Breathless & Bloodstained (The Chicago War #4) (42 page)

“So to speak,”
said one of the two men from behind Dante.

Tommas recognized
the man instantly.

“Lucian,” Tommas
greeted.

“Rossi,” Lucian
said with forced politeness.

Dante didn’t act
like his brother had said a thing. The other Marcello brother, the youngest, stayed
quiet beside Lucian. Giovanni did give a nod to Theo who was standing with
Damian. From what Tommas understood, the two men had an old friendship.

“Lucian,” Tommas
started, “I hear that apologies are in order.”

Lucian cleared his
throat, seemingly surprised. “They have been in order for years, yet we’ve not
received a single one.”

“Let me correct
that quickly. I apologize for the unfortunate events that took the lives of
your crew by men in the Outfit. It’s unacceptable and it never should have happened.
I know it’s been quite a while, but if there’s anything that would help smooth
this resentment away—”

“Actually, there
is,” Lucian interrupted.

“Try me.”

“There’s a trust
fund set up for the two men’s children. I made it myself. Those kids are without
fathers now because someone’s hotheaded men couldn’t work with my men. Those
children didn’t ask for that, and I felt a need to help them in whatever way I
could.”

“I’ll gladly
contribute,” Tommas said.

Lucian nodded.
“Apology accepted.”

A sense of relief
flooded Tommas. It was a small thing, to be sure, but the bitterness between
the Marcello family and the Chicago Outfit had been standing between their
mutual businesses for years. It was just one thing that Tommas wanted to
correct in his new position as boss.

“Clarify who
you’ve brought and why,” Dante said.

“Damian is my
underboss, and Theo is the front boss as of last month. It was a bit of a …
situation, we’ll say … to get him to agree to the spot.”

“I liked being a
Capo,” Theo muttered.

Dante chuckled.
“You’ll make a good front boss, Theo. Duty and responsibility look well on
you.”

“Thank you for
seeing me before the meeting,” Tommas said.

“You’ll have no
problems inside with the Commission,” Dante assured. “We’re missing a family
this year, but it won’t be an issue when they rejoin.”

“Oh, which one?”

“The Guzzis.”

Canada.

Tommas’ thoughts
instantly went to his surviving sister who lived in Toronto.

“Is there
something happening up there?” Tommas asked.

“We don’t really
know,” Giovanni said. “It was just explained that they had no need to be
included this year, and the families should proceed as they normally would with
the meeting.”

It still bothered
Tommas, but he chose to ignore it until he could make a few calls.

Reaching out,
Dante snagged Tommas’ arm and lifted his wrist. The man eyed the new white gold
band on Tommas’ ring finger.

“Thank you for
assuring he was married when he came, Damian,” Dante said.

Damian laughed. “I
had little to do with that.”

Tommas took his
arm back, and fixed his suit jacket. “It’s quite new, actually.”

“Just three days
old, hmm?” Dante asked.

“You’ve been
keeping track, I see,” Tommas replied.

“Good bosses
always do.” Dante shrugged like it didn’t make a difference, but the air of the
boss of bosses still radiated off the man. He demanded respect, and he already
had Tommas’ in the bucketful. “And where is your wife, Tommas?”

“Enjoying the presidential
suite across the city, and waiting for me to return to finish out our
honeymoon.”

Dante smirked.
“It’s never good to keep a woman waiting. Let’s get this started and over with,
yes?”

“Absolutely,”
Tommas agreed.

“These are horse
pills,” Abriella complained. “Fucking impossible, Tommy.”

Amused by her
pout, but knowing better than to tell her he was, Tommas slipped the large,
pink prenatal vitamin from Abriella’s hand. He looked it over. “It’s not that
big.”

“Then you take
it.”

“Ella, I’m not the
one who is pregnant.”

“But if you were, would
you swallow that thing?” she asked.

Tommas eyed the
pill again. “No.”

“See!”

Laughing under his
breath, Tommas made quick work of chopping the pill using the butter knife from
their breakfast tray. He split the pink pill into four pieces.

“There, baby,
manageable,” he said, handing the pieces over.

Scowling playfully
at having been bested, Abriella tossed the pills back with her remaining orange
juice. Swathed in Egyptian cotton sheets, the peek of her skin and curves was
enough to make Tommas harder than steel and dry in the mouth.

God, he loved this
woman.

After Tommas had
moved the tray from the bed, stripped down to nothing but his skin, and joined
his wife in bed again, he was content. Her legs tangled with his, keeping him
pinned in place and close to her smooth, sweet-smelling skin.

“Well?” Abriella
asked.

“Well what?”

“How did it go
yesterday? You haven’t said a thing about it.”

Tommas kissed the
tip of her nose, earning himself a pretty smile. “It went okay. Better than I
expected.”

“I told you it
would.”

For as long as
Tommas could remember, Abriella had been his confidant where the Outfit and
mafia business was concerned. She let him talk, never judged his choices, and
was one of the better people to go to for advice if he needed it.

