Page 400 of Filthy Elites

How many women had he been with since me? The caress of his hand against my sex wasn’t particularly practiced—and that was part of what was turning me on so quickly. It didn’t feel like a man going through the motions but something raw and hungry.

I inhaled as evenly as I could to steady my own voice. I could make use of his unsettled state.

“Whatever you want to believe. I’m not sure you’re in controlanyway you think you are. I hear an entire deal with my brother went wrong under your watch? You haven’t questioned this Mick guy about how it all fell apart? Too busy trying to prove what a tough guy you are to the ladies, I guess.”

“Mick’s been through enough,” Lucan said with an edge in his voice. “He practically died thanks to your brother’s people—or should I sayyourpeople? He had to watch good men die.”

So he really believed that. I guessed that explained some of his hostility toward me, even though I hadn’t known anything about the deal until well after it’d gone down, regardless of who was to blame.

I opened my mouth to question him further and immediately shut it again to clamp down on a moan. Heat was surging up from my pussy, the tension building and unfurling at the same time. More than anything, I wanted to clamp my thighs around his hand to urge him on, but the second I showed I was that into his attentions, he’d stop.

I focused as much as I could on the stroke of my leg against his groin. I teased my fingers along the side of his neck to distract him from examining my responses, and his eyes flickered shut. His hand hitched against me, swiveling over my clit at just the right speed, once, twice, with a fresh burst of pleasure—

A dam broke inside me. As I came, I couldn’t keep quiet. A choked cry burst from my lips; my head arched back against the bedspread. Pleasure washed all through my body like I hadn’t felt in years, not from someone else’s touch.

Lucan yanked himself away. He stared down at me, his cock straining against his slacks, his eyes startlingly wild. “Fuck,” he spat at me, and marched out of the room without another word.

I pushed myself upright on shaky arms, watching the door thump shut behind him. My breath rushed in and out of my lungs raggedly. The afterglow of the momentary physical release was already fading.

Technically, I’d won. He’d meant to tease me until I was begging without letting me tip over the edge, but I’d gotten off despite his intentions, while he’d been left hard as a rock. Ishouldbe triumphant.

So why did I feel like I’d lost something by falling apart at the stroke of his hand?

NINE

Anthea

I slippedfrom my room the next morning with less confidence than usual. On the outside, I could be as cool and firm as diamond, but I wasn’t sure how my insides would react if I ran into Lucan.

Thankfully, I didn’t encounter any of the Rosano brothers on my way to the kitchen to scrounge up some breakfast. And my luck held even after. I was just leaving the kitchen when a gruff voice reached my ears from the direction of the front hall.

“Mick! About time you came back around.”

I slunk toward the hall quickly enough to make out the answer, though that voice was lower. “The boss has a job for me. I come when called.”

Maybe some resentment about his status as a lackey? I hadn’t picked up on any sourness in his nonchalant tone, but it was hard to say across this distance.

I eased toward the stairs, checking that no one was observing me. As Mick headed up, I caught a glimpse of him: shoulder-length hair that was black flecked with gray, a frame corded with lean sinewy muscle. He might have been getting on in his years, maybe halfway through his forties, but he didn’t look like any kind of weakling.

I dawdled for a few moments near the base of the stairs and then headed up with a distracted air as if I were simply wandering back to my bedroom. Mick would have disappeared in the opposite direction, into Marcel’s office.

What excuse did I have to head that way? There was a bathroom nearby. I veered toward it.

Out of view of the stairs, I edged toward the door to the office. No one was in the hall outside. If I heard someone heading this way—from within the room or the other end of the hall—I could dash into the bathroom and pretend I’d been in there the whole time.

The conversation had started while I was making my approach. It sounded like Marcel had already given Mick his marching orders. Mick was responding in a low voice. “I can definitely handle that. Should I be reporting to you or to Lucan?”

“Given the circumstances, I wanted to oversee this deal myself,” Marcel said. “I assume you’ll exercise more caution this time?”

Mick’s tone became terse. “I don’t believe there were any signs I could have missed the last time. Believe me, I’ve spent plenty of hours trying to think of how I could have saved any of those men from the Nobles’ bullets.”

So he was giving Marcel the same story everyone else had heard about our people turning on theirs—interesting. It seemed as though none of the Rosanos knew any differently. I’d thought it might be a conspiracy between just them and their trusted underling. What could his endgame be?

“We’ll have to approach all our supposed allies with more caution from here on, I suppose,” Marcel said with a sigh. “There was oncesomehonor among thieves. Well, no good mourning the old days. You’re clear on the details?”

“No questions here. Looks pretty standard. I’ll handle this without a hitch like I always did before that one disaster. You know I’ve never let the Hell Kickers down before.”

“I do. Let’s show we’re still just as much in business as we always were.”

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