JASON BEAT THE sole of his shoe against the hallway floor with more force than was necessary to get his point across. Siena shot the enforcer a glare over her shoulder, but he only cocked an eyebrow back at her in silent response. He didn’t move as she flipped through the keys on the ring to find the right one for her apartment door.
Asshole.
Apparently, she was taking too much time unlocking her door. The same way she took too much time to get into a car, or cross the goddamn street. Or getting to and from places. Even eating in front of a window took too much time.
Anything.
She just took too much time lately.
According to Jason, anyway.
Siena knew what the issue really was. Nobody in the Calabrese family felt safe ever since their attack on the Marcellos the week before. And rightfully so, likely. Siena only heard about the attack because the shooting was on the news, and the anchors had named names regarding the victims involved.
She wasn’t exactly sure John would appreciate his father and him being called victims and then criminals in the same goddamn sentence. Just the victim portrayal would be enough to piss him off.
Nonetheless, no one in the Calabrese family felt very safe at the moment. They were back to violence and bloodshed by Darren’s command, and yet, the Marcellos had yet to respond to this latest attack.
Everybody was on edge.
What would they do?
Who would it be?
How?
When?
Siena was often shuffled from place to place before she could even sit down and think about where she currently was. She might spend a half of a day in one place to work, and then be moved to another place before she could even finish.
She wasn’t allowed to stay out very long in public, and heaven forbid she stop on the side of the street. Her enforcer was closer than ever, including driving her all over the place because she couldn’t even use her car.
It was stifling.
Suffocating.
She was dying.
Finally, Siena got her door unlocked, and pushed it open. Turning as she entered the place, she gave Jason a wave and said, “See, there, all safe. Bye.”
The guy opened his mouth.
Siena closed the door in his face.
It wasn’t like the guy would run to Darren and tell on her for misbehaving, or anything. Darren was too caught up in his own bullshit to care very much about Siena at the moment. It was a blessing in disguise, really.
Opening up her door not long after she closed it, she peeked down the hallway to find that Jason was just closing his apartment door. The slam echoed.
Siena smiled.
Quietly, she shut her door again, and headed through her small apartment. Another benefit of Darren being caught up in Kev’s murder, and trying to plan for the next attack from the Marcellos was that he had yet to move Siena from her place. Shit, maybe he even forgot that it had been him who was so outspoken about letting her move back.
Who knew?
Who cared?
Not her.
All that mattered was she was still in her place, and that gave her a little bit of freedom to move. At least, where John was concerned.
In her bedroom, she bent down and pulled out a shoebox from under the bed. Flipping off the top, she dug through some magazines to find the item hidden beneath. She dug out the burner cell phone John had provided, and turned the home screen on.
Instantly, her heart dropped.
There was no messages. No missed calls.
Nothing.
Today marked one entire week since John had contacted her. The last time had been the morning of the shooting—he mentioned he would be going to his therapist’s, and if he could, would call her that night.
He hadn’t called.
Not then.
Not since.
Siena was started to get worried. It wasn’t like John to break his word, and after everything that was going on between their families and on the streets, she really needed him to check in with her.
She needed to know he was okay.
Something.
Anything.
Was there a reason he went off the radar?
Siena didn’t know that, either. The last time she had spoken to Andino was weeks ago, as it seemed he no longer needed information from her, or rather, knew she would pass it through Johnathan, anyway. She didn’t know if she could get any information from him about John, either.
She dialed John’s number, and put the phone to her ear. It rang and rang, but no one picked up. She tried again, and then again. She sent a text message, and waited five minutes to see if she would get a response.
Nothing.
Her worry picked up a notch.
Her anxiety thrummed deep.
Siena glanced out her bedroom window to find the sun was still high, and bright. It wasn’t even supper time, but Darren didn’t want her out in public too much. Someone might come after her, apparently.
She didn’t think anyone was coming for her.
Siena knew better …
It was a huge risk.
She shouldn’t leave when it wasn’t even dark. Someone might see her, or follow her. It was a dumb move to make, and yet, her heart screamed louder than the warning bells ringing over and over again in her head.
Still, she sent one last text to John letting him know she was coming over, and to expect her. She kept an eye out when she left her apartment building and hailed a cab. She glanced up and watched the windows of Jason’s apartment, but never saw a single curtain move as she left the place.
It all seemed good.
She thought she was in the clear.
She didn’t see anybody …
But that didn’t mean nobody saw her.
• • •
“Your front door is unlocked.”
