Page 56 of The Killer Cupcake (Poison Cherry #3)

J osé maneuvered his car close to the curb; the streetlights cast long shadows across the dashboard. "What time should I come back?"

Debbie juggled her belongings while balancing Junior in her arms. His chubby fingers reached desperately toward José as he called him Pa-Pee because Papa was for Matteo. "You heading over to Sam's?"

"Yeah, he's making his famous pot roast. He sends all his love, Debs." The words came out thick, weighted with unspoken grief.

She nodded, biting the inside of her cheek to keep composure.

Her eyes caught the chrome gleam of Matteo's motorcycle parked beneath the flickering neon of Mama Stewart's Diner.

Drawing in a shaky breath, she said, "I'll call you.

They've sedated Mama—she needs the rest. Brother's already gone to the streets, and Ms. Gladys brought the church to sit vigil, so... I can’t stay there.” She paused, gathering strength.

"I need to prepare myself for tomorrow. And right now, I need Matteo. Pick me up first thing in the morning?"

"What about the train? When do they arrive.”

"Not until the afternoon. We'll all gather at Uncle Henry's when the family arrives.”

"I'll request the day off. Count on me," José promised.

Debbie leaned in and pressed a kiss of gratitude to his stubbled cheek. He made no effort to hide the tears that slid down his face. Pete had become like a second father to him after the wedding—their lavender marriage (a term that José taught her) had blossomed into a genuine family.

She stepped out of the car and hurried toward their door. Before her hand touched the knob, it swung open. Matteo pulled her inside. He wrapped them both in his arms. Junior, caught between his parents, squealed in mild protest.

Debbie's bags hit the floor as something broke inside her. The sobs tore from her throat, violent and unstoppable. Matteo half-carried her inside, prying Junior from her shaking arms.

"How's Mama?” he asked, shifting the baby to his hip.

“She isn’t good. Matteo? Can't—can't breathe—,” Debbie panted.

Matteo helped her to the sofa, placing Junior on her lap.

The toddler immediately cried out, reaching for his father.

Matteo scooped him up again and headed to the kitchen.

He returned with cognac over ice instead of water.

She accepted it gratefully, sipping slowly as she tried to steady her breathing.

Matteo dropped beside her, pulling her tight against his side.

She turned, buried her face in the crook of his underarm, still shaking.

Junior's babbling filled the silence, punctuated by Matteo's ridiculous fish faces and the baby's resulting shrieks of laughter.

His steady presence, his unflinching care—it was slowly taming the wild grief clawing at her insides.

But part of her wanted to keep crying, terrified that if she stopped, she'd lose her grip on her father completely. The contradiction was driving her mad.

"They tortured him." The words scraped out of Debbie's throat as she clawed her way back from despair.

"Debs, don't—" Matteo's voice cracked.

She buried her face in his chest, sobbing hard. Junior's tiny fingers tangled in her hair. He tried to soothe. Matteo crushed them both against him, as if he could shield them from the horror. And tears slipped down his face, as his own trauma from his mother’s suicide surfaced.

An hour crawled by. Junior had escaped earlier, leaving a trail of toys, but now he stumbled back, climbing Matteo like a tree before collapsing against his father's chest and putting his thumb in his mouth.

"I should put him to bed," Debbie mumbled, swaying as she stood. The cognac hit hard. He’d poured enough.

Matteo caught her hand. Moving like a man in a dream, he locked up the place, killed the lights, and pulled her upstairs.

Junior's crib waited in their room for nights like these, when closeness mattered most. And Matteo never truly slept, always ready for his son's escape attempts from the crib in the middle of the night.

He stripped the boy down with practiced efficiency, changing him quickly.

"Didn't bathe him. Can't remember if he ate." Debbie's words came out broken. "Can't remember anything today."

His eyes found hers in the dark. "I've got him, Debs.”

She leaned against the doorframe, watching.

Her gangster. Her baby's father. More tender with their son than she'd ever dreamed possible.

Better than she deserved. The thought ambushed her with memories of her father's gentle hands when she was a girl, of how she had migrated from Mississippi with him, riding upon his sturdy shoulders. He was a stern disciplinarian, but he’d only taken his belt to her twice in life.

He was their rock. He broke his back and bent his knee before men lesser than him to give his family all he could.

His patient teaching and silent love carved her into the woman she would become.

Matteo looked back to see Debbie shivering and on the verge of another emotional collapse. She wore a dress and no shoes. He pulled the blanket up over his son and went to her.

"Want to take a shower?" he asked softly, thumbs brushing the tears from her cheeks.

She nodded, unable to speak.

He pulled her to the bathroom and left the doors open.

Matteo was always listening for Junior. His hands were careful and tender as he peeled away her clothes.

He did his best not to make any of his actions sexual.

Though even distressed Debbie undressed made his loins ache.

He reached in and twisted the taps to turn on the water until steam billowed.

Matteo stripped and followed her in. The warm water pounded her shoulders while he soaped her back with firm strokes, then turned her to wash her front. His hands moved with purpose—cleaning, caring. He barely rinsed himself, urgent to get her warm and dry.

Within minutes, he guided them back to their bedroom, where Junior slept peacefully in his crib.

"Matteo?" She said in barely a whisper.

"What is it?" He tucked her into bed, skin against skin.

"Do you think—was it bad? The torture?" Her voice cracked.

"Your father was iron, Debs. Whatever they did, he didn't give them satisfaction. Hell, he probably put a couple in the ground before they finished him."

She shattered again. He wrapped himself around her, blankets sealing them in. She pressed into his chest, wrung out and hollow.

"When Mama's stronger, I'm telling her everything. About us. How you've saved us—me and Junior—over and over. With Magdalena. And now. You're my guardian angel, Matteo. God's gift."

His smile felt like broken glass. She didn't know the truth—the bodies he'd left cooling in their own blood, the screams he'd drawn out with his blade on those who survived.

She knew only this version: lover, protector, father.

Not the Butcher who stalked through nightmares, and took the aggression Cosimo sealed in him out on the guilty and deserving. He'd keep it that way.

"Debs, when the dust settles, I've got plans for us.

Vegas, just as we talked about. We'll go without my father's blessing—I'm building my own connections now.

We'll bring your mother, find her the best doctors money can buy.

Get the hell out of New York while we can.

" His voice dropped lower. "What's coming.

.. it won't be good, baby. Mama Stewart warned me it would be bloody.

She said Harlem would strike back, and that's exactly what my father's counting on.

It's how he'll convince the other families to unite—to wipe Harlem off the map.

This is going to be war, Debs. I won't have you and Junior anywhere near it. "

The room fell silent.

He glanced down to find her breathing steady against his chest, lost to exhausted sleep. Matteo released a long breath, his gaze fixed on the shadows dancing across the ceiling.

"It's going to be war," he whispered to the darkness.

Matteo’s breathing came faster and sudden.

The need for oxygen brought his consciousness out of the deep sleep he’d finally achieved before his mind could grapple with the intense seizing in his dick.

The strikingly hot shots of pleasure in his pelvis that spread heat through his balls.

His back arched up on the bed, and his jaw clenched through a deep guttural grunt.

Debbie nearly swallowed his dick. She suctioned her jaws harder, and her tongue did a loving glide over his stalk as her head bobbed beneath the sheet.

He lifted the sheet to look down the line of his body.

His hips moved and rolled involuntarily from the assault.

And his woman gave him the dick-suck of his life.

“Damn it, Debs, stop,” he said, but he wanted her to go further.

She let him go before he released. His hips buckled in response. She grinned and came up on him. Straddling him. He looked over to their son and saw he was still asleep. She was on him again. Her hand gripped the head of his cock and fed it into her pussy before he could stop her.

“Deb’s please… I can’t control it.”

“No. I need it. I don’t want to dream anymore. I need you,” she said.

Debbie, José, and her son lived by Matteo's rules—unspoken laws he'd established to protect what mattered most. This particular one remained unbreakable: their intimate moments would never touch the same space where Junior slept.

Usually, they could leave him with José for a few hours.

But Matteo, bound by old-world sensibilities, insisted on absolute separation even when that wasn't possible.

On those nights, he'd lead her to the bathroom across the hall or press her against the wall outside their bedroom door—anywhere but near their sleeping son.

She understood his fierce need to preserve Junior's innocence, to shield him from every shadow of the adult world.

Still, in her heart where he lived as her faithful husband, she sometimes yearned for the simple normalcy of sharing their bed without calculation or compromise.

Debbie rode his dick hard and fast. Matteo was powerless to stop her.

The passion unleashed from her was wild.

Her tongue licked over his chest, neck, and lips.

Her pussy tightened and never released or compromised.

He looked over and saw his son stir and panicked.

He had to please his woman. Somehow, do it without her mounting cries of pleasure disturbing Junior.

He flipped her and pinned her down. He kissed her to keep her cries of passion muffled.

He fucked her slowly to settle the urgency in her and deliver the release she needed.

And masterfully, he got her there, just as Junior sat up.

Debbie climaxed with her hands pinned down and mouth gaping.

He could not. Though he desperately wanted it.

He wanted it badly. When his son stood in the crib and stared at their moving bodies, he quit.

“Damn it, Matteo!” she cursed.

“Don’t swear around Junior Debs,” he said and left her. He pulled on his pants to bury his angry cock and reached for Junior, who immediately began to cry for his attention.

“I’ll make him a bottle,” Matteo said and headed for the door.

“He’s too old for bottles!” she shouted after him.

They were gone. She rolled her eyes and turned over in bed, less than satisfied. But soon her anger dissolved. She had to smile. Though her heart was shattered, her hope was still there. She had Matteo, and in his imperfect world, he was perfectly perfect for her and Junior.

The train cut through midnight darkness.

Ely had fallen asleep against the window, his breath fogging the glass in small, rhythmic clouds.

Kathy snapped her journal shut and stared at him.

The guilt hit like a physical thing—sharp, relentless, piercing her heart.

This man had destroyed another woman to be with her.

He'd asked for nothing, given everything, and where had it gotten him?

On a train racing toward Harlem and her father's bloody vendetta.

His peaceful life in Butts might as well have been a dream now.

She'd done this to him. Her salvation had become his cause.

Her fingers found his cheek, memorizing the planes of his face.

She loved this man—God, how she loved him—more than she'd thought possible.

But love and passion were different creatures, and that distinction would remain forever unspoken.

Ely's sacrifice demanded her absolute loyalty, which made returning to Harlem feel like walking into a trap.

Carmelo existed there like a lit match near gasoline.

What if her resolve crumbled? What if he said her name just right, looked at her that certain way?

She could never face him alone again. The child they shared inside of her whispered his name in her dreams. She needed backup—someone who could keep her anchored when the past came calling.

Across the narrow aisle, her mother slept peacefully against her father's thigh. He sat wakeful, lost in the black landscape streaming past the train window. Another soul too troubled for rest.

Something made him glance her way. Their eyes met, and he offered that subtle wink that had always meant "everything will be alright, baby girl, daddy has you.” Her smile was almost bashful.

She pressed her hand to her heart and nodded—I love you—a gesture they'd shared since she was small.

He returned it without hesitation. The exchange loosened the tight insecurity and worry in her chest. Maybe she could do this—return to Harlem as Ely's wife, carrying her secret child, protected by these two good men and faith.

Maybe not.