Page 65 of Stolen Sin

I smile to myself. Laura would be mad. She’s a homebody and barely ever leaves the oasis, but if there’s anything she hates, it’s being told what she can and cannot do.

“I need a favor from you. There’s a restaurant in South Commons, it’s this little Italian joint Santoro owns. I want you and your boys to torch it.”

Emilio’s eyebrows raise. “Don’t you have your own guys for that?”

“They’re going to be busy killing other people. Tell your boss it’s coming straight from me, alright? He’ll be fine with it.”

Emilio cracks his knuckles and steps onto the sidewalk. “If there’s one thing Davide loves in this world, it’s killing Santoro’s people. And his wife. But mostly killing.” He shrugs and gives me a wave. “I’ll tell him we spoke.”

I watch Emilio walk off. For a while, I remain where I am, keeping an eye on the cars parked nearby, looking for movement, and anyone that walks past or drives too slow. I’m trying to catch a tail, but there’s nothing suspicious.

I hate this spy shit.

But the lines are drawn. I’m on the outside, and if I want to break through and make Dad see reason, I need to play the fucking game whether I want to or not.

Chapter 40

Emily

I get three days with him. Three days in an apartment near the water that’s not much more than a bed, a couch, and a kitchen. Three days of drinking wine, eating take-out, and having more sex than I thought my body could physically handle.

Three days of laughter, three days of movies and music, three days of a little dancing even though Simon doesn’t want to.

I drop the pretense of not being totally head over heels for him and let myself enjoy the weird break from reality. I throw myself into it and refuse to think too much because every time I stop to look at our situation, it only makes me fucking terrified.

Three days with Simon are the best three days I’ve ever had in my life.

It’s like a vacation, except it’s a forced vacation and if we get caught by a whole litany of people, we’re probably dead.

Simon tries to make it feel normal. There are tells though: he pays for everything in cash and he wears baseball caps pulled down over his face when he leaves the house. Since we left the oasis in a hurry with nothing more than a hastily packed duffel, he buys us both new wardrobes, which is a fun afternoon spent online shopping, then trying things on, then taking it all off and fucking again.

He’s also on the phone a lot. I don’t know who he’s talking to and the one time I press, he gets defensive and tells me not to worry. But I’m pretty sure he’s talking to his brothers and sisters, and maybe some people in the Famiglia, even though I can’t tell.

We should divorce. He should go back home. We don’t do either of those things.

Instead, it’s three days of happiness, which I think is more than some people ever get in their whole life.

On the morning of the fourth day, Simon’s up early. He makes us coffee and comes back to bed as I stretch lazily already thinking about how I’m going to spend the afternoon doing nothing but being with him. He leans over me and peppers kisses down my neck and pulls me against him, and I laugh when his hard cock presses into me.

“You really can’t help yourself, can you?” I ask as he grunts in reply. “I mean, you’d think with all the humping we’ve been doing lately, you’d be shooting blanks?—”

He groans and pins me down. “Please, dear god, don’t ever call it humping again.”

“What should I say?” I writhe a little, giving him a come punish me, big daddy, sort of look, although I’m not sure it’s registering. “Would you prefer I call it ‘lovemaking?’ Because I don’t think what we’ve been doing is very loving if you know what I mean.”

“Call it sex. Call it fucking. But just not humping. That’s just so—” He makes a face and shakes his head. “It’s like we’re a couple of animals.”

“Sometimes that’s exactly what I feel like.” I arch my back and get a little burst of gratification when his eyes instantly go to my chest. The man is predictable, but in a very good way. “When you’ve got me on all fours and my face is in the pillow, and you’re fucking me from behind.”

“You mean, I’m humping you from behind.”

I bite my lip and make a face. “Alright, fine, you’ve made your point and now I’ve thoroughly turned myself off.”

He laughs and kisses my neck. His grip on my wrists tightens and he pushes me down tighter against the mattress. “I think I can help with that.”

“No, definitely not. I don’t think I’ll ever make love again.” I sigh dramatically and he buries his mouth with mine, his tongue invading my lips, and okay, I was wrong because I can definitely make love to this man whenever he wants it.

He strips off my clothes and when I try to squirm away, because it’s more fun when I put up a little token resistance, he grabs me and spanks my ass hard until it’s nice and pink. Then he turns me over and buries his mouth between my legs, and I grind my hips into his mouth as he does his filthy work and brings me to what has to be the ten-thousandth orgasm of the past forty-eight hours.

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