John didn’t look up from the things he had spread out on his bed. “You said you were coming over. I left it open for you when I got home.”
“You couldn’t call me back? Send a text?”
“No.”
That was all he offered.
No.
Siena could see in the way John’s gaze narrowed as he fingered the edge of a piece of paper that something was weighing on him. On his mind, likely. Maybe it was the slope of his shoulders, too, or how he wouldn’t look at her.
She came a little closer.
“What’s all this?”
It looked as though he had dumped out a bubble mailer if the empty package tossed to the pillow was any indication.
“My latest surprise,” he said dryly.
“What?”
John looked up from the stuff on the bed.
Pain stared back at her.
“I keep getting these—this shit,” he said, waving at the papers on the bed. “It’s like they want to remind me how easy it is to dredge shit up from my past. It feels like they’re telling me they can put my life and business on display. I don’t know how they keep finding this shit, Siena.”
She grabbed a document on the bed, and looked it over.
A police report, it seemed.
A sixteen year old Johnathan Marcello had stolen a neighbor’s car, and crashed it on the interstate. He tested positive for two different kinds of drugs, and had a blood alcohol level slightly over the limit.
Holy shit.
Siena understood that this event that had been documented in John’s life—when he was younger, of course—was shortly before the time his bipolar disorder had finally been properly diagnosed. It was likely one of the many manic episodes that had led up to the final diagnosis.
“This accident was brushed under the rug,” John said, taking the paper from Siena. “Or it was supposed to be. My family paid people off—got serious about trying to figure out what in the hell was going on with me, then.”
“What happened to the case and file?”
John shrugged. “Should have been destroyed. Some went on record—few hours of probation, some fines. I once spent sixty days in a juvenile detention center for other shit. Of course, none of them ever actually had my disorder on record. That was all before I got diagnosed, and then even after, we were careful about keeping it off record when shit went down.”
He gestured behind him to other opened bubble mailers on the floor.
“What is this?”
“Me,” John said. “Me and bipolar.”
Siena blinked, and then looked at John. “Someone is sending you these?”
He nodded. “Every day, usually. I come home, and one is on my doorstep. I come out of a place, and one is stuffed under the wiper of my car. I’m not the only one to get a package, either. Some of my people—my family, too. Associates of mine.”
“John—”
“It makes people look at me differently, and that irritates me like nothing fucking else. Like I might blow up, or freak out. They don’t trust me, or something.”
“Or is that just how it makes you feel to have other people know,” she said.
Siena didn’t even pose it as a question.
John didn’t respond.
She figured it was probably a bit of both, really.
“They’re fucking with me, and I don’t like it.”
“Darren’s people?” she asked.
She didn’t really need to ask.
She already knew.
John looked up from the stuff on his bed, and finally met her gaze. She didn’t like what stared back, or how distant he seemed. She knew that John didn’t rapid cycle from high to lows all the time, but things could tip him one way or the other.
High, or low.
Good, or not.
Manic, settled, or depressed.
She wondered how low he was right then.
How low did he feel?
How dark was he in his mind?
“None of this is important,” she told him, grabbing one of the papers, and shaking it hard. “Not to you, or your family. You know it isn’t important. None of this has ever made any difference to them, John.”
She tossed the paper away, grabbed another, and then did the same thing. She continued until all the crap was gone from the bed.
John never moved, or said a word.
Siena felt marginally better, but she doubted John did. “I’m worried about you, John.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t call.”
“You haven’t called in a week.”
“It’s nonstop lately.”
“What is?”
“This,” he said, waving at the mailers, “and this.”
He pointed to his head.
“So call me,” she said.
“I’m trying to handle it, Siena.”
“Alone?”
“There’s enough going on without me—”
Siena heard enough. She moved around the corner of the bed, and stepped in front of John. She put her body between him and the bed to make him look away from the spot that had been filled with things he likely regretted, and events that made him ashamed.
She knew what he had been doing.
Going over everything.
Reliving mistakes.
Wishing for different things.
Eating guilt like a second meal.
Fuck all that noise.
Siena reached up and cupped John’s face. His hazel eyes locked on hers, and for a second, that darkness dimming his gaze disappeared. He focused on her, and nothing else seemed to matter to him.
She wished she could be here more.
Give him more.
Do more.
“Stop giving my brother and his people what they want by getting messed up over all of this,” she said quietly. “You know that’s their goal—don’t do it, John. Nothing else matters but right here, and right now. Everybody else around you is going to tell you the same thing. You have too many other things to worry about right now.”
He couldn’t be off his game.
Not now.
