Ruthless People (17 page)

“What’s your favorite color?” she asked, taking a bite of sandwich.

“I don’t have one.”

She shook her head at me.

“Favorite movie?” I asked her.

“
Shawshank Redemption
,” she said.

“Seriously?”

“Yes, seriously. What’s yours then?” she asked.

“
Goodfellas
,” I said, winking and causing her to roll her pretty brown eyes at me.

“Of course.”

“I’m also a huge superhero nerd.”

She looked me over before nodding. “I can see that.”

“Shut up,” I said as she laughed. It wasn’t forced, or harsh, but soft like bells
chiming in the wind.

She brought her legs in, and I noticed she was still wearing her white heels, which
meant a few things. One, I fucked her in her heels and that was fucking hot. Two,
she looked fucking sexy sitting on my bed naked with only heels on, and third, she
almost always wore white shoes. I would make a note of that for whenever I bought
her something, but still.

“Why do you wear white heels all the time? Is it an Italian fashion statement or something?”

She froze for a moment, before her shoulders dropped and her eyes glazed over.

“Orlando and my mother, Aviela, fought often when I was a child. I was young, but
even I knew something was wrong. On the outside they put on a show of this happy,
well-off couple, but really, my mom was living in a different wing of the house. She
even spent most of her time in Italy. Sometimes, after her fights with my father,
I wouldn’t see her for weeks. When they were young and fell for each other hard, my
father didn’t want to lose her, so he only told her about what he did for a living
after they were married.” She frowned, drinking from the bottle again.

“Shit.” There was no way a relationship in our lives could work if we didn’t make
it clear who we were from the get go.

“Yep.” She shook her head. “From what I gathered, my mom was a hippie. She hated violence,
and like all hippies, she protested. My grandparents wouldn’t let her get a divorce,
and so she wore white gloves. Basically, she was telling Orlando every time he saw
her that her hands were clean. She told him if he could go a week without killing,
she would take them off and he could touch her. But it never happened. My father turned
to whores, pretending they were her, and she fell in love with her bodyguard. However,
she was pregnant with me, and my father told me that she miscarried once while they
were dating, so she didn’t want to risk anything the second time around. They tried
to stick it out for my sake, but Orlando finally gave up trying to win her over and
they agreed to let me spend holidays with him. It was like that until the plane crash.”

“And so you wear the white shoes . . .”

“Because my hands aren’t clean, but . . .” She half smiled. “When I see them, I think
of her and I don’t feel like I never had a mother. I just see a woman with white gloves.”

“That’s . . .”

“Really weird I know. That’s something no one knew about me but Orlando, but you asked.”

I cupped the side of her face. “It is odd, but it makes sense to me. I didn’t realize
it was so deep. I wouldn’t have asked.”

“No, you would have most likely looked into it behind my back.” She shook her head.
“I’d rather get all the skeletons out now while we are both civil and sexually satisfied.”

I smirked at that. “I’m not sexually satisfied yet.”

She rolled her eyes at me. “Relax, tiger. Tell me about you.”

Grabbing the wine, I took a deep breath before knocking back a drink. She went deep
into her past and shared something no one alive knew, with the exception being me.
She trusted me. I would have to trust her. I just didn’t know how to start.

“You don’t have to.”

“I want to, Mel,” I said softly. “I want to, and I will. I haven’t traveled this deep
in me for a long time.”

“Is it about your childhood?” she asked, and I shouldn’t have been surprised, but
I was. “I don’t know anything other than that you were sick once and tormented for
it.”

I started slowly. “I was born a twin. Evelyn was on her way to a fundraiser with my
brother when one of Vance’s people drove them off the road and into a tree. The driver
was able to get Neal out, but Evelyn went into labor and couldn’t move. When the paramedics
came and got her she, was already pushing my sister out. But she never cried, or even
took a breath, and when they got to the hospital I was stuck. They had to pull, and
because of that my shoulder was broken. My heart and lungs weren’t fully developed
yet, and I barely even cried. It was more like I was gasping for air. They didn’t
think I was going to make it, but I did. However my growth, weight, and speech were
stunted, and on top of it I was blessed with clubfeet.”

For some odd reason, even though I didn’t remember it, I always felt a pain in my
shoulder when I thought about it.

“Evelyn went into a deep depression, and as much as she
loved
me, she couldn’t look at me without seeing her dead baby girl in her hands, so she
stayed away. In all honesty, my earliest memory of her isn’t until I was maybe twelve.
It was my father who spent most of his time with me at the hospital. Over the years,
he read articles from the paper and would tell me how important my future was while
the doctors did tests and I went through treatment. I remember him losing his shit
at doctors once . . . or twice. All that reading and teaching he did stuck with me,
though. By the time I could finally leave the hospital and go to school, I was well
beyond any twelve-year-old. One moment I was at Saint John’s Hospital, the next I
was Northside College Preparatory High School with Neal, who had a reputation as a
badass.” I laughed at the memory. Students almost shit themselves when Neal was pissed
at them.

“He was captain of the football team, a wrestler, and played hockey and every other
sport that let him destroy guys for fun. So naturally, I looked up to him, but in
school he stayed away from me. I, shaky legs and all, tried out for the football team
only to have balls thrown at my back. The coach took pity on me and made me the water
boy.
 
One day, some of Neal’s friends pushed me down a flight of stairs before putting me
in a locker with their dirty clothes. Neal didn’t know I was there. He just walked
in when his friends were pissing on my clothes and told them to chill out, that I
was my father’s
favorite
and he would have to deal with my
mental
shit later. I didn’t say anything because I couldn’t. I hadn’t taken my medication
that morning and ended up having a seizure in the fucking locker.” I almost wanted
to laugh because it was so fucked up.

