Conquered by the Mafia Boss

I’m not going for a third. I just won’t.

Besides, living a bachelor’s life isn’t bad at all. Tony did it, before he knocked up that girl.

I pick up the fork and wind the pasta around and around.

Then I think about how Tony talks about his baby girl all the time with a look in his eyes that I don’t understand, and my chest tightens.

I shove the feeling away.

Who needs a wife?

“So how’s work going?”

“Pretty good.”

Work is always a tricky topic to navigate around my mother. She knows exactly who I am, but I wouldn’t tell her, for example, that I’m planning the biggest heist in history. Millions of dollars in cash. That’s what fucking drives me. Nearly every restaurant, casino, and racetrack in this city gives me a piece of their action in exchange for protection from other gangs. If this heist goes as planned, all of us will be fucking rich. We won’t need that shit anymore.

She looks up at me from her plate of Bolognese, her eyes evasive. “I just find it hard to believe that you can’t find another wife.”

My fork clatters on the plate as I throw my head back and close my eyes.

Keep it together. Don’t fucking yell at her, or she’ll cry and you’ll be stuck here even longer.

“Ma, marriage isn’t for me.”

“I thought I would die of shame when you got divorced the first time. It’s a sin, Johnny. Marriage is a sacred vow-”

“Oh will you fucking please stop with this shit!” The chair crashes to the floor as I stand up abruptly. “Every fucking time I come over, it’s the same thing! I’m not getting married again. I’m not having kids. Get the fuck over it. I am.”

I’m stewing with the rage of being reminded of this failure over and over again, but then she bundles the tablecloth in her hands, and her face screws up.

Shit.

“How can you talk like that to your mother?”

Seeing her tears would be a bigger punch to my gut if she hadn’t done it a thousand times already. I shove my hands deep inside my pockets, filled with a rush of self-loathing.

She’s right. You don’t disrespect your mother.

“I’m sorry, Ma.”

“You’re all I have left. Your father left us.”

Oh, fuck him.

A fresh stab of anger hits me right in the chest as she looks at a family portrait hanging on the wall. I want to smash it, or at least cut him from the fucking photograph so I don’t have to see his rotten face staring back at me.Property belongs to Nôvel(D)r/ama.Org.

“He’s been dead a long time, Ma. You should meet someone else.”

“I can’t. I loved your father.”

I didn’t.

I don’t dare say that out loud.

“I’m so proud of you, Johnny. I just want you to be happy, and I don’t think you are.”

I am fucking happy. Aren’t I?

What the fuck is happiness? Is it whistling to yourself as you walk down the street without a care in the world? Is it being able to fuck gorgeous women, night after night? I search inside myself, but I only feel vague annoyance and that stirring need for more stimulation.

Bending over, I pick up the chair from the floor, avoiding my mother’s gaze. “I gotta go.”

“Already? But you just-”

I take a few steps toward her chair and give her a kiss on the cheek. “Yeah, thanks for the food.”

“Wait-I have to give you leftovers!”

“No, really. I got to go.”

I finally breathe the moment I’m out of that fucking house, and for some reason that girl pops into my head again, shoving all thoughts of my exes away. She was a fucking tease, and she talked to me as though I were just a regular guy. Hell, she acted as though she was better than me. It’s so rare that I meet a beautiful girl who is self-confident.

Then I think about how hot those haughty lips would look wrapped around my cock, and I hope she returns to the bar.

I’m not taking no for an answer.

MAYA

For a while I was content to sit there in my cousin’s badly fitting dress, surrounded by men I didn’t know as conversation and music boomed around me. It felt familiar and yet different from the obnoxious beat of the clubhouse. It was just as loud, but without my father’s men treating me like a princess. It was nice. Now it’s like nails on chalkboard, like an unpleasant shrieking sound, growing louder and louder. Kind of like my heartbeat, slamming against my chest.

Shit. What did I almost get myself into?

My chest rattles from my heartbeat as I totter in my heels, trying to look dignified as I focus on getting the fuck away from this bar as fast as possible.

That Italian guy in the bar had me wrapped around his finger. He just wanted to fuck me, to use my body. My father’s dire warnings against them ring in my head: Never ever let me catch you with an Italian, Maya. They’re no good. They’ll just use you for your body and dump you when it’s over.

Damn, I almost made a decision I would’ve regretted.

Don’t kid yourself. You would have loved stripping off your dress for him. He was sex on a stick.

He was. Fuck, the way his hands glided up my legs, just brushing my upper thigh. I was ready to give myself to him there, to let him smooth his hands all the way up my thighs and make me come the way he said he would.

Daddy will never know.

I shiver in the warm June air as I think of that desperately sinful smile, those dimples curving into his face, the small wrinkles near his eyes. Just having his hands on me in the office was almost enough for me to get wet. They felt so strong and confident, as if he’d held a woman many times before. There was no lack of confidence in that hot gaze, even when he told me to let him talk to my dad.

Hah. As if.