Page 60 of Not Mine to Keep

“We’ll make it quick,” Leo said, and since he appeared to be the less offensive of the two, I debated possibly allowing only him to enter.

“Orders are orders, Costa. You don’t run the business yet,” Frankie remarked, drawing my eyes again. “So I’ll be coming in, or we’ll send the good doctor over to do a more thorough check.”

“Just let them in,” Callie called out, trying to be the voice of reason when all I wanted to do was kill a motherfucker. Correction:thisparticular one.

“Do what the lady says. Move,” Frankie said, and it sure as hell felt like he was trying to antagonize me to the point he got off on it.

“Please.” Callie’s soft tone allowed my walls to drop, and I begrudgingly surrendered room for the guys to enter, but Leo hung back in the hall. Smart man.

Frankie walked around the room, having the indecency to sniff the air like a hound, which I’d called happening.

I wasn’t sure why I’d expected Calliope to be nervous, given how she’d been holding up. But when she said in a low, cutting tone, “Don’t forget, you’ll be answering to me one day. This is not the best way to woo me,” I about fell the fuck over.

“They’re good,” Leo said, filling the doorframe. “Let’s go.”

Frankie sneered at him, as if unhappy with the good-cop-bad-cop thing they were probably doing, then he brushed past me, shouldering my bad arm like an asshole on the way out. But he was going in the direction I wanted, so I didn’t stop him.

Once Frankie was gone, I nodded my thanks, if that’s what I wanted to call it, to Leo, then closed and locked the door.

Callie’s gasp had me whirling around in worry.What happened?Her hand was over her mouth, and she’d let the cover drop, giving me a view of that sexy lingerie again. “Your back. It’s—”

“I’m fine.” I went over to my suitcase, which someone must’ve brought up earlier, unsure what the hell I would wear to bed. Sleeping in the nude was standard for me, but that wouldn’t work alongside her. “You should sleep.” I snatched a pair of briefs, and keeping my back to her, let the towel fall.

“You don’t miss glutes day at the gym, huh?”

“Neither do you, sweetheart,” I tossed out while putting on the briefs.

“Tell me you’re wearing more than that to bed?”

I faced her. “Thisismore for me. I’m usually naked,” I said, letting her in on my secret, and it really was since I didn’t sleep next to anyone. Not in a long time, at least.

“Oh.” She chewed on her lip, and my hands slammed to my hips as I fought the urge to think about that sexy mouth of hers wrapping around my cock.

“How about you? You plan on changing?”

She twirled her finger, signaling for me to turn so she could walk to the bathroom, and I almost laughed. “Shy now?”

“I have my moments.” She waited for me to be good and look away, and I obliged her request as she went to her suitcase.

“I’m rinsing off, too, like you did.” I took that as my cue to look her way again. “I feel ... dirty after letting those bastards hear me. You know, since I wasn’t acting.”

“I’m sorry,” was all I managed before she retreated to the bathroom and shut the door.

The second I was alone, I grabbed my phone, in need of someone to talk me off the ledge I was climbing before I jumped without a chute.

Me:You awake?

I dropped onto the bed, planting my feet on the floor while bowing my head, waiting for my brother to respond so someone could talk some sense into me.

Enzo:Yeah, I’m up. I was talking to Maria. I’ll call her back. You okay?

Me:No.

Enzo:???

Me:Physically okay. Mentally ... not so much.

Enzo:Are you texting me because you need advice on how to resist your wife? Because you do remember I tried to keep away from Maria and wound up married, and we’re having twins. I’m not the best one to ask.

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