Page 71 of Sin & Secrets

Mia may have lied, but my own mother might have known all this too. And that is more heartbreaking than I know how to deal with right now.

Instead, I take a deep breath and force myself to focus on the task at hand. Find Claudio. Get him to talk.

Everything else I can figure out later.

But it turns out I don’t have to look very hard.

I hear him as I round the corner to my old dressing room.

Moaning. Loudly.

A shiver of disgust runs across my body. I already hate what I’m about to see before I even open the door.

There, leaning againstmyfucking dressing table, is Claudio. His pants are wrapped around his ankles as fucking Teresa, in her fucking midnight blue body suit, fu his fucking cock in her fucking mouth.

Fuck.

My anger doesn’t rage within. It burns everything around me to a crisp.

They both seem to feel it at the same time. Claudio’s eyes shoot open just as Teresa lets out a pathetic scream and scampers away.

“Cas!” Claudio chokes on the word as he fully registers who he’s staring at and what I’m wearing.

He awkwardly scrambles for his boxers and pants as Teresa all but crawls away. Coward.

“I thought you said you wanted to meet me here.”

Awareness seems to flood his expression finally. I can’t even begin to imagine how many drugs he’s on right now.

“I did, I do, baby!” he slurs slightly as he steps toward me, still fumbling with his belt. “It’s so good to see you.”

“Did you spend all the money you traded me for on drugs?”

Claudio makes an odd, dismissive sound. “Of course not! You paid off a loan, baby. I’m a free man because of you.”

“Clearly.”

“Don’t be like that,” he groans. “Teresa and I are just friends.”

“She was literally just in here sucking your cock!”

He gives me a blank look. “Was she really?”

This isn’t going anywhere, so I change tactics.

“Look, I came here tonight to seeyou.To see if you could be trusted enough to start over again after everything that happened. But clearly, this was a mistake.”

I make to leave and try not to flinch as he grabs my arm. “You can trust me, baby.”

“Can I?”

“Of course. I’m gonna make you a star, remember?”

I pretend to consider his grim smile as something I could possibly adore. “Then tell me something.”

“Anything.”

“Why would you take that money from the mafia? It’s so dangerous! What could you possibly have needed it for to be worth the risk?”

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