“I was shaking so badly that the locker shook with me in it, and the coach found me.
I ended up in the hospital with my mom crying and praying over me. I had been in a
coma for a week, and she promised God she would be a better mother if he just made
me healthy. They ran tests, gave me drugs. Declan, who had spent most of his time
to himself after his parents died, came to me and told me they burned down the house
of the fucker who put me in the locker. Neal and I don’t take trips down memory lane.
I think I got better in spite of him.”

I had almost forgotten she was sitting across from me when she handed me the bottle
of wine again.

It wasn’t better than brandy, but it was good enough.

“Okay, you win most depressing childhood. You should have cut his dick off and shoved
it down his throat.” I coughed as I took a drink, before smiling at her.

“I was twelve.”

She shrugged. “I don’t give a fuck. Neal’s dick and the fucker’s dick, or anyone else
who was there, would have to live with it, the assholes.”

She didn’t know it, but for someone who didn’t know how to love, she was sure doing
a good job.

“Noted.” She was the best thing in my life, and it only took three fucking days. She
made me excited for the future.

“Now I don’t feel bad for shooting Neal,” she replied, falling back on the bed, and
I allowed my eyes to wander up her legs, then her thighs and her stomach before reaching
her breasts.

“Did you ever feel bad?” I asked her, pushing the tray of wine and food off the bed
and onto the floor. It shattered, and I knew it would make a huge mess, but I didn’t
give a fuck. I just wanted my wife.

She watched me as I rose above her.

“What were the files for?”

I had forgotten all about them. Grabbing her back, I pulled her up against me. “First
pleasure, then work.”

“I think it’s the other way around,” she replied, wrapping her legs around my waist.

“We make our own rules from now on, Mrs. Callahan.” I kissed her forehead, cupping
her ass and thrusting into her tight pussy. Her lips went straight to my neck.

“Rule number one. After, or during, our meetings and chats we make sure to fuck each
other’s brains out.” I slammed into her. “Agreed?”

She gripped on to my shoulders and moaned. “Agreed,” she said, before pushing me back
and holding me there.

“Rule two. We never use a fucking condom. Agreed?” She hissed at me, and I almost
came. She was fucking perfect.

“Fuck yes.”

I flipped her over and pulled out of her, grabbed the lube on the bedside table, and
squeezed a generous amount before burying myself in her tight ass.

“Rule three.” I moaned out loudly, unable to think when she raised onto her knees,
pushing her ass against me with her hands wrapped around my neck.

“Rule three. We trust no one but each other,” she said to me, and I could no longer
control my need. Grabbing onto her ass as I did her waist earlier in the evening,
I slammed myself into her. Pushing her back down, I pulled on her hair as though it
were reins.

“Agreed.”

“Fuck, Liam.” She moaned as she came, and when she did I pulled out of her, allowing
my seed to slip onto her back.

It was sick how much I enjoyed it. She was mine. She was all fucking mine.

Rising, she turned to me and slapped me in the face, something I was starting to fucking
enjoy even as it burned. It was one of the many things that made Mel different.

“Now I have to take a shower,” she hissed at me, getting up, and I looked to her proud
and in lust. She had found the monster inside me and fed it. Sadly, I didn’t think
it would ever have enough of her.

She headed over to my bathroom and stopped to look back me. “Are you tired already
Mr. Callahan? I still have more rules.”

She’s fucking perfect.

I almost groaned. We were going to break each other, and it only made me more excited.
Jumping up, my cock standing alert and searing for her, I let her lead me into the
waiting shower.

She’s fucking perfect.
Even as she pushed me down onto my knees and forced my face into her
pussy, I would happily drink her in.

MELODY

I said nothing, choosing one of his clean shirts to wear as he spoke with a dark-haired
man at the door.

Taking a seat on his bed, I watched him carefully as two maids ran in quickly to clean
up the mess we had made with the wine and food. Neither of them dared to look up.
Instead, they worked as quickly as possible.

I wasn’t sure what was going on between Liam and me, but the untrusting part of my
mind was telling me to put on the damn breaks. We had only known each other for three,
now four days, seeing as how it was still very early in the day. Neither of us was
tired, which was odd because we had done nothing but have mind-blowing sex for hours.
The only time we had spoken was when we had confessed some of our darkest secrets.
He put me on edge because he made me trust him. He told me the truth, and then stepped
up in the one thing I knew I did not have the strength to do.

Orlando had wanted to make sure he died after my wedding because he didn’t want me
to feel alone. I tried to tell him I wasn’t lonely, but he always told me the path
of a Boss was a dark and lonely one. I never had friends. I never socialized with
anyone other than my men and the servants at our home. I always kept myself busy learning
languages, studying, and training. I never thought too much about it. Not until now.
Not until Orlando, the only family I had, had died. It hit me like a tsunami. I did
not have anyone. And then there was Liam.

For the first time I understood why Orlando had pushed me so hard into accepting him,
because even though I didn’t trust Liam yet, the promise of future trust was there.
He was now the only family I had. A fact that confused me.

I felt like I could trust him. I wanted to trust him. I wanted to be what he needed,
because now I needed somebody. I never realized how much Orlando filled that role
for me. Over the last four years since I had become Boss, he was the one person I
vented to. The one person I used as a whiteboard for all my plans, telling him each
and every step just because I needed to get it out of my head. I told him when I was
stressed, when I just wanted to murder someone, and when I did murder someone. Orlando
was my true right-hand, and now Liam was taking his place. Not in a creepy
Liam is my daddy
type way, but more like Liam was now the only person I could freely speak with.