Page 33 of The Darkest King

I calculate the days left of my two-year agreement, and I’msurethere are still two weeks remaining. I’msure.So, it must be the lack of sleep, the way I can’t stop thinking about Connor Barrett and the night we spent together.

It’s like his scent is still on me.

My head is fuzzy, and I’m still floating after the seven or more orgasms. I’m sure the blood hasn’t returned to all the correct places in my body yet.

If I close my eyes, I can still see Connor and I lying on our sides, exhausted, my leg over his hip as he slowly thrusts in and out of me, not wanting to stop.

There was little left in either of us, our bodies coated in glossy sweat, and yet his hand clutched my hair, and those deep brown eyes clung to mine as he grunted and groaned out the same desperate pleasure I did.

We fucked until we couldn’t keep our eyes open. Falling asleep tangled in a pile of limbs, sticky and almost sated.

I don’t think I could ever be completely sated by a man like Connor Barrett. I’d always want more.

He’d always take more.

So, I can’t just act as if last night never happened.

The meal is long and laborious, and the more my father watches me, the more certain I am that he knows.

Which irritates me.

I’m twenty-four—this controlling behavior has to end. I don’t care if wearea mafia family. I’m a grown woman. I’m not the same Mia who left this house two years ago. He knows, surely, I’m not a virgin. There’s never been an expectation that I would remain one.

Only that I may be required to marry someone from the world we exist in.

Another gangster.

But nothing of the sort has been raised since my mother was alive and reminding me it was a possibility.

“Go, have fun, but be careful, Mia. There will come a day when you will be expected to play your part in this family. I can’t protect you from that. Your father is who he is, and I love him,” she would say.

Still, it may be that I’m tired.

Two hours later, there are half-empty plates of pasta, salads, breads, and meats everywhere. Cutlery is scraping, and glasses are being refilled once again.

Everything is normal.

“How is the job, Mia?” Aunt Rosa asks, using my preferred name, and I’m grateful.

“Good.” I lift the red wine to my lips. “I love it.”

Never miss an opportunity, I say. I’m forever hoping Father will see how happy I am and will let me continue living my life my way.

I know he loves me, so surely, he must see this is what I want. Not a career in crime, murder, and other illegal activities that are too abhorrent to consider.

I’ve never said it to him directly, but he’s seen the look in my eyes, heard my cries, and even watched me run to the bathroom, vomiting, when I was younger and overheard things. Or worse, witnessed them.

Cade would laugh.

Papa would just tell my mother she needed to harden me up. That this was the world we lived in.

“Donna does the most incredible events,” Aunt Silvia says. “She did the gala for the Rochford’s. You should’ve seen it. Spectacular is the only word to use.”

Ididsee it.

I helped run the event. In fact, the internally lit ice fountain was my idea, and it was all over the NYC media for days.

We helped raise nearly two million dollars to stop the use of animals for entertainment. I was so proud. I hate seeing all those social feeds with photos of people on vacation, where they’re smiling and holding a koala, crocodile, tiger, or other wild animal. Don’t they know the poor animal has either had food withheld to make them so complaint—a.k.a. starving—or they’re drugged?

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