped in, giving Sal a dirty look. “Come on inside, Amo; you can verse me.”

Those words only made him want to kill Amo more, especially when it was obvious the big dumbass didn’t recognize Valerie much in her new clothes, but he should’ve known he had nothing to worry about with Amo. His arrogance would get himself in trouble.

“Easy, doll.” Amo finally recognized her from earlier in the underground. “I don’t want to kick your ass and make you feel bad.”

“You know what? Be my guest,” Sal offered gleefully, opening the door wide when he saw those fighting words lighten Valerie’s eyes.

It was quick and dirty with multiple KOs before Amo had enough of getting his ass kicked and handed off the controller to the next lucky player.

As she kicked the men’s asses one by one, Angel, Nero, and Dominic had their fair share against her, but not one of them came out victorious.

It wasn’t until Katarina gave her best shot against Valerie that someone stood a chance, even though it was slight by KOing Valerie once.

With only few of them left to try to best her, a controller was held out for Vincent to take.

“No, thanks.”

Amo nudged his friend. “Come on, man.”

“I said, no, thanks ,” Vincent repeated, making himself clearer.

Trying her best to move the awkwardness of the situation, Maria raised a brow at her brother. “Lucca, then?”

Lucca wrapped an arm behind Chloe’s back, clearly enjoying the show and comfortable where he was. “That’s all right. I’ll save myself the embarrassment.”

“One man standing.” Kat’s smile turned into a wicked sneer from excitement. “Go on, Sal.”

“Oh, this will be good.” Amo grabbed the popcorn from in front of Valerie for himself.

she had asked for a snack to keep up her energy to kick their asses, and it was now being passed around for the others to enjoy as they witnessed history.

The oooing and ahhing continued as Sal took the controller, ready to face off in a battle of bloody guts and glory.

This match didn’t go down like the others, where Valerie had triple KO’d each one of them. They started out the gate in a rare tie with everyone’s eyes glued to the TV.

Scared to get beaten, or to win, he knew he’d never hear the end of it either way, knowing either the guys would make jokes that a girl was finally able to beat The Great Salvatore or Valerie would accuse him of cheating like she had last night in Mario Kart.

It was a lose-lose situation; under no circumstances was Sal coming out of this a winner.

Valerie wiped the sweat off her forehead with the inside of her elbow. Fucking hell, he was good, but she’d be damned if he ended her winning streak.

“What the hell do you do?” Amo asked, looking at Valerie in disbelief when they went to another tie.

“She designs video games,” Kat said appreciatively.

“Well, that explains the nerd-off,” Amo huffed, watching them go at it. “You’re not able to look up our Internet history, too, are you?”

Thankfully, Valerie laughing didn’t cost her the game when she realized how it was that Sal put the fear in the big men. “I don’t really use my gifts for that. I more so use them on myself.”

“Someone could learn something from her, ahem ”—Amo coughed loudly—“Sal.”

“What do you mean by that?” Sal asked, responding to Valerie and not the annoying cougher.

“Like, I mostly just incognito my shit.” She shrugged between mashing the buttons. “For instance, you probably tried searching me up, huh?”

Sal’s heart dropped as she continued on, knowing full well he had.

“Then all you found were some speeding and parking tickets, and I’m sure you found out that I’m broke.”

His silence made all of their mouths drop, hanging on to her every word while they simultaneously watched the screen.

“Well, that’s not news to anyone.” Valerie laughed, uncaring that she was airing out her business. “The trick is you keep that stuff for show ’cause no one’s squeaky clean.”

Fucking hell, that was smart. He had to admit he hadn’t bothered to try to look into her deeper, taking the surface level as good enough.

“That’s why I left my speeding tickets, ’cause, I mean, who the hell pulls someone over and gives them a ticket for going eleven over?”

Sal, still dumbfounded he hadn’t thought of that, tried his best to take in this new information all while trying to murder her in the game.

“You got a speeding ticket for going eleven over?” Vincent ended his vow of silence there, getting pissed. “That’s foul.”

“Well, technically, I was going ten over. I know ’cause I had my cruise control set for it. I thought going ten over was an unspoken rule for being okay.”

“Nah, it’s five,” Amo told her, popping another kernel into his mouth.

