Page 12 of The Cost of Corruption

This time, there was no hidden emotion behind the glare she shot me.

“All right then,” she huffed. “If we’re going to address each other by actions, then I guess from now on, I’ll be calling youPerverted Asshole.”

I laughed—louder and harder than I had in years, the air bursting out of my lungs in a rush.

Well, goddamn. It appeared the little nun could surprise the hell out of me after all.

“Careful,” I teasingly warned her after I’d recovered. “I’m not sure about swearing, but I know for a fact that judging othersisa sin.”

“I’m sure it won’t take the Lord much convincing to forgive me this one time,” she huffed. “Besides, it’s your own soul you should be worrying about. Not mine.”

“Thank you for the concern, Sister,” I said, a smile lifting my lips. “But my conscience is clear, and my soul’s no dirtier than anyone else’s. As far as I’m concerned, everything’s good between me and the big man upstairs.”

Her gold eyes widened in disbelief.

“How can you believe that?” For the first time since setting foot in my office, she leaned in closer. Not much—an inch or two—but still,closer. “You’re a D’Angelo. Everyone knows what your family has done.”

“And you are a Costa,” I said with a shrug. “Does that make you culpable for your family’s crimes?”

“No, of course not,” she shot back with a passionate heat that only a few flutes of champagne followed by a strong vodka chaser could ignite. “ButIbecame a nun. My whole life was meant as penance for my father’s sins.”

Of course, I’d heard the rumors of how Michael Costa had pledged his only daughter to the church at birth, but I’d never given them much thought. Not until now.

Ridiculous stories about the five families were as commonplace in New York as cups of coffee. Everyone on the streets seemed to have one. Most you took with a large grain of salt, but this one looked like it might actually be true.

“That might be the saddest thing I’ve heard,” I remarked honestly, but Chastity didn’t appear to be listening. Either that or the things I was saying weren’t the ones she wanted to hear.

“You, on the other hand,” she continued, “differentiated yourself from the rest of your family by buying a sleazy sex club.”

That last drink must have washed the last of her inhibitions away. Gone was the nervous tension that had been there when she’d first walked in. There were no shaking hands. No trembling voice.

Now she was all shoulders-back confidence—even if it did come with a slight slur at the end of her words.

“Sex club? Yes,” I admitted without shame. “Sleazy? No.”

“Oh, come on, Matteo.” She shook her head hard. “You can line the hallways with all the crimson velvet and marble in the world, but nothing will cover up the fact that this place is nothing more than a den of Jezebels stripping off their clothes for cash.”

“You’re wrong,” I informed her dispassionately, my gaze fixed on the single wavy lock of caramel-colored hair that had come loose from its covering and was now gently brushing against her cheek.

“No, I’m not,” she said, leaning in even closer as if she was about to whisper a secret. “You forget, I was in that room with my cousins. I saw what those dancers were doing.”

“Did you?” I arched a brow. “Tell me what you saw, Chastity. Tell meeverythingyou saw.”

That pink flush came roaring back, filling her cheeks and making me wonder if it was just her face that blushed when she was bashful or if it was her whole body.

Damn, if I wasn’t tempted to peel off all that heavy wool and cotton to find out for myself.

“I saw enough,” she said, ducking her head down, trying to hide her face from view. “Enough to realize that it was time for me to leave.”

But I wasn’t about to let her off that easy. Reaching out, I hooked my two fingers under her chin and lifted her eyes to mine again.

“Right, but you also saw your cousins,” I said, dropping my voice down low. Now that we were this close—her face, her lips mere inches from mine—there was no need to be any louder. “You saw them enjoying themselves. Indulging in their deepest fantasies.”

“I don’t know about that,” she scoffed…or at least she tried. But the closeness between us, the contact of my skin against hers, made it nearly impossible for her to shrug off my words so easily. “I saw them acting like lustful idiots. I watched them succumbing to their baser instincts.”

“Which is something you would never do?” My half-smile made it clear I didn’t believe her.

“Absolutely not,” she said, still trying to convince me. “I was in that room for hours and wasn’t tempted for a single second.”

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