Page 25 of Luciano (Belles & Mobsters 1)

She took a deep, resigned breath. “Yep, plane.” I placed my hand on her lower back and nudged her up the stairs. She quickly smacked my hand away. “I got it, thank you.”

Lovely, she couldn’t even stand my touch, and I was ready to pounce on her. Years of jerking off with only images of my wife to help me find release finally caught up to me. This homecoming was worse than I could have imagined.

The second she entered the cabin, Ella quickly stood up and headed her way. “Are you okay?”

Grace nodded, her lips pressed tightly together. If looks could kill, my dear wife would have had me dead already.

“Hello, Mr. Vitale,” the stewardess greeted us. “Would you and your guests like some drinks?”

“Yes, thank you. The usual.” I would need to get drunk to survive this transatlantic flight with my wife on board. Otherwise, I might drag her into the back of the plane by her hair and fuck her senseless.

“And you ladies?” she asked our guests.

Grace and Ella just shook their heads.

“And who are you?” The stewardess cooed Grace’s son. “Would you like some milk or juice?”

The boy looked from the stewardess to his mother, questioning in his eyes.

“Whichever you want, Matteo,” she murmured.

I covered my surprise. Matteo was my father’s name. Not that she called my father by his first name. Initially she kept calling him Mr. Vitale and gradually changed it to Dad. It must be a coincidence. Matteo was a very common name in Italy. Was that the name of the boy’s father?

“Succo,” Matteo answered the stewardess. She looked in confusion at Grace and then me.

“He’ll have juice,” I told her.

Grace turned her back to me, then headed with Ella and her son to the furthest corner of the plane and sat themselves there. Massimo and I shared a look. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t as if they could run anywhere, unless they planned to jump out of the plane.

The stewardess was back with all our drinks.

“I brought you two ladies some water, just in case,” she told Grace and Ella.

“Thanks,” they both murmured, taking the bottled water.

I couldn’t help but watch my wife. She seemed different somehow. More confident, stronger, more beautiful. Although that hair would have to go. I loved her natural hair color. Not that it should matter to me at all.

The moment she had another man’s child, our marriage was history.

No, the moment you pulled the trigger, your marriage was history.

I shoved my conscience away. I didn’t need it, didn’t want it. She wanted an annulment. I should want it too. She meant nothing to me. Then why did it bother me to think of her marrying someone else? It would be the only reason she would want a divorce or annulment. The whole marriage with her started wrong, the means for revenge against her family.

And that need for revenge wasn’t gone. I would use her, for revenge and to drag her back into my bed. I had to get her out of my system somehow.

I watched her with her son as the plane ascended into the air, murmuring soft words to him I couldn’t hear. I recalled how she insisted on not having kids during those short months we were married. She certainly didn’t mind having a child with another man right away. I wanted to hunt him down and slice his throat for daring to touch something that wasn’t his. Fuck, I wanted to torture the man, nice and long, and see light extinguish from his eyes for ever seeing my woman flush with orgasm. The bitterness in my veins was like poison.

Her fingers stroke her son’s hair softly, her whispers soft. I watched the boy’s eyes droop and the moment we were up in the air, he fell asleep, his head on his mother’s lap.

I turned my gaze away, grinding my teeth. Instead, I caught Massimo watching Gabriella. He had a crush on her before they disappeared. I imagined he probably still did.

Yeah, good luck with that.

I would have to assign Roberto to keep an eye on the women, although that didn’t sit well with me either. Grace was a beautiful woman, and Roberto didn’t have a woman. He knew if he even thought of touching her, he’d be a dead man.

I trusted Massimo unconditionally. He was family, a true blood relative. But he would think with his dick. So would I. We needed someone with no skin in the game to keep an eye on them, so they wouldn’t slip through our fingers again.

Although I refused to look my wife’s way for the rest of the trip, I sensed her the entire time. I could hear the two of them speaking in hushed voices, and I had no doubt they were planning an escape.

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