Page 29 of The Mafia's Surprise Gift

“What happened?”

“None of your business.” Mae’s head snapped up and she glared at me. “Why are you still here? Was I not clear enough?”

“Mae… I want to explain everything I do. I want you to understand me and why my life is like this. Why I left all those years ago.”

“Why?” Mae snapped. “Why should I give a crap what you need?”

“Because I need you to know how important you are to me. How much I…” Then the words caught in my mouth, and the extent of my affections remained unsaid.

“I’m not important to you.” Mae sucked in a deep breath and placed one hand on her cocked hip. “Whatever you feel, or what you think you might feel, is just… residuals from when we were in college. We’re different people now, and we have different lives. You’re in the Mafia, for fuck’s sake. So… so, no. I’m not some–some shiny toy you can just swoop back in to play with.”

As she spoke, I walked closer and closer to her until I was half a foot away. Lifting one hand, I slowly stroked my fingers through loose strands of her hair and then tucked them gently behind her ear. A trembling breath escaped her parted lips.

“Are you trying to persuade me?” I asked softly. “Or yourself?”

Slowly, Mae lifted her eyes to me. “It doesn’t matter what I think. Or what I feel,” she replied firmly, despite the shakes in her breaths. “You’re a criminal and you live in a dangerous world. I have Zack to think about, and after what happened at the funeral, within two days of meeting you again, I—” She pressed her lips together and then took a forceful step away from me.

“Stay away from me, Rocco,” she said quietly. “You’re too dangerous.”

My heart plummeted like a rock cast off the edge into a drowning abyss.

12

MAE

Itold Rocco to stay away from me, and to my surprise, he honored it. I hadn’t seen him since he left my house last week, nor had I heard from him in any capacity. What stuck out to me, though, was how quickly the shooting at the graveyard was quickly brushed under the rug as some kind of accident.

Those who had been injured were shipped off to incredible private hospitals and given the absolute best in care, and within a day or two, the topic changed. No one cared about the shooting. All people cared about was how the Adami family was still taking care of the town despite Aldo’s passing.

Was this an example of Rocco’s power? Of the power he held over this town, be it good or bad? Had it always been here, and I just never noticed before?

The important thing I chose to focus on was that no one died, and my mother’s impending birthday party was becoming a date in everyone’s calendar to celebrate just that. The community center was booked, the cake was ordered, and by the time I finished my third trek around the town, Zack’s dinosaur costume was secured. All I needed was a dress, but my best friend Denise was helping with that.

With Dozer by my side, I strolled slowly toward the house, swinging my shopping bag back and forth. Since arriving, Mom had grown so attached to Zack, and I was more than happy to let them spend time together. However, Zack’s absence painfully highlighted how empty my life was outside of work and being a mother. I had one friend who was back in the city preparing to get married, and the closest relationship I had was with my vibrator.

It was difficult to pinpoint exactly how my life had become so empty, but now I was here, and the loneliness was creating a heavy ache in my chest.

Dozer whined softly, then yawned with an adorable squeak that brought a smile to my face. As I hunched down to pet him, something glinted across the street and caught my attention.

Well, technically, I wasn’t alone.

While Rocco had done as I asked and stayed away from me, his presence wasn’t more than a few feet away. With Dozer by my side, I crossed over the road and stopped at the bottom of the hill next to the blue car that had been following me around all day. All week, in fact.

Knocking sharply on the window, I glared straight into a pair of sunglasses as the window slid down.

“Mae!” Dino smiled widely at me from his seat. “What a surprise!”

“Cut the bullshit,” I snapped. “You’ve been following me around for days, and at first I was okay with it, but now it’s really starting to piss me off.”

“Really?” Dino lifted one brow. “I thought I was being inconspicuous.”

“We’re in a town where everyone walks,” I snapped. “Driving around after me is fucking obvious.”

“Geez.” Dino raised both hands off the steering wheel. “It’s not what you think.”

“Oh, really?” I stepped back from the car as Dino opened the door and slid out. “You’re not here keeping an eye on me to make sure I don’t go to the police?” Surging forward, I prodded him hard in the middle of his chest. Just a single touch and rock-hard muscle met me. The T-shirt he was wearing was so thin it barely counted as clothing. “You making sure I don’t spill any secrets to the wrong people, huh?”

Deep down, I wasn’t angry. As stubborn as I was on the surface, part of me enjoyed that Dino was following me around and Rocco wasn’t far from my thoughts. Hell, I’d even been on the lookout for the hot guy from the store. I was attention-starved. I wanted someone to notice me, to take pity on me and push through the bullshit.

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