Coveted: An Alpha Male Romance (14 page)

Three weeks without Baby had turned me into a monster.

“I’m sorry! Please!”

I barely could hear his cries over the sound of my knuckles connecting to his face. I could barely see the tears coming from his eyes beyond the blood that was spewing from every orifice.

I didn’t even know this fucker’s real name; I only knew that he headed a group of teenagers that had been robbing a few businesses in my old neighborhood, Little Italy. Not only was he and his little dumbass friends taking them for everything valuable that they had, but the idiots would not leave without completely destroying the property. My crew had been called to handle them. Usually I allowed my soldiers to get their hands this dirty. But today, I needed someone to take my aggression out on.

“Roc!” I kept pummeling this poor bastard into damn near a corpse. “Roc!”

“WHAT?!” My voice bounced off of every wall in the basement of the auto store, one of the legit businesses that I used to front my legal ones.

I stood, sweating profusely, damn near foaming at the mouth as I stared at Gabe, who had a frightened look in his eyes that I’d never seen.

“That’s enough,” he told me timidly. “Let Franco and the boys take care of him.”

His eyes had brought me back to reality. He was right. I deeply sighed as I ran my hands over my face. Baby was literally driving me mad. I hadn’t seen her in so long that I was scared that I could no longer envision her in my dreams. She wouldn’t answer my calls. I needed to hear her sweet voice like I needed my next breath. I didn’t have the balls to show up at her place. I was a dangerous man. Some people were all bark. Some people were all bite. I was all of both, but I knew better than to piss off Tracy and Madea by showing up uninvited, and, per Baby’s text messages, I was uninvited.

“Come on.” Gabe was guiding me away from that withering, bleeding kid, carefully, like I was an unruly beast about to get put down. “We have to go meet your Pops, anyway.”

Fuck. Something else to piss me off.

I rang my hands violently through my hair before snatching my fitted from my back pocket and throwing it on. “What the fuck does he want now?”

“No clue.” All I knew was that whatever it was, I had to comply. Per my mother’s text messages, my father needed me and it would make her happy if I bit my lip and acted like a loving son for once. “He only said that it was urgent.”

For the life of me, my brain couldn’t operate beyond Yanna. Something told me that I should further investigate what Pops wanted, but I couldn’t function. Three weeks without Yanna had left me a shell of the man that I used to be. I was sporadic. Business would be unorganized and falling apart if it weren’t for Gabe.

Hell, I was even losing fucking weight.

I fell silent and attempted to smooth my rage as Gabe and I left the auto store. Once in his passenger seat, I sat silent as Gabe drove us through the city. It was a hot August day. I would have loved to be on the beach with Baby as she fussed about not wanting the sun to make her skin any darker. Just thinking about her put a faint smile on my face.

That stayed across my face until we approached the round top double mahogany doors of the de Michele estate. Joseph opened the door before I could even put my hand on the door knob. Even though now almost in his sixties, he was meticulous with his services.

“Roc… To what do we owe the honor?”

And he was still an asshole. But for the first time in three weeks, he caused a genuine smile on my face. “Blame it on Pops.”

He gave Gabe and I space to enter while telling us that Pops was in his office on the second floor. I ascended the stairs with a heavy heart. With each step, I wondered how I could get past this wall that Baby had built between her heart and mine.

For weeks, I had been a patient man, not wanting to push her further away with my aggression. I knew that my presence would hurt her. With Baby, I was selfless enough to cause my own pain by preventing hers, but my patience was running thin.

“Rocco, Gabe; come on in.”

Pops was behind his desk. To this day, I didn’t know why that man had an office. He couldn’t even complete a search on Google. He was technologically illiterate. It took the man two years to learn how to send a text message, and even then he hated to do so. He felt like every device was bugged.

I reluctantly sat in one of the leather seats in front of his wood desk. Gabe was beside me going through his phone.

“I’m going to get straight to the point… I need a favor, Rocco.”

My father’s favors were never favorable for me, so I just stared at him, waiting for him to continue. Gabe wasn’t even interested. He continued to send out text messages.

“There is a two–million dollar contract that I am fighting for on a site in Florida. I need this contract, son…”

Son? Damn, he’s serious.

He even got Gabe’s attention, who’d sat his iPhone in his lap and started to listen.

“… Money was lost in the market crash,” my father continued. “I need this deal. And even my connections in Florida aren’t proving to be helpful.”

