My hands are wrapped around the warm mug of coffee on the table in front of me. The waitress just refilled it and the smell of cinnamon hits my nose with a bad case of memories. Childish memories too hard to think about—thoughts better left in the past—better off staying buried and long dead.

I sip at the cup, my mind tugging at the new memories I’ve made, breaking them down, tearing them piece by piece to shreds. What did I do? How could I have been so careless with my feelings?

Another sip and I close my eyes. Someone three booths away orders a plate of cheese fries and a Coke, somewhere farther down the loud clang of a fork hits down against a dish. I block it all out, quieting everything in my head.

I can still feel him.

Corrado.

His cologne still lingers on my shirt and I breathe in, smelling him all around me.

Maybe it’s the heat from the cup in my hands—but for a moment I can feel us again, together. The mattress dipping as he crawls over me from behind. The cool sheets under me and the warmth radiating from his body right above me.

The aching anticipation of his touch as he hovers there, no more than an inch away. Teasing me. When will he touch me? When will his fingers touch down? I want his tongue in my mouth—his hands all over me.

Hot skin, heavy and tense, presses down against my back. I can feel every inch of his skin on every inch of mine, both of us naked, open. Smooth, hot skin. His erection, hotter than the rest of his body, is hard pushing and straining against the back of my thigh. I need him inside me. Filling me.

Light fingertips push my hair from my shoulder, sending a tingling sensation that trickles heat down my spine. His lips, warm and wet, press against the curve of my neck and slowly slide and kiss and lick their way across each of my shoulder blades. Between my thighs becomes slick, aroused.

His teeth graze over the shell of my ear and I hear his breathing as it falters and heightens from his exploration of my body. The taste of my skin turns him on.

Strong knees push my thighs apart and his mouth teases the back of my neck until I’m squirming beneath him. His cock finds his way between my legs and my body trembles with a needy ache. He teases me like that for so long, until I’m begging him, pleading and lifting my bottom up to try to reach him. Then he’s deep inside me, everywhere, all at once. Fingers, cock, tongue, all of him dipping over and over inside me until I’m breathless and writhing under him, whimpering out his name.

A throat clears in front of me, pulling me out of my daydream. “Why did you want to meet me here?”

I open my eyes and place my mug back down onto the table. My fingers were gripping it so tightly it almost tumbles out of my hands when I let it go. Damn fantasies. Now I have to sit here in front of this idiot with my panties practically melted into my thighs. I squirm uncomfortably.

Lev Jakov slides into the booth across the table from me, grunting and mumbling as he tries to shove his overflowing gut into the small space. He should be used to being uncomfortable in front of me by now. I smile at him, knowing how much he gets off on the humiliation of it.

“You couldn’t pick a table?” he wheezes.

“You love feeling caged in, so stop.”

His eyes roam around the diner, avoiding mine. “So why all the way out here in the middle of nowhere?”

I shrug like it’s no big deal, and lie through my teeth. “I needed to go back home for something.”

“What’s the something?” he asks. He’s always so curious. Him and his brother, Viktor. But Lev is way easier to deal with. Especially when I dangle free drinks and lap dances from the other girls at the club for him. He loves Lace. And when I told her he was a special friend of mine she let him cum for free in the front seat of his Porsche the first night he came to the club.

I had to pay for the rest of the times he came on her.

I might have put her kid through college already. I’d give her the money anyway, she needs it. But for some reason Lace needs to feel sexually exploited too.

“Hey, stop worrying so much about me, okay? I just needed to visit my parents for the day.”

“I worry about you working for that no good piece of—” The waitress comes over, stopping his words dead.

“What can I get you, hun?” She snaps a bubble at him and smiles down at the gold rings adorning his pinky fingers, each sparking with diamonds. Her eyes roam up his hands. Greedy girl.

He loves the attention. Slides his sleeves up a little, letting his Rolex peek out. “Just coffee,” he says, sliding the menu he never opened to the edge of the table.

Bullshit. You’ll order more, you stupid glutton.

“Wait. Wait. You know what, I haven’t eaten at all today. Um, you got any cheesecake?” he asks, curiously.

“We sure do. I’ll go cut you an extra big piece, be right back,” she says, winking at him.

He watches her ass while she walks away and I’m slapped in the face with disgust.

“You come here a lot? You know that waitress?” His eyes still haven’t left her backside and he wets his lips repeatedly.

“No, I don’t, Lev, sorry.” I want to stick a fork in each of his pupils so he’ll stop with the eye fucking. I should give her my sunglass for protection. “Lev, stop mentally humping her in front of me.”

His eyes dart to mine and he’s wearing some angry expression like I’m actually taking part in cock blocking him with this waitress. “Just give her a nice tip and maybe she’ll slip you her number.”

He glares at me.