The risk was too high.
She wondered if anybody else had told him that.
Did anyone else even know his state of mind?
John’s fingers circled around Siena’s wrists, held tight, and then he kissed her. A soft, quick kiss that didn’t stay long, and yet still lingered once his lips were gone from hers. He gave her a crooked smile, and she gave him one back.
“Thank you,” he said in a rough murmur.
He never needed to thank her.
Not for loving him.
“Don’t worry me again.”
He nodded. “I was just going to jump in the shower, and got distracted. I was out for a jog before I came home.”
“To another mailer?”
“Yeah.”
Fuck Darren.
“Go have your shower,” Siena said. “I’ll still be here.”
“Better be.”
John let her go, and Siena tried not to show how the loss of him made her heart heavy all over again. She watched over her shoulder as he disappeared into the connecting bathroom. She took a seat on the edge of the bed as the shower turned on, and eyed the mailers on the floor.
Her anger grew.
She wanted to kill Darren, too.
How much longer was this going to last?
The silence echoed from the bathroom. Siena looked over her shoulder to see the curve of John’s naked back, but he wasn’t moving. The shower continued raining on, and while he was naked, he didn’t make a move to get in the water.
She was inside the bathroom before she had even really thought about it. John stayed stone still as she slipped in behind him, and let her hands travel over his naked back. A soft, light touch that eased some of the tension in his muscles.
“It’ll pass,” he murmured.
His mood.
This nonsense.
Everything.
Siena nodded, and pressed a kiss to the spot between his shoulder blades. “It’ll pass, John.”
“You probably shouldn’t have come over here today.”
“Probably not. I needed to see you, though.”
“Worrying you, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“Sorry, mia cara bella.”
Siena smiled, and pressed her forehead to his warm back. His muscles jumped from her touch that time. “I always have you on the back of my mind, John.”
“Always have my back, too, huh?”
“Forever.”
“Sempre.”
And always.
John stepped into the walk-in shower, and Siena decided she didn’t like him being that far away in those moments. She wanted to be close to him for as long as she could. Quickly, she shed her dress, and undergarments. Stepping into the shower, she found herself tugged into John, and then his arms wrapped around her.
Water pounded down.
Steam wrapped around them.
The world stopped.
That was just fine, too.
It took only an innocent kiss to her forehead that led to another kiss on her lips which started an entirely different fire. One that stroked her from the inside out, the same way his fingers felt stroking her pussy when they slipped between her thighs.
Before she even knew what had happened, Siena was backed against the shower wall, and lifted from the floor. Cold tiles met her back, but she barely felt it at all. She was too focused on the way John’s mouth felt slipping down her throat. The way his tongue lapped at her skin, and his breath came out harder when his cock rubbed against her center.
One of his hands tangled into her hair, while his other kept her held up under the curve of her ass. His fingertips dug into her skin in the best way—a shock of pain that swam through her blood, but only made her want more.
“Love me, love me.”
It was as good as please, please to him.
She didn’t need to say more, or ask for anything else. It was only a quick shift of his hips, and her hand sliding between their bodies to line his cock up with her center. She took in one good breath before his cock filled her full.
She needed that breath.
He took the rest while he fucked her.
John kissed her again, then. All tongue and teeth warring. A hard kiss that left her lips numb, and her tongue tingling. She found he kissed the same way he fucked.
Deep and fast.
Unforgiving, and passionate.
A sweet dance she had come to crave.
Constantly.
John buried his face into her neck, and his teeth left marks behind on her pulse point. Each thrust of his cock brought her a little bit closer to the edge. Every time he withdrew, his length dragged across every single one of her most sensitive spots. Her heels dug into his back while her words urged him on, whispered fast and low into his hair.
There, there ... almost there.
“Come on, give it to me, love,” she heard him grunt against her neck.
His fingers dug deeper.
Her nails drew lines across his shoulders.
The orgasm came on swift, and left her a mess in his arms. John didn’t seem to mind. It was only then that his pace slowed, and he went back to kissing her. Her mouth, cheeks, the tip of her nose, and down over her jaw. His thrusts came at a leisurely pace. He took his time getting himself to where he wanted, and Siena didn’t mind at all.
She wanted to do this for the rest of her life with him.
Calm him.
Love him.
Have him.
Someday, someday … someday.
Her mind chanted it.
Someday soon.
He would be all hers, then.
John came with a shaky exhale, and his eyes locked on hers. His thumbs trembled when he stroked them over her jaw, and then her lips.
One softer kiss to her lips …
A quiet, “I love you, my girl.”