“Thank you for
coming with me,” Tommas said. “You could have stayed in Chicago, but I wanted
you here, so thank you.”

Abriella snuggled
in until she was tucked into his chest. One of his hands rested on the small of
her back, keeping her close, while his other laid over the toned contour of her
stomach.

“You couldn’t
leave me behind if you tried.”

No, he probably
couldn’t.

“You’re my
everything, Ella. You can’t leave something like that behind.”

Abriella stilled
in his arms, her blue eyes twinkling with an honest love. “Everything?”

“Everything worth
bleeding for.”

“I guess it’s a
damned good thing you’re what makes me breathe, huh?”

Tommas didn’t tell
her, but she kept him breathing, too.

That’s how love
worked.

EPILOGUE

“I love you,
Tommy.”

Tommas’ lips
curved into a smile against Abriella’s skin. “Do you?”

“So very much.”

“I love you, too.”

Abriella had spent
so much time keeping those three simple words from Tommas that she made goddamn
sure it was the first thing he heard from her mouth every morning, and one of
the last things he heard from her at night.

She hummed
contentedly at the sensations coursing through her body. Tommas’ dark chuckles
filled the quiet bedroom with a heady, sexy melody. His wandering fingers and
teasing kisses on her stomach seemed determined to wake her up. Abriella
refused to open her eyes. Feeling was far better, anyway.  

“Ella,” Tommas
whispered against her hip.

“Hmm?”

“Wake up.”

“I am.”

“Let me rephrase
…”

Abriella laughed when
the very tips of Tommas’ fingers ticked up her side. “Please do.”

“Open your eyes,
Ella, and watch me while I fuck you good morning properly.”

“We’re not having
sex. We’re sleep—”

Abriella’s words
cut off the second she felt a familiar vibration against her thigh. It wasn’t a
second later that the vibrator slipped between her thighs, the hum of the toy
muffled under the blanket, and then slid between the fleshy lips of her pussy.
Abriella’s gasp echoed in the room the moment the toy filled her sex. Tommas’
exploration of her body had made her wet and hot, and it allowed the toy easy
entrance as the vibrations turned up a notch or two.

“Jesus,” Abriella
mumbled into her palm.

She felt Tommas’
mouth press on the hood of her clit, adding an extra layer of intensity to the
vibrator working her pussy. His tongue flicked hard against her clit over and
over, leaving her begging for breath and right on the precipice of an orgasm.

It wasn’t often
that Tommas surprised her with something like a toy in bed. He preferred his
body against hers, his hands working her to a peak, and his mouth lapping up
anything that was left behind.

Abriella wasn’t
about to complain.

Her muscles
clenched in response to Tommas’ gravely hum of contentment against her
sensitive clit. With every twist of the toy in his hands, her body was ready to
give up the fight and freefall into bliss. He knew exactly how to play her
body, and how to make it so much better if he wanted.

“
There
…
Oh, my God, Tommy, there.”

Tommas sucked the
hard nub of her clit between his teeth as he tilted the toy on the next thrust.
The stimulation of Abriella’s G-spot mixed in with the shock of pain from her
clit was enough to send the orgasm racing through her bloodstream.

She froze for a
brief second, stunned and shocked at how fast and how intense she came. She
twisted off the bed with a shout stuck in the back of her throat as Tommas’
fingers bit into her thighs, forcing them open as she shook through the orgasm.

“
Cazzo
perfetto
,”
Tommas praised lowly.

His husky tone
beat through the haze of Abriella’s senses. She vaguely felt the toy slide from
between her legs and her body be turned under demanding hands. Still trembling
and feeling a bead of sweat gather on her spine, Tommas’ warm fingers danced
over her backside. It was only a flicker of his touch, a passing moment of his
affection for her with his hands, but she had still felt it.

Then he was
pushing in.

Abriella’s muscles
tightened all over again at the sensation of her sensitive tissues between
stretched and opened for her husband’s cock.

“Tommy, wait …”

Tommas hesitated,
but barely. He was already half-way in and a blink away from pushing his cock
in to the hilt. “What?”

Abriella giggled
at how whiney he sounded behind her. Like she’d just interrupted the one thing
he wanted more than anything. “Just … wait a sec.”

“
Abriella
,”
Tommas said through what sounded like his teeth.

She glanced over
her shoulder, finding his jaw tight and his eyes blazing. Sliding her hand
between their bodies, she glided the tips of her fingers over the base of her
husband’s cock. Bare and wet from her pussy, his dick twitched under her touch.

“No condom,”
Abriella told him.

Abriella hadn’t
been on birth control for a while. She’d been terribly careful about using
condoms for fear of getting pregnant. Apparently, Tommas was done with that
nonsense.

Tommas sighed, the
action jostling his cock a little further into her soaked core. “Ella, come
on.”

“I don’t—”

“Before you even
start, I do, babe.”

Abriella’s refusal
caught in her throat and melted into a moan as Tommas pushed the rest of the
way in and hit all the best spots inside her sex. “God, Tommy. It’s not even
been a
year
.”