“What does this have to do with me?”

“Governor Barkin has a better proposal for him, but I think he’d sway into my direction if his single daughter that he wants to marry into a prestigious family has a date with the son of a boss.”

A rumble was forming at the base of my throat, but I couldn’t help but see the desperation in the eyes of a man that had always been nothing but confident. Plus, my mother’s plea for me to comply played as a constant reminder in my mind.

“You’re selling my dick for two–million dollars?” I asked as a mischievous grin spread across my face. “It’s worth that much?” Then Gabe and I let out chuckles that irritated the shit out of the old man.

“Son, please?”

The fact that my father was willingly showing such vulnerability affected my already weakened stubbornness. I had always been a problem child. I had always purposely went left when my father said right. Besides, my heart was too heavy to fight. I was the Tin Man in search of my heart.

My father saw my vulnerability and pounced on it. “She and Jamie are visiting this weekend. Just one date, Roc. Keep her busy until I get my signature on that contract.”

I sat wondering what Baby was doing. I got angry when I thought about the possibilities of her dating some poor schmuck that I would kill the moment that I found out. But I also thought of how empty my bed had been since she left me.

“Fine. I’ll do it. No harm in one date.” Besides, maybe some pussy would make me feel better.

“‘
Now you're gone; what am I gooonnnnna do? Sooooo empty! My heart, my soul can't go ooooon– go on without yooooou! My rainy days fade away when you come around. Please tell me, baby; why you go so far awaaaaaaaaay? Why you go... Looooooooove!’”
I was nearly in tears as I sang into Courtney’s wig brush along with Keisha Cole, who played through Courtney surround sound. Looking into the foggy mirror of the bathroom, I saw the tears fighting their way out. I had just gotten out of the shower. The one shower that I had managed to crawl out of the bed in Courtney’s bedroom to take, over the last four days. As time had gone on, I realized that I had walked away from the perfect man, but the walk was necessary and there was nothing that I could do to mend my broken heart. “‘
Never knew what I was missing! But I knew once we start kissin', I fooooooooooouuuuuund... Loooooooove’–
Courtney
!”

He’d barged in suddenly, startling me and causing me to drop my “mic.” “Could you knock?!” I quickly grabbed my towel from the sink.

“Girl, I thought it was an emergency! Isn’t it a cat dying up in here?!”

As I secured my towel around my body, I smacked my lips. “Whatever.”

He folded his arms across his chest. He looked so summer appropriate in linen shorts, a tank and thong sandals with his shades resting on top of his head. “No, seriously! Where is the damn cat? Because I know that ain’t you up in here sounding like that.”

I pouted as I stomped past Courtney and into the guest bedroom.

“Yanna, honey, you need to get it together.”

“I am!” I whined. “I got in the shower, didn’t I?”

“Yes, after four days!”

“What do you expect? I don’t have Roc. Madea is s–” I couldn’t even say it without the floodgates opening. “I don’t know what to do.” I flopped down on the bed, lost and confused. I wanted nothing more than to be with Roc, but I couldn’t imagine being the reason why he had issues with his family.

“You shouldn’t have left that man in the first place.”

I rolled my eyes, saying, “Here you go.” Courtney had been fussing at me for leaving Roc since the day that he picked me up outside of Roc’s home. “I told you how they treated me and you said that I was right for leaving.”

“Leaving the house but not leaving him,” he told me as he sat beside me, placing a tender hand on my thigh. “Roc loved you to little bitty ‘ol pieces, and he was a good man. I love you, so I am going to keep it real. You’re like family to me, and we don’t believe in leaving no good man in my family.”

“What about your Auntie Brenda?”

“Oh, she didn’t leave Uncle Ronnie… She shot him.”

Courtney laughed, trying to encourage my own laughter. I did chuckle, but it was so very weak. “I miss him, Courtney,” I told him as I lay my head on his shoulder.

“I know, baby. Why don’t you call him?”

“Because…” I sighed, as I realized that what I was feeling was right when, though my heart ached with yearning for him, I had not one ounce of urge to put myself back in the midst of that hateful, bitter family. “…His family wants him to marry a traditional Italian woman, which I am far from. Hell, I’m not even light–skinned. And though he doesn’t give a shit about what his father and sister think, I care enough that I do not want to live my life fighting those people and their prejudices.”

With an exhale, Courtney put his arm around me and squeezed. “I can understand that. And I support you. So… stop crying! You’re right. You don’t have to deal with that, and you have so much to be thankful for. You are about to have a Master’s degree, honey!” He smiled and began to wipe my face free of tears. “Come on. Let’s go shopping. I’m going to find you a bomb graduation dress!”

“Oh wow, Roc! I never expected it to be so big!”

My eyes rolled into the back of my head, which was laying against the back of the couch. My eyes were staring up into the ceiling, so Tia didn’t see my utter disgust for her.

Just shut up and suck, will you?

This woman had been the most annoying specimen with a pussy that I had the unfortunate luck of being in the presence of, in my twenty–nine years of existence. She was a spoiled brat who thought that she could win a man of magnitude by wearing some little ass dress that left absolutely nothing to the imagination while talking about nothing of any significance to anyone that graduated from eighth grade.

She was an idiot, a dipshit in a red latex dress with an obscene plunge neckline that made her look like a hooker as it lay against her overly tanned skin.

I’d taken her to my father’s club as a “date,” hoping that the loud techno and pop music would drown out her squeaky voice, but low and behold, she’d spent every second literally in my lap with her mouth directly to my ear, making sure that I heard every God–awful word of persuasion to make her mine. My efforts to pump her full of tequila in hopes to render her belligerent so that our night would, by some miracle, end early, and I then wouldn’t go through with shooting my hurt down her throat, thus making me feel even more like shit, had gone wrong. The club had closed and she was still attached to my hip like a gun holster. She wanted this cock and, admittedly, no matter how much of a dingbat she was, it would have made me feel better that I at least got the privilege of a nut after this miserable night.

“Finally,” left her breath in a whisper as her petite lips wrapped around my semi–erect length. I knew then that I would have to do some work on my own to get off. I closed my eyes and imaged that I finally had Baby back in my arms. I tried; I really did, but I didn’t feel her full, suckable lips around the tip of my cock, sucking and licking the head like a fucking professional. I felt amateur dick sucking, at best, by some tramp that was trying her best to convince me to be with her because of her obsession with being a part of a prestigious crime family.

Being best friends with Jamie all of this time had given Tia a glimpse of a luxurious lifestyle that being the governor’s daughter did not even afford her. For years, she spent her time throwing her ass at our associates, at the sons of other bosses, in hopes that she would snag herself a made man and live the life that Jaime raved over. Though she was not Italian, she knew that her father’s influence made her prime real estate for any man in the mafia. Tia wanted to marry into money, power, and the danger made her pussy wet as fuck. Her father wanted it too. It would protect his power just the same. And though I would never be in line to be the next boss of the de Michele family, I was a boss in my own right and it was known, no matter the relationship between me and my father, that I was rich beyond her tiny brain’s wildest dreams.

I’d heard that over the years she had been rejected by many: From rappers to athletes to an abundance of gangsters. The closer she came to having the power of being the wife of a mad man, the zanier and more possessive she became. Nobody wanted to deal with her crazy ass, and I felt more and more like slime the longer I allowed her to suck on my balls.

“Stop.” The moment that it left my lips, coupled with an annoyed grunt, she started licking with more effort, like a fucking lapdog, as if that shit would convince me. “STOP!!”

My voice bounced off the walls and caused her to jump slightly. But I knew just how fucking pathetic she was when she kept sucking nonetheless.

I grabbed her shoulders and pushed her until she lost balance on her knees. As she hit the floor, I stood and stepped over her, pulling my jeans up along the way.

“Fuck you!” she spat.

I looked at her, wearing a taunting grin. “That’s what you wanted to do. But I don’t fuck the help.”

She literally gasped as she fought to stand on her feet. “You bastard!”

On cue, at the first sign of trouble, Gabe appeared in the doorway.

We locked eyes and he knew that I wasn’t able to go through with it. Like all the other women that had thrown themselves at me for the past month, no one could catch my eye or change my heart like Baby.

I stared out of the window, out onto Lake Michigan, fighting the urge to jump through the glass. I was not myself without Baby, and I would never be the same. “Take her home.”

“Take me home?!” Her squeaky voice filled that air like nails. “You asshole!”

I didn’t move. I couldn’t. I could not let her or Gabe see the hurt in my face or the tears forming in them, which were even surprising me. “TAKE HER HOME, GABE!”

The venom in my voice was enough to silence her antics. I could hear Gabe ushering her out of the room. As the door closed behind him, my hands went to my face, forcing my tears away.