Omerta (The DeLuca Family #1) (18 page)
Read Omerta (The DeLuca Family #1) Online
Authors: K. A. Ware
I was floating in that post-orgasmic place between sleep and consciousness, my limbs tingly and sort of numb and my head fuzzy. As I came back down I replayed the last hour in my head. He had been all around me, completely consuming me. I couldn’t move an inch without feeling him somewhere. Sex had never been like that before, not with anybody and especially not with Carlo. We were always hot and heavy, in a frantic race for the finish line, constantly fighting for the upper hand.
This time had been completely different. We wanted each other just as desperately as every time we came together, but this time I hadn’t fought him. He’d needed the reassurance of control after our conversation. I gave it to him willingly, my way of telling him that I was his and I wasn’t going anywhere. I had absolutely no intention of letting him keep it but I’d let him borrow it for a while.
I felt a calmness blanket me as I snuggled closer to him, my head resting on his chest with an arm thrown over his stomach. His heart beat steadily under my cheek as I inhaled his scent, a mixture of expensive cologne and sex with a hint of sweat.
God, I love the way he smells.
“Are you sniffing me?” he asked and chuckled when I stilled at his question, his laughter causing my head to bounce on his hard chest.
“No,” I replied immediately.
“Do I smell good?”
“Yes,” I said, my voice muffled against his side as I hid my face in embarrassment over being caught.
“And what do I smell like?” he asked, his words laced with a teasing tone that I didn’t entirely appreciate.
“Like shit, you should take a shower.”
Carlo’s loud laugh echoed throughout the room, “I call bullshit, if I smelled like shit you wouldn’t have had that dopey look on your face while you were sniffing me.”
“Shut up.”
“I’m just teasing you and you know it,” he said, brushing the hair off of my face and tracing his fingertips over my shoulder and down my side causing me to shiver.
“Doesn’t make me want to kick your ass any less for laughing at me.” I said pulling away from him.
Before I could get away he looped an arm around my middle and rolled us so I was pinned beneath him. I squirmed, trying to get away but he grabbed my arms and pinned them to the bed by my head. His strong thighs straddled my legs, rendering me immobile. I grunted and glared at him.
“Baby, stop trying to pick a fight with me, it’s not going to work.”
“Who said I was trying to pick a fight?”
Carlo just cocked an eyebrow at me without saying a word.
“Fine, I’m sorry.”
“Not yet, but you will be.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“It means I’m still pissed about that vigilante shit.”
“What do you plan to do about it?” My heart raced at the possibilities flitting through my mind. I hadn’t seen this side of Carlo in bed before tonight, but I had a feeling I could get addicted to it.
“I’m going to spank that perfect ass, and you’re going to get a few more for trying to pick a fight with me right after sex.”
“What the fuck?” I did not want that to sound as hot as it did, but I couldn’t help the slickness between my legs at his words.
“You put yourself in danger and you scared the shit out of me. I’m going to spank your ass, then I’m going to fuck you so hard you’ll still be feeling me tomorrow.”
Goosebumps erupted across my skin, “Why?” I asked, my voice breathy. I was already panting and squeezing my thighs together.
“Because you’re mine.”
“I want Mouse here,” she said.
“We’ll fly him in tomorrow,” I nodded, understanding where she was coming from. She needed someone she trusted, one of
her people
here. If she was going to stay behind she wanted to feel like she had some semblance of control over the situation. “I’m going to bring in Frankie as well. She knows our set up and she can help bring Mouse up to speed.”
“Who?”
“My tech person, Francesca Delrossi. She’s been working for me for about five years. You’ve met her, she works out of the main office in the city.”
“Francesca? The dragon lady Francesca?”
I chuckled, “Yes, she’s a fucking genius. Plucked her up while she was still in college and she’s been working for me ever since.”
“I’ve never actually met her. I heard about an intern that went down there once to get help with a tablet that kept freezing up and he came back nearly in tears,
a grown man.
You know they call her office the dungeon, right?”
“She can be a little… hostile when she isn’t fully caffeinated.” I said, choosing my words carefully. “She doesn’t have much of a bedside manner.”
“So what makes you think she’ll be able to work with Mouse?”
“Frankie might not have much in the way of people skills but she is the best hacker on the west coast. I’m sure she’ll be much more cooperative when she has someone around that speaks her language.” At least I hoped she would be. Frankie had always been a bit of a handful, but she was the best and sometimes you have to deal with a little crazy if you want the genius that goes along with it.