“Ten,” Kat visibly disagreed, making Dominic give his baby sister a scolding look.

“ Five .”

“Ten,” Maria corrected her husband.

“Agreed,” Adalyn and Angel chimed in.

“Five is always a safer bet,” Elle said, but her boyfriend challenged, “You shouldn’t have gotten pulled over for that. That’s just a waste of everyone’s time.”

Chloe even gave her two cents, agreeing with Nero. “I do think it was a little harsh to give you a ticket for that.”

“What do you think?” Valerie asked Sal curiously, having heard the other’s responses.

“I mean, you did technically get a ticket for eleven , not ten ri—Ow!” Sal bellowed when Maria’s heel hit him in his foot.

Valerie just rolled her eyes, not sure why she thought he would think any differently than analytically. Typical.

Lucca, who had been quietly listening to everyone discuss, finally gave his opinion on the matter. “Do you know the officer’s name who wrote you the ticket?”

By the dark look on his face, he meant to do something about it. She knew she was risking a man’s life, but she just couldn’t help it, remembering when she was almost shoved to the ground.

“Why, yes, I do—Officer Dunbar.”

Maria hitting him again, this time more discreetly, had Sal taking a mental note of that name.

He’d been on duty the night of Valerie’s arrest and usually patrolled with Officer Daniels.

However, he was certain if Daniels was there, she wouldn’t have gotten a ticket in the first place, let alone been pulled over for that.

Dunbar enjoyed giving out tickets; he had one of the highest quotas in the precinct.

Amo’s big mouth spoke up again when Valerie was just about to win. “Come on; aren’t you supposed to be The Great Salvatore, or what?”

Oh shit.

The controller slipped from Valerie’s hand in pure shock, letting Sal use his finishing move and defeating her. Thinking maybe she hadn’t heard Amo correctly, she knew she actually had when Maria spoke.

“Wait—” The blonde looked around to see it wasn’t only her who was confused. “You didn’t even at least tell her who you are?”

“No …” Sal gave Amo a threatening glance.

“Well, I didn’t know!” he blurted out, trying to desperately save his ass. “Maybe she doesn’t even know what it means. It’s not like everyone’s heard of The Great Salvato—”

“Oh, I think she knows.” Katarina could see the obvious, just like everyone else in the room. “I think she’s broken.”

Valerie stood catatonic. Everything made sense as the last piece of the Sal puzzle filled itself in. Holy fuck , he didn’t even try to hide his identity. How stupid could she be?

“ You’re The Great Salvatore?” she asked, still in disbelief but able to form words at last.

“Yep, she knows,” Amo said, setting the popcorn down and getting up to leave. “Time to go.”

“Oh, I think it’s time for everyone to leave,” Valerie made herself clear, staring Sal down.

“Good idea.” Maria hurried for the door next.

“Goodbye.”

“See ya next time.”

“We had fun!” a different guest chimed in, as they all knew their stay had reached to the over-welcomed part.

With a quiet room, her eyes had yet to move from him. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me that at least.”

She wanted to feel hurt that he had yet to trust her with a thing, considering she had freely told him everything about her. She had hidden no part of herself and become so vulnerable with absolutely nothing in exchange. But right now, it wasn’t hurt that she felt …

“Go on.” Sal sat down on the couch, preparing himself for all the questions. “Ask me everything you want to know.”

Every now and then, The Great Salvatore would do a stunt the whole world would hear about, but curiosity wasn’t what she was feeling, either.

“I don’t want to know how you did anything.”

“You don’t?” he asked, confused.

“I already know,” she revealed, like what he did wasn’t hard. “Why wouldn’t I know?”

“Oh, well, okay. No reason,” Sal said, not wanting his words to step himself into a pile of shit that would have him never getting laid again. “Then how come you haven’t cared to look me up or stop me?”

Considering Valerie did know how he had done it, technically, she could do those things. But what Sal lacked to understand was how she could wield the power and yet had decided against using it for any personal gain.

And there was only one good explanation for that.

“Because I just want to create video games.”

It was a simple and humbling answer that Sal respected her for.

“Well, that’s good … But …” He went back to looking slightly confused. “But why does it look like you want to ask me something?”

“’Cause I do.” She was glad to finally be able to express her true feelings. “Do you wanna fuck?”