Page 25 of Runaway in the Mafia (The shadows of Cosa Nostra Chronicles #3)

CHAPTER NINETEEN

AHANA

H eat rode my skin. Intoxication rolled inside my head.

A low hum of frustration pulsed between my legs.

I could feel it even when I crawled out of my slumber, where I was no doubt drugged by his presence.

I’d dreamt of him. No surprise there when the night before, I couldn’t stop myself from rubbing against his erection.

It had felt like he had reinforced steel hidden behind his pants.

The memory of it made me wince as my eyes fluttered open.

Soft sunlight poured in, and quietness lulled me.

An illusion, surely, because awareness rustled me.

A scent that shouldn’t have been present slithered to me.

The rich undertones of a spice. Smooth and mellow.

At home in a dark office or a darker alleyway.

But never in my bedroom. You have got to be kidding me.

Agitation brewed along my stiff spine. The air sizzled with a heat burning behind me. For a hot second, I contemplated ignoring him, but like a moth to a flame, I rolled around to face the heat.

Insanity draped on the armchair. Hidden behind a cloud of tobacco, dressed in a sage dress pant, white button-down, and damn it.

He’d rolled the sleeves up to show off those brawny forearms. My eyes had a will of their own.

They ran along his right arm, the one that had wrapped around me the last time, carrying inked words of doom.

His hands were clasped, holding the cigar in between.

A wrist clad with a black leather wristband and rosary beads.

All of it had been on my naked skin just the night before.

I pulled my eyes and ran them up, past the devil’s head of his tie pin, to find his gaze on me. His burned. Glittered in bottle green. It was all dark, edgy, and full of self-righteousness. Like I was in his room instead of him in mine.

“This stalker thing… a born trait or a talent acquired?”

His lips tilted up. Lazy. Slow. I shouldn’t like it as much as I did. “A talent, huh?”

I frowned. Not. “My bad.”

“I’ve heard.”

Something told me we were talking about two different things. “I don’t think I even want to know what’s going on inside that crazy head of yours.”

His gaze rolled along the crisp cotton sheets covering me. “Most days, there’s only one thought in there,” he said, eyes blazing at me, leaving me in no doubt as to what those thoughts could be.

“World peace?” I asked innocently, and he laughed. It was so rough and full of ill thought that it sent goosebumps rushing through my skin.

“Something like that. But today, a little bird’s told me something disturbing…” his laugh morphed into a twisted glare, and I already knew it could have no good ending for me. “A weekend away? With fucking Romeo?”

For God’s sake, Lia. Could she not have told her demon brother this?

“And Lia.”

His tone was tight. “Cancel it.”

“No.” I was actually looking forward to it. A distraction from him. But most importantly, a distraction from another call from Rajesh to Pāpā.

His gaze was all black. “Ahana, don’t make me fucking ask you again.”

“Don’t then.” I was so done with men ordering me around.

His gaze dropped to the floor like he was trying to rein in his anger. A beat passed. Two. And failed. The tick in his jaw was a dead giveaway. The man was insane, but good God, he could kiss. If he kissed as well as he—Do. Not. Go. There.

“This disobedience…” he pulled his gaze off the floor and directed it to me. “Does it get you off?”

I couldn’t say I saw that coming. My mouth popped open and closed. I couldn’t even find a comeback for that.

“Or is it me?”

I was in such a rush to be the last one to close off that I blurted words without thinking of the consequences. “Of course it is.”

His gaze sparked.

I sat up and put my hands on my hips. “I’ll negate you at every turn.” I shouldn’t have said that. Childish. Just a tad.

He was up and across the room in a few heartbeats.

The room shrank to half its size, with him towering next to me.

His hands fisted in his pockets and one knee came to rest on the bed.

Right next to me. What am I doing? I should have kicked him out the moment I felt his presence.

My nipples puckered behind the thin silk top.

I felt it, and he saw it. His gaze followed it, and when he put his tongue to trace his teeth, it almost felt like he’d put it on them and outlined them. “Bet it makes you wet,” he rasped.

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t have found one in a million years.

He took my silence as an invitation and leaned towards me.

His gaze said he only had one intention, and it had nothing to do with world peace.

I should stop him. I really, really should.

His breath was deep, soft, and warm. It fanned my face, and my eyes fluttered under its weight.

“I’ll give you an incentive to listen.” His rough hand fell on my neck.

My skin combusted, and a slow, needy moan slipped out of me.

He put me so on edge I could have come with the first lick of his lips on mine.

But all I felt was a sharp tug and cold air.

I gasped and blinked to find my chain with the locket in his hands.

He pushed off the bed entirely and pocketed it in his pants with an evil grin. “You go away with any man other than me, you’ll never see that again.”

Pāpā’s picture and that locket had been a birthday gift when I had turned eighteen, and it had rested in the dip between my breasts ever since.

I would have fought Rajesh tooth and nail for that tiny thing.

The only luck I had was that he never figured out the importance of it.

How Vitale saw through it when Rajesh hadn’t was beyond me.

He was smart. But not so smart. Because I loved that locket. But more than that, I hated an arrogant man. One who thought he could control my actions. Rajesh had pushed me past that. So I ignored him.

I’d made plans with Lia and Romeo to go out to their grandparents’ cabin weeks ago.

No man was going to get me to change my mind about it.

Especially not one who was so sure I would follow him.

He oozed confidence. I itched to shatter it.

Not only was I going to disobey him, I was going to shove his face in it at every turn.

I was so done with men treating me like I was an idiot.

An object to be shifted from room to room or kicked to the dark corner.

And telling me what to do made my stomach churn worse than any bout of food poisoning.

I had a damn Master’s. Just because I didn’t have a stick in my pants didn’t mean I couldn’t run an empire if I wanted to.

I worked just as hard or even harder than any of them.

I found Lia and Romeo in the kitchen when I walked in.

Grey smoke with a mellow scent followed me.

When he smoked, it was easier to catch the drift of his cigars before he rounded the next corner.

Excitement flared in my ribcage. The win a sure thing.

So I walked into the kitchen and called out merrily, “Buon giorno, mia ammaliatrice.”

I had no idea what it meant. Couldn’t figure out the spelling to Google it. But I knew one thing. It wasn’t meant to be used with a friend, unless you were that kind of friend.

Lia burst into a giggle. I took my time pouring the English Breakfast Tea into my mug and turned around to find two pairs of eyes fixed on me.

The problem was that I was only aware of the third one in my peripheral vision.

The thunderstorm hovering in the open archway between the kitchen and the living room.

“What?” I asked Lia innocently.

“Who’s the ammaliatrice?” Romeo asked sheepishly.

I shrugged. “You, of course.” The growl coming from the doorway was murderous. Worthy of my attention. I turned to address him. “Oh no, my bad. I keep on forgetting this male, female thing. It’s mio ammaliatrice, isn’t it?”

His gaze barked. Romeo was full of cockiness behind me. “You can call me whatever you want, mia ammaliatrice.”

I turned and giggled. “You’re the best, mia ammaliatrice.

” Romeo’s grin was wide, and Lia doubled over in laughter.

But I didn’t feel the moodiness blocking the doorway, and a thrill ran through my body.

This was addictive. A high I could easily get used to.

One for Ahana and zero for the arrogant jackass.

Never underestimate your enemy.

I realised too late when I rounded the corner of the kitchen with a fresh mug of tea.

A hand on my wrist and hot tea burned around my knuckles on the way to the floor.

I hit the floral wallpaper on my back. Darkness loomed in front of me.

I was caged. With a look that drilled through to my core, he grabbed the mug from my hand and finished the rest in one gulp.

I didn’t miss the thin gold chain wrapped around his wrist. The heart-shaped locket resting cosily right next to his black rosary beads.

Shit. Was this why Maa told me I wouldn’t be able to stand up to a man?

A twinge of fear filled me. Letting me know I was yet again at a disadvantage with a man. But my stubbornness to win overpowered it. I opened my mouth to spit something out, anything really, but he got to me before I could.

“I’d be careful with what comes out of your pretty mouth, if I were you.”

I gritted my teeth and decided against it. “You can’t—”

“More words, the deeper the hole you keep digging for yourself. You know…” he leaned to drop the mug on the console next to us, and the way his shirt brushed my chest, you’d think we were naked.

Skin to skin. Alone in a room. This was so overrated.

No man was that appealing. “I know someone who’s interested in this locket.

He wants to get it for his future wife.”

“Bullshit.” It was a pretty little thing. I’d give it that. But of value only to me. Even if it was twenty-four-carat gold and the heart was edged in tiny diamonds.

“Want to bet on it?”

His gaze was pure evil. The glint in his eyes full of ill intentions. He’d probably do it just to piss me off.

His knuckles rubbed on my collarbone, the locket tracing against my skin, temptingly close to where it should have rightfully been. “But I’ll give it back to you. All you have to do is agree with me. Yes, Vitale, I belong to you. I will cancel the weekend with another man.”

You are mine, Ahana.

My eyes closed painfully to a tone from the past.

I was no one's.

“I don’t think so.” I shoved off the wall.

An eyebrow hiked up. “Yeah?”

“No. I won’t do anything you demand.”

“I bet you’ll obey me.”

“No, I won’t.”

“Prove it.”

“I am pro—”

“You should definitely wear these.”

“What?” My breath heaved.

He didn’t answer. Didn’t need to. He rolled my dress up and hooked his finger onto the hot pink satin underneath it. Both our gazes dropped. How had we got to this? “I insist.” His voice rasped. Scraped against my skin like sand.

“No.” I winced. “I mean. Yes.”

“So you are obeying me?”

“No.” I bristled. “I’m not.”

“So you’re going to take them off?” His fingers traced the path, from hip to ass, his palm a sheet of heat on my skin.

“Ugh.” I couldn’t think. The sanity in me was in shambles. I was confused. Hot. Bothered. There was an actual pulse beating where it shouldn’t. “I. Am. Not. Going. To—”

“Such an obedient girl.” His tone was saucy.

It made me want to rip them off and chuck them in his face.

To think I thought I was smarter. Instead, I acted like the village idiot.

I slipped my hands inside my dress and pulled off the satin.

It came away clenched in my hand, attached with a rush of aggravation.

The mood exploded. The heat in the room sky rocketed.

The air was electric. It sizzled and burned like a hot pan on fire.

Shit.

His gaze sparked. There was no more green or hazel in his eyes, only black.

He hadn’t thought I’d go through with it. I hadn’t thought I’d do it.

There was a line. One I’d drawn in my mind. It was thick, black, and robust. It should have kept me behind. Safe. Away from him. I wasn’t going to cross it. It shook. Seeped an inch at a time. The black sinking away to translucent. What have I done?

My hand squeezed around the evidence. It was light and silky.

Betrayed the dead weight within it. His forearms strained.

A fist gripped my hip. Panic rattled in my chest. Frustration dripped into my blood.

He must have felt it because his hand released me.

But when I pushed to shove past him, his hand banded around my palm.

My breath hitched. It burned hot. A finger at a time, he unclasped it and the pink fell. Right into his palm.

I was almost out the door when his throaty rasp caught my back. “Such a bad girl.”

I shouldn’t have turned around. I really shouldn’t have. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have had the sight of him inhaling pink satin burned into my retinas.

Maa was wrong. I could stand up to a man. But when a man was a predator like him… I had never stood a chance.