And then the phone rang.
Reality was always waiting to call them home.
• • •
He would be so angry with you for this.
Siena’s inner voice taunted her, but she pushed it aside to deal with her current task. There would come a day in their life when she would no longer have to do something like this. There would come a day when John would have her every single day—he could come to her, and never have to worry about needing someone else to have his back like she did.
That’s what she kept telling herself, anyway.
It made this easier.
She had almost talked herself out of it, but ended up just doing it. Dialing a familiar number before she could think twice, she put the phone to her ear, and waited the ringing out.
One ring.
Two.
Three.
She thought it might go to voicemail.
Thankfully, it didn’t.
“Ciao.”
The Italian greeting almost made her smile.
“Lucian?”
A beat of silence passed before John’s father asked, “Siena?”
“One and only.”
Her joke fell flat, but she figured that. Sometimes, shitty humor was the only way she knew how to deal with things that stressed her out.
She had way too much stress lately.
“New number?” Lucian asked.
She laughed. “A burner from John, actually.”
“Ah, I see.”
Siena wasn’t exactly surprised that Lucian didn’t quite know what to make of her call. Sure, she had been given his number from Andino in case she needed another way to get ahold of him while John was in the facility. Lucian had periodically got messages through to her about John while he was away, too.
Still, their conversations were short, and to the point. He wasn’t, however, rude to her or anything. Always respectful, and kind, but never personal. Siena kind of got the feeling that was just how Lucian approached people, and how he handled them.
She didn’t take it personally.
“What can I do for you?” Lucian asked.
“Check on John for me, that would be great.”
She didn’t mention that she was at John’s place, or that he had taken off shortly after she arrived because someone called him away.
“Why do you need me to do that?”
“He hasn’t called in a while.”
Not a lie.
“Oh?” Lucian asked.
“Usually, he calls every day.”
“He’s been a little off lately,” Lucian said.
Good.
Someone had noticed it. Someone was taking note. Someone could help.
Siena wasn’t entirely comfortable with outing John’s business to anyone, even if it was his father. That’s why she chose to hold off on telling Lucian that she suspected John was in a rough place because she saw him in a rough place.
John wouldn’t want her bringing that up, either. His lines in the sand about his disorder, and how he wanted to handle it with those close to him were clearly drawn. Siena was not about to cross one of those lines.
Still …
She had to do something.
John needed something.
This was the best she could do—a call, a suggestion, and a simple request. No information, and no personal details that crossed a line. John would get someone to check in, and talk to him more than he had talked to her.
It was the best she could do.
It was all she could do right then.
Siena hated that.
“He’s keeping up with everything, right?” she asked.
Her unspoken question hung heavily between them.
His meds?
His therapy?
Everything else?
Lucian seemed to understand what she didn’t say. “He is.”
“I hear a but in there.”
“But,” Lucian said, chuckling dryly, “he got some unsettling things thrown his way lately. I don’t think he handled it well. That’s to be expected.”
Siena’s gaze drifted to the packages in the corner. It looked like John had gotten more than one unsettling thing thrown his way, actually.
Did Lucian know about those?
She hated her brother for doing that to John. She had made a promise months ago that no one would ever use John’s own mind against him again, and yet, here they were.
It was happening.
Again.
“Could you check in on him for me?” she asked. “Just don’t mention I asked. I know everything is all over the place lately—I need to know he’s okay, that’s all.”
John loved his family. Siena saw in his expressions when he spoke about them, and heard it in his voice when one of their names were brought up. John was careful in the way he talked about others, sure, but he couldn’t hide anything from Siena.
He loved his family so much.
“I will,” Lucian promised. “I was going that way tomorrow.”
“Great. Thanks.”
“Be safe, Siena. This war is almost over.”
“I’m trying.”
“That’s all we can ask.”
Lucian said a quick goodbye, and then hung up the phone.
Siena pulled a pad and pen from the nightstand next to John’s side of the bed. She scribbled a quick note for John as she looked around his empty bedroom.
Call me. Love you. –S.
She had thought to stay and wait for him. Maybe he would get back before she had to leave again, but that didn’t seem to be the case. She needed to get back home just in case someone dropped by, or shit, Darren decided to call her away from her place.
She couldn’t afford to be caught stepping out of line right now. Who fucking knew what Darren would do?
Her heart felt heavy as she slipped out of the room, and headed down the stairs, and left his house. She still kept an eye out for someone she might recognize.
Nothing seemed out of place.
That didn’t mean it was safe.