Mia rolled her eyes, “Anyways,” she said, switching directions. “The meet with Eddie’s gang and Kashnikov’s crew is two days away and Ivan still hasn’t made any changes to the plan?”
“No, according to Eddie everything is a go exactly how it was planned.”
“Don’t you find that odd? After Boris, wouldn’t he want to postpone the meet?”
“Not really, if this deal goes through for them it will put their family in an even better position than they were three years ago when I ran them out of town. Probably doesn’t want to run the risk of spooking them.” I shrugged. “This is their foot in the door for the gun trade, not the small time stuff they’ve been dabbling in. This is the big time. We’re talking millions. Once word gets out that the Kashnikov’s are big enough players to support that kind of demand
and
offering it at a discounted price, we’re talking
hundreds of millions.
Ivan is smart enough not to take the chance of fucking this up over a potential threat. He still hasn’t given them the meeting place. He’ll call it in about an hour before the meet takes place. That’s about as much security as you can get in this business. It’s the move I’d make.”
“I wish you’d let me go with you.”
I sighed, “We’ve been over this Mia, and I’m not willing to risk putting you in that kind of situation. It’s too dangerous.”
“What about you? I’m not willing to put you in danger. Why can’t you just send in a team to handle it and stay here with me?”
“This is what I
do
. I’m not going to hide out while I send my men off to handle my business. Besides, it would just create a bigger target for others to try to do what the Kashnikov’s have done. I have to send a message. I have to show the world, our world, that I am not a man to be challenged.”
“I hate this,” she said solemnly.
“I know, baby, I hate it too. I’m sorry I ever put you in this kind of situation,” I groaned and scrubbed my hands over my face. “I should have just set you up in an apartment in the city until you went off to college. I never should have brought you into my world.”
“What?” she gasped. When I looked up from my hands and saw the heartbroken look on her face, a feeling of dread washed over me.
“Baby, no. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Then how did you mean it, Carlo? Because it sounded like you were saying you regret our life together, it
sounded
like you were saying you wish you never knew me.”
“No, no, no,” I rushed to say, “It’s not like that. I meant that I wish things were different, that you’re involvement with me didn’t put you in a position of constant potential danger. I know this isn’t the life you imagined for yourself. You deserve a life where you don’t have to look over your shoulder at every turn.”
Her face softened, “I’d rather have to look over my shoulder with you by my side than not at all.”
“Yeah, baby, me too. Which is why even though I know you deserve better I won’t let you leave me.”
“I don’t ever
want
to leave you, Carlo. Even though you piss me off any chance you get, you’re everything to me. All I want is to be by your side. Wherever that takes us it will be worth it if we’re together.”
Taking her face in my hands I kissed her softly and pulled back to look into her eyes, “I love you, Mia.” My voice rough with emotion as I spoke over the lump in my throat.
Tears formed in her eyes and she smiled, “I love you too, Carlo.”
I felt my world turn upside down with those three little whispered words. My life would never be the same. Instead of running away from the slightly panicked feeling in my chest, I embraced it, just as I embraced Mia.
It was D-day. The past two days had flown by while we discussed strategy and made the necessary preparations for what would hopefully be the take down of the Kashnikov’s. Ten men, including Carlo, Angelo, Enzo, and Antonio, were getting ready to head down to Portland where the meet would take place. Eddie and his guys were down in Portland already and since Ivan wasn’t phoning in the actual location until an hour before they were supposed to meet we knew it would be somewhere in the Portland area. All the ranking members of the DeLuca Family had been called in to the estate, those that weren’t going with Carlo would remain with me awaiting their return.
Mouse had arrived the day before, nervous and unsure. He tried not to show it, but the fear was written across his face. Carlo did his best to be pleasant towards my friend but no matter how he tried he couldn’t mask the aura of power and danger that seemed to emanate from him. I didn’t fault Mouse for being cautious of Carlo, I knew he was scary as shit to everyone but me.
His trepidation didn’t last long when I showed him the control room where he would be spending most of his time. It was like watching a kid on Christmas morning the way he lit up when I opened the door to the large room. A giant L-shaped desk ran along two walls of the room. Two work stations were set up on the oversized desk and eight monitors hung above each of the stations. I couldn’t even pronounce the names most of the equipment in the room let alone identify it, but Mouse seemed to be in his element, eyes jumping around the room and his body practically vibrating with excitement. I had let him loose to play with his new toys and he had barely come up for food since, at least until Frankie showed up that morning.
Frankie was nothing like I had imagined. She had barged into the control room that morning like a fucking Polly Pocket sized tornado, interrupting the quiet conversation Mouse and I had been having.
“Who the fuck is he,” she asked at full volume, pointing to Mouse, “And why the fuck is he in my spot?”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” Mouse said standing quickly, “I’m Mouse.” He gave her a painfully awkward wave, and I had to stifle my laughter. Mouse was a lot of things but smooth wasn’t one of them.
“That only answers my first question, now tell my why the fuck you are in my room and sitting in my spot,” she huffed, blowing a stray hair out of her face while simultaneously trying to maintain her hold on her computer bag and a case of Redbull.
Enzo walked in silently behind, “Frankie!” he said loudly startling her and causing her to jump which, in turn, caused the case of Redbull balanced on her arm to tip. She scrambled to keep a hold of it but it toppled over. Enzo lunged forward and caught it before the cans hit the ground, righting himself he glared at her, “I saved your precious energy drinks, now you owe me. Play nice with Mouse here, okay? He’s here to help you.”
She scoffed, “One, you scared me with the creepy prowler thing you do which caused me to lose my grip so technically, since you were the cause of the potential disaster that discredits any owing on my part for your hand in averting said disaster. Two, I don’t need any fucking help.”
She stomped over to the desk, her fire engine red messy bun bouncing against her black plastic rimmed glasses that sat perched on top of her head and plopped her stuff down at her station. She was wearing black leggings, converse and a Gonzaga University sweatshirt that had been cut at the neckline causing it to fall off of one of her slim shoulders. My best guess was that she was about five foot, and barely tipping the scales at a buck ten. The girl was tiny but her attitude was larger than life.
Turning to me she smiled brightly, all previous hostility completely absent from her expression. “You must be Mia, nice to finally have another vagina around here,” she said, and clapped me on the shoulder before plopping down in the chair Mouse had just vacated.
I glanced around to see if I was the only one completely in shock over all that was Ms. Francesca Delrossi. Mouse was staring at her with his mouth hanging open and Enzo just shook his head while looking up at the ceiling as if he were praying for the strength to handle this feisty little thing.
I blinked a few times before I remembered myself, “Nice to meet you Frankie, this is my friend Mouse. He’s a fellow hacker and he’s here to help with the surveillance.”
She didn’t look up from hooking up her computer when she responded, “Appreciate the thought, but I don’t need any help.”
I stood up slowly and looked down at her. I understood where she was coming from, but now
she
needed to understand where
I
was coming from. “It wasn’t a suggestion,” I said firmly, “I trust that you will be able to get Mouse up to speed by the time the men head out this afternoon.”
“I-“ she started to reply.
I held up my hand to stop her, “Look Frankie, I get it. But now I need you to get me. I’m not asking you to let Mouse help you, I’m telling you. Now, you’re feisty and I like that about you, but your pride needs to be checked at the door. Mouse is an asset, use him. I’ll be back to check on you guys in a little while, okay?”
She blinked a few times then a smirk stretched across her face, “You got it Boss lady,” she said with a nod.
I smiled and walked out the door with Enzo on my heels. When the door clicked behind us I turned to Enzo. “Is she always like that?” I asked.
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“This is going to be interesting,” I said as I made my way down the hall.
…
We only had about five hours before the meet. The control room was crowded with people getting ready and going over plans. I glanced over to where Carlo was talking to Angelo and Antonio; the two men may have been brothers, but they looked more like twins. I hadn’t gotten to spend a lot of time with Antonio and before this week I had only met him a handful of times. He was even more reserved than Angelo, which was saying something, and he had this blank look in his eyes that made me more than a little weary of him.
Walking over to the men I sidled up next to Carlo, hoping to get a few moments alone with him before they left. It didn’t take long for him to wrap up his conversation. I had to force myself not to roll my eyes at him as he confirmed plans with the brothers for the one thousandth time.
“Hey, you have a second?” I asked.
“Of course. We have a few minutes before we need to head out, let’s go into your office,” he said guiding me out of the room with a hand on the small of my back. That was another thing that had changed over the past couple of days, Carlo was no longer holding back his affections. He didn’t make a show of it but the men caught on pretty quickly and aside from a few sideways glances it was business as usual.
