I have always secretly loved watching the rich be brought to their knees. Hell, I have enjoyed them being on their knees, looking up at me like I’m some sort of trophy to be won. I was raised with nothing, but I lucked out by getting my mother’s looks, the only thing a whore like her had to offer. I made sure I became strong, stronger than any opponent I may ever come up against. In doing so, I became something.

I have no respect for rich bitches, only disdain and malicious satisfaction gained from seeing my cum filling their well-fed mouths and dripping down their overly made up faces.

Having worked for Miss Segretti’s family for years, covering for Franco’s much-needed vacations and time off from his charge, I knew what I was getting into if I agreed to become her full-time protector. The family trusted me because I had been chosen and trained by him.

I knew her erratic behavior and tenacious ways. I understood she was a nightmare and any normal man would have run the other way.

Even so, I agreed.

Eight years ago, I was on edge, watching her look at her children like she was afraid of them. It wasn’t an act. She was afraid of them.

She watched her family swoop in and take charge. She let them, becoming even more afraid. Then the spoiled, little socialite learned from them.

Many times, I watched her crumble into a pile on her bedroom floor from exhaustion and frustration when they were finally in bed. I also watched her fight harder than I have ever seen her fight before, for or against anything. In that time, I gained respect for a spoiled rich girl who I never anticipated for a moment I would have.

Over the past eight years, I watched the lioness become tamed by her cubs. I watched her become a woman who would someday make her children proud. I watched her, and I watched her children become something I never imagined—a family.

Over the past few days, I watched her more closely, knowing she is about to come face to face with a past as a changed woman. She is going to fight an enemy twice her size, who has won round after round against her. She is going to fight someone whose hunger is stronger than any she had ever come up against. She is going to fight, and she is going to lose, as she has lost this battle before.

In a sick way, I am interested to see what becomes of her after she has fought so hard to become something more and gets knocked on her ass again. Will she fall into the lifestyle she left behind, becoming nothing more than she was? Will her children suffer, or will her family step in and save her again?

It doesn’t really matter to me. I will have a job either way.

This afternoon, Miss Segretti is going to the spa with her cousins’ wives, her aunt, and the little socialite in the making, Isabella Steel. I will be spending the rest of the day fishing off my boat and enjoying an afternoon to myself.

When the boat is loaded up with beverages and I am awaiting my female companion for the afternoon, my phone rings from an unknown number. Since it could be my companion informing me that her husband is coming home early from a business trip, instead of ignoring the call, I answer.

“Vincent,” an old, familiar voice comes thorough the phone.

“Yes.”

“Do you know who this is?”

“Of course I do.”

“I need a favor.”

“Okay.”

“I need a ride. Apparently, a hand was slicked and my plans have changed until tomorrow.”

No explanation is needed. I owe him one favor at very least.

“I’ll be there in two hours,” I tell him as I spot the BMW pulling into the spot next to my vehicle, knowing I can still come before sending her off.

“I need you here in one.”

Fuck, I groan to myself before telling him, “I’ll be there.”

Trenton is an hour from Asbury Park. There is no fucking way I’m getting off before all hell breaks loose.

I shove the phone in my pocket and watch as she hurries toward me.

Tammy is a beautiful woman. She’s blonde, which works in her favor—I seem to have acquired a taste for them. She is on the shorter side, and although I assume she’s had some work done—most women in the circle I have found myself in have—from what I have seen, she looks natural.

I crave natural.

I walk to meet her, knowing I’m going to disappoint her.

* * *

Nine years and three months ago, I woke up after what I have since learned was a five-day coma. In St. Francis Hospital, I lay with gunshot wounds to my chest, listening to a voice I had loved, then loathed, then loved again for the majority of my life.

Valentina Segretti’s small hand held mine as she prayed to all the saints and the Virgin Mother for my life, while I prayed to the same for death.

When I opened my eyes and looked at her, she sobbed and praised them all while her tears and kisses fell gently upon my face.

“I knew they’d bring you back to me, my love, my everything, mio amante,” she cried.

“And I prayed for death. I want you to leave and never look back.”

Do you know what a hospital staff and law enforcement officers can do to a one hundred and twenty-pound woman when she crosses a line? When she loses all sense? When she attacks a man who has just woken from a coma, though he wishes he hadn’t? Not much more than they can do to a junkie who is full of adrenaline and drugs, making them fearless and unafraid.

However, hands got slicked, and as real as the world is round, she was allowed back in.

She pled and begged me to accept the lawyer she and her family had sent.

I turned away.

I again told her to leave.

She flipped even worse that time and was put on the hospital’s no-trespass list.

Two days later, she was kicked out of Central Reception and Assignment Facility in Mