Page 41 of Assassin Daddy

And does Matteo always snore so loud?

Kyan sat up and looked around the cinema room. It was dark and at some point in the night the projector screen must have shut itself down and gone into standby mode. Kyan rubbed his eyes and looked at Matteo as he lay next to him, his hulking body taking up a large amount of space – the couch was big, butit probably wasn’t ideally suited to two people falling asleep on it.

‘Daddy?’ Kyan whispered, smiling as Matteo’s snores momentarily paused before resuming moments later. ‘Sleep tight.’

Kyan suddenly felt very awake. While Matteo may have been dreaming about whatever mobsters dreamed of after sex, Kyan’s mind was alive and fizzing. He wanted something to do. The idea of going back to sleep didn’t even cross Kyan’s mind for a split second.

I guess I could put a movie on with subtitles…

Or go to the kitchen and make a snack?

Or maybe…

It was at this moment that Kyan noticed Matteo’s cell phone flash up with an email notification. And out of nowhere, Kyan felt an overriding desire to do something that he knew he one hundred percent should not do.

Moving as quietly as a mouse, Kyan got up from the couch and tiptoed over toward Matteo’s phone as it continued to illuminate the room.

All Kyan could think about was getting online, logging into his poker account, and playing a few rounds. Nothing too big. No crazy stakes. Just a few hands of poker against some of the other millions of people playing anonymously across the globe.

Kyan picked Matteo’s cell phone up and immediately went to the browser, set it to private, and tapped his finger on the screen to navigate to his favorite poker site.

‘Is this crazy?’ Kyan asked himself, shooting a nervous glance back to a still sleeping Matteo. ‘Maybe. But… it’s been too long. A few quick games won’t hurt. The bad people all think I’m dead. No one will ever know.’

Kyan was soon online and ready to place his first bet.

With his heart pounding and his eyes wide with anticipation, Kyan began to play. Barely seconds into the first flop and Kyan felt alive once again. Playing poker had been his life for so long, and even though it had only been a matter of days since he last played, Kyan felt a huge relief as he got back into the swing of things.

A quick first win was followed by another. And then another. And one more after that too…

‘Beginner’s luckhehe,’ Kyan whispered, his eyes bulging at the sight of his cash balance increasing with each victory.

Kyan knew enough about poker to know that he would lose one or two games along the way. But that was fine. All Kyan cared about that he was on a hot streak and feeling all the happy vibes that poker brought him.

Perhaps it was his connection back to his Grandpoppy, but Kyan felt a sense of comfort that only playing poker could give him. He might have been playing an illicit game in his Daddy’s cinema room, but Kyan’s mind was all the way back on his grandparent’s ranch – and Kyan could almost hear the crackle of their open fire and the bubbling of one of their vegetable stews in the cozy kitchen.

Up a thousand dollars and with his mind locked into game, Kyan fought back any guilt or worry about getting caught by Matteo and continued on with hand after hand.

After all, with Matteo’s snores getting louder and louder, there was nothing stopping Kyan playing all the way through until dawn…

Chapter 20

Matteo

It was rare for Matteo to fall asleep anywhere other than his own bed. Matteo lived a life of precision, control, and an almost paranoid alertness to threats. But such was the sheer bliss of his cinema room encounter with Kyan that Matteo had well and truly let his guard down and slept all through the night.

‘Good morning, baby boy,’ Matteo said as he woke to the sight of Kyan sitting upright next to him as he lay. ‘Have you been up for long?’

‘Ummmm… nope,’ Kyan replied, evidently not telling the whole truth. ‘I was just about to choose a morning movie to watch.’

‘Sure,’ Matteo said, looking up at the projector screen and watching as Kyan scrolled through the choices on offer, his fingers nervously twitching on the remote control. ‘Something tells me you’ve been up for a while. Or maybe that’s just me being a suspicious Daddy?’

Kyan giggled and shook his head in mock disgust.

‘I’d never lie to my, Daddy,’ Kyan said, rolling his eyes for added effect. ‘Okay. How about something fun, like a cartoon.’

‘You choose, I’ll be back in a moment,’ Matteo said, standing up from the couch in nothing but his boxer briefs. ‘I need my morning caffeine injection. And I’ll make you a warm milk too.’

‘With cocoa sprinkles?’ Kyan asked, his big eyes looking up at Matteo pleadingly.

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