He led me into the office and closed the door behind us. Turning to him, I reached up and linked my hands behind his neck, his hands automatically going to my waist. “I love you,” I said, and stretched up on my toes to kiss him. What started out as a soft and slow kiss quickly dissolved into deep and hungry battle of lips and tongues.
Carlo was first to break away, “As much as I would love to bend you over your desk right now, we don’t have time, and I need to stay focused on what I’m about to do If we’re going to pull this off,” he whispered into my ear, his words were a direct contradiction to the soft kisses he was trailing down my neck.
“I know,” I said. “I just wanted to get in a few minutes of alone time before you left.”
“We’ll have a lot more than a few minutes when I get back.”
“Oh yeah? How long?” I asked feigning innocence.
“How about forever?” he asked, dropping to one knee and pulling a small velvet box from his pants pocket.
I couldn’t keep the shocked look from my face, “W-wha—“ I stuttered, unable to form a coherent thought with him in front of me holding the largest, most exquisite ring I had ever seen.
“I was going to wait until tonight but,” he shrugged. “This feels right.” He cleared his throat, “Mia, I can’t promise you that I won’t mess up or that I will always do what you want me to, but I what I can promise you is that I will do everything in my power to make you happy and safe. I want you by my side for the rest of our lives, each step of the way. I never thought I was capable of feeling for someone what I feel for you. I wasn’t expecting you when you came into my life but one look into your eyes and I knew there was something different about you, something that called to me. I won’t say you’re my other half because you’re so much more than that. You’re my partner, my equal, and together we make a matched set.” He pulled the ring from where it was nestled into the box and held it out to me, “So, Mia, will you allow me the honor of calling you my wife?”
I couldn’t breathe. The air had actually been sucked from my lungs and no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t fill them again. Carlo had just proposed,
he was currently proposing
. My mind was scrabbling to make sense of the situation, to register everything he had just said but my wheels were just spinning. I stood there staring at him. I was pretty sure my mouth was hanging open but there wasn’t a thing I could do about it. I was frozen.
“Mia, baby?” He pulled back a little, the smile on his face growing stiff, “If it’s too soon, I understand, I just thought…”
All of a sudden everything slammed into me at once, and I took in a huge gulp of air. Images of us over the past three years played out in front of me in fast forward. In all my life I had never been as happy as I had been when I was with Carlo. No matter what we were doing, even if it was just a phone call or a text, he was always the highlight of my day. Did I want that for the rest of my life? I didn’t even need to think about it.
“Yes!” I screamed and lunged for him. He grunted as I collided with him, sending both of us to the ground. His arms wrapped around me and he rolled us so I was beneath him, my head cradled in his hand.
“Just to clarify, that was a ‘yes’ that you screamed at me, right?” he asked chuckling.
“You bet your ass it was.” I replied smiling so big my cheeks hurt.
“Thank God, you had me worried for a second there.” His tone was light but the look in his eyes revealed the truth in his words.
Pulling my left hand up between us he slipped the enormous diamond ring on my finger. I immediately did the thing that every girl does the moment she gets engaged; I stretched my left hand out and gazed at the ring. It was a cushion cut yellow diamond surrounded by a halo of smaller white diamonds that also trailed along the top of the band, I had no idea how many carats it was but it was definitely heavy on my finger.
“It was my mothers,” he said quietly.
I glanced up at him and smiled, “It’s beautiful, I love it. I love
you
.” I said, craning my neck to kiss him.
Thunk, Thunk, Thunk.
There was a loud knock at the door, then we heard Enzo’s voice filter in from the other side, “Boss?”
Carlo’s forehead came to rest on my own, “I have to go.”
“I know,” I smiled and kissed him once more, “I’ll be here when you get back.”
We made our way back down to the control room, this time hand in hand. As soon as we walked into the room things started moving at an even faster pace than before. Men were loading their guns and strapping on their holsters while others were packing extra ammo into bags. Before I knew it Carlo was standing in front of me again kissing the breath out of me.
In front of everyone.
I was shocked, but I guess since we were getting married discretion was out the window. Carlo pulled back and looked into my eyes.
“I love you,” he said softly.
“Love you, too.” I returned, equally as softly.
I had been so caught up in the moment I hadn’t noticed the room grow deadly quiet until I heard Frankie’s voice break the silence.
“Damn, that ring is fucking huge!”
Of course the only other woman in the room would zero in on the rock currently taking up residence on my left hand. I laughed and smiled at her. The men gave Carlo and me a few rounds of ‘congratulations’ before Enzo signaled for the group to head out.