“I know. Shut up
and let me fuck you.”

“But—”

“Ella, I’m warning
you, sweet girl. I will turn you over, shove my cock in your mouth, and fuck
you quiet that way instead of like this. We both know you want this far more
right now. But if you’re a good girl and let me pound into your pussy like I
need to right now, I’ll still let you suck me clean once I’ve filled you full.”

Abriella shivered,
her pussy flexing and hugging him tighter as he began to withdrawal his cock
slowly. Tommas’ responded with a groan.

“Diapers,” she
mumbled.

“What?”

“Diapers. Bottles.
Twelve, two, and four AM feedings. Car seats. Teething. Fevers. Late night runs
to the store. Colic. Crying. No sleep. Midnight drives to make them sleep.”

Tommas pulled
Abriella back into his length, making her ass slap to his skin. “So?”

“Labor,” she
whispered. “Hours and hours of labor, Tommy. You remember that, right? You
remember being scared, exhausted, and not wanting to do it again—
twice
.
Because I sure do.”

His fingers dug
into her sides. “Stop it.”

“Well, that’s what
you want.”

“It is. With you,
of course it is. We make beautiful babies, Ella.”

Abriella bit her
lip and buried her face into the bed in an attempt to muffle the volume of her
moan. It didn’t help much. She didn’t get the chance to make another noise
before Tommas’ hand was covering her mouth and his wet fingers, slick with her
arousal, pushed in between her lips to find her tongue.

She sucked his
digits clean as he fucked her hard from behind. Abriella whined, happy and
blissed, when Tommas fisted her hair and pulled her head to the side. The
roughness in his actions only made her wetter—it got her off even more. She
backed into every thrust, feeling him hit her deeper with each one. The rougher
he fucked her, the better it was.

There was no
love-making in their bed.

Not the usual
kind.

Softness wasn’t good
for her when she needed to feel him still between her thighs long after he left
their home for the day. Sweetness did nothing for her when she liked his dirty talk,
and his names, and his dark promises ringing through her mind for hours.

This was perfect.

This was them.

“There’s my girl,”
Tommas growled into her ear. “Fucking me so good, Ella. You’re tight as hell,
baby. Love this pussy.”

His words were
punctuated by a hard slap to her ass. The heat of the sting traveled from her
backside straight to her wet pussy. Abriella responded to his tap by biting
down on his fingers. He liked to take it as much as he gave it. It only added
to their tempo and the sound of their bodies meeting again and again.

And then his
whispers came dark and dirty in her ear.

Just how she
liked.

Little slut.

Fuck that cock,
Ella.

Take it, baby.
Fucking take it.

Tommas’ hand
slipped away from her mouth to grab Abriella under her throat. She never
worried about him hurting her, or that his hand might squeeze too tightly for
once. He wouldn’t ever do something to ruin the trust that she gave to him
every time he used her in bed. Because for as much as Tommas did use her for
however he saw fit, he also needed what she gave. The compliance. His dirty
girl. His friend and lover.

She was still his
slut in their bed. That had never changed. Nearly ten years did nothing to
affect their sex life inside of a bedroom … or even outside of it. Abriella
would still drop to her knees for this man in a back alley and suck his cock
when he told her to. She would still let him finger-fuck her under a table full
of guests. She would always pull him into the closest room and let him bend her
over whatever he could, even if there was a room full of people next door.

Abriella would
always be whatever Tommas wanted in the bedroom, because he let her be whatever
she needed.

And outside?

Outside, she was
still his equal.

Using one hand to
keep her steady on the bed, Abriella reached back with her other to find
Tommas’ fingers weaved into her hair. She grabbed onto his wrist and held
tight, letting her nails score into his skin as their pace became frantic and
brutal.

“Make me come,”
Abriella whispered.

“So fucking hard,”
Tommas breathed.

Her second orgasm
came on much like the first had. Suspended in time, airless, weightless, and
there in a blink of time.

“Oh,
God
.”

“Yes,” Tommas ground
out. “Make me fucking come, Ella. Come on, sweet girl.”

He fucked her
through the tremors until her body protested in the best way, and she couldn’t
breathe. Her pussy milked him into his own release, and Abriella felt the ropey
stream of his come fill her deep.

She gasped for air
and came up with nothing.

Not a drop.

Breathless
.

This man made her
breathless.

They were damn
dirty, bloodstained by his own hands, and by hers.

Perfection was a
myth.

Beauty was in the
flaws.  

A stream of light
woke Abriella. Strong, warm arms tightened around her frame as she blinked at
the early morning sunlight coming in from the crack in the curtain.

“Tommas?”

“Mmhmm?”

“What time is it?”

“Six-thirty.”

Abriella groaned.
“What time did you wake me up earlier?”

“Like four?”

“Asshole.”

Tommas laughed
against her shoulder blade before pressing a soft kiss to her skin. “You needed
it, I think.”

“You did, too.”

“Clearly.”

Abriella turned
under his urging hands to face her husband. A gentle smile played at the edges
of his mouth. “Did you even go back to bed?”