Page 82 of The Devil Can Be Kind

I yelled and hurled myself at her.

The second we collided, I started clawing at whatever I could get my hands on and she did the same. Skin, clothing, hair. It didn’t matter. The aim was to inflict pain—it didn’t matter how. Lost in our thirst for each other’s blood we toppled to the floor as we both started grappling for the upper hand.

Lexi shrieked as I struck her in the jaw, and I smirked in satisfaction. She clawed at my arms once again, but another hit to her jaw sent her flying off me.I’m winning this fight,I realized.

However, the satisfaction was short lived.

Lexi grabbed a fistful of my hair and threw her weight to the side, sending us both crashing into the swimming pool. Our scrap continued for a second or two underwater, until our need for oxygen outweighed our need for blood—though in my case it wasn’t by much.

A symphony of shouting, laughing and exclamations shattered the temporary silence of the water.

When I looked about me, the first thing I noticed was Marco standing at the pools edge. His expression was one of pure fury and I instinctually shrunk away. It took a second for me to realize that his fury wasn’t directed at me for once, but at the half-drowned Barbie off to my left.

“Get thefuckout of the water! NOW!”

“She started it!” Lexi’s whining response shouted back.

Humiliation over the entire situation heated my face despite the mildness of the water.

Too ashamed to stand my ground in front of the hoard of people who already hated my guts and now believed me to be nothing but a naïve slut, I swam to the furthest edge of the pool. Keeping my eyes trained on my hands, I lifted myself onto the edge and pulled off my heels before finding my feet. Soundlessly, I dived toward the path leading down the far side of the mansion and away from the scene behind me.

MARCO

“Get her out of here. I swear to God if she gets into this complex again, I will cut your fucking dick off.” I hissed viciously into Jesse’s ear after Ada had fled.

Part of me wanted to follow her, but I knew I couldn’t.

I hadn’t seen all of the fight, but I had seen enough of it to know the damage Lexi’s words would have caused.

Despite what most people knew of the Mannino daughter, she wasn’t as assured or as fearless as her smart mouth made her out to be. Underneath it all there was a…. A softness that was rare to come across amongst the Cosa Nostra, having been quashed in our early years by a propensity for violence. It was a softness that seemed to make devotees out of anyone that she dined to show it to. My staff, Jesse, and my fucking self included.

My self-restraint pulled dangerously taut as her figure, soaked in pool water, disappeared down the side of the house.

God, she was beautiful. The things I could do to that woman…

Now really isn’t the fucking time!

I shook my head to clear the thought.

Unfortunately for me, Lexi was fast approaching with a manufactured sadness in her eyes and a bullshit apology on her lips. She looked closer to a drowned thrift store doll than the classy hooker she often tried to imitate.

I didn’t feel an ounce of remorse when I nodded at Layton to dump her gold-digging ass off my property. I turned my back toher, ignoring her protests as she was dragged away in what I was hoping would be the last time I would ever see her.

Truth be told, I didn’t know why I had fucked about with Lexi for so long. She was an easy lay and a guy had to eat, I guess. It was also a way of releasing all the extra energy oneparticularhostage kept manufacturing….

I turned to the spectators that had gathered in the garden.

I could see the accusations Lexi made about Ada had made an impact, marring their view on the Mannino descendent that had done nothing to earn their disgust. We weren’t even sleeping together.Yet.

“Adalyn Rossi has done nothing to earn the accusations made here tonight.” I addressed the mixture of friends and family milling about my yard, immediately silencing them.

The men looked back at me with a combination of reverence or fear, while the woman looked at me with either reservation or barely restrained attraction. Even some of the older ones.

“She is part of this family now. She is a La Torre. If anyone has a problem with that then your family will have your body back in a box. Am I clear?” I swear I could have heard a moth shit it was so quiet.

I turned and stalked back inside.

I needed a plan to show Ada Lexi’s words weren’t true.

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