“Look, let’s just make this a fast visit, okay. And you can get all snuggly-blow-jobby with the wait staff here,” I whisper.

The waitress comes back with a huge smile on her face and plops down a gigantic slice of cheesecake, dripping with raspberry sauce, right between us. “You two going to share?”

“Um, no.” I smile up at her, and push the plate toward Lev. “This is all for him. My very single, rich brother.”

Lev smiles at my fib. Well, he is definitely single and rich, the brother part is false, of course, but seriously, who cares as long as the woman gets the fact he isn’t with me.

She walks away, smiling back over her shoulder at him.

“You suck at being a wingman. Next time add in enormous cock,” he says, shoving a forkful of cake into his mouth. “What do you have for me, anyway?”

I dig into my purse and pull out a folded piece of paper. “Stole it off Tony’s desk last night.” Another lie. I haven’t been at the club in two days. I take a quick sip of my cocoa when Corey’s face pops into my head. Why can’t I just stop thinking about him?

It’s the way he looks at me, I think.

The way his hands feel on my skin.

No, it’s more than that. I just don’t want to admit to it.

I can’t ever admit to it.

“What’s this?” Lev asks, unfolding the papers.

I watch his eyes scan quickly over the document and grow wider and wider.

“It’s the entire list of Tony Fretolli’s contacts. Every person he associates with. Every business he involves himself with. Every piece-of-shit criminal he works with. And all the other family members having to do with his organization.” It’s not, though, it’s only a quarter of the list, and the majority of the people on it are dead. I smile at him like a giddy schoolgirl.

“My father is meeting with him today,” he says, greedy eyes still reading over Fretolli’s secrets. He’s inhaling the cheesecake like an award-winning vacuum.

Tony is meeting with Niko today? “Why? I thought your father was cutting him out of everything.”

“Oh, he is, beautiful. Tony called him for a sit down. Something fucked up must be happening for him to reach out and beg like that.” He laughs as he licks the last remnants of the cheesecake off his fork. If he starts licking the plate like a dog, my camera is coming out.

Then I realize what he just said. Something big must be happening. Tony believes Niko is behind his men being slaughtered like pigs. And he’s never going to own up to the fact it’s Tony himself ordering the damn pork sandwiches. Tony Fretolli is not sitting down talking to anyone. He’s probably cutting them up into little pieces and selling it to the neighborhood butcher as a new kind of organic meat.

“You know,” he says, dipping a tissue into a glass of water to wipe the mess of white gunk caked around his lips. “You shouldn’t go back there. With the things Tony is into, you’re not safe. Big things are going to start happening. Do yourself a favor and stay away. Dance privately if you need the money. I know plenty of men who’d pay for you.”

Heat surges through me, but I ignore the words and quiet my rage. Now is not the time to lose my shit on him. “What do you think is going to happen?”

“Really,” he chuckles, “you want to go there?”

“Yeah, seriously, what’s going on?” I ask, grasping the mug hard in my hands.

“Hun, the Jakovs are much more powerful than the Fretollis. The Italian mob? They’re nothing in this city now, haven’t been for the last ten years.” He leans forward and takes a slurp of his coffee. “Today, most of the top guys in the families are doing time or dead,” he whispers. “We think it’s time for a changing of the guard, so to speak.”

“You don’t think Anthony Fretolli is powerful?” I ask, taking a small casual sip from my cup.

“Nah, he’s just crazy. People listen to him out of fear, not respect. My father said it was Angelo Acerbi that was respected in that family, and him and his whole family got gunned down years ago. My senior year in high school.” He shrugs and offers me a small calculating smile, “With all the disgusting shit Tony and his crew are dabbling in? The chemical shit, the kids—we think it’s time for that entire organization to be read its last rites.” He motions the waitress over and takes out a roll of cash, flashing it like a stack of cards. My mind spins out of control. He’s talking about killing Corrado too.

“What do my sister and I owe you, gorgeous? My sister has to get out of here,” he asks the waitress.

She writes out the receipt and they banter while I think of a dozen ways I would love to see Lev die. It’s a sick thought, but it’s there, breathing, living, festering inside me.

When the waitress sashays away, he nods toward the door, dismissing me.

I don’t move.

“What’s wrong? Come on, get out of here. I want to hit that,” he says, grinning ear to ear, gaze locked on to the waitress’s—her name is Melissa—ass.

“Don’t touch Corrado.” My tone is even, it’s not a plea nor a question. It’s a bold-faced demand.

He leans back, the waitress suddenly dropping right out of his thoughts. A smile playing at his lips. “And what will you give me so I don’t touch Corrado Fretolli?”

I lean forward and bite along the bottom of my lip. “Big boy, you take me into the backseat of your Porsche right now, and I’ll give you anything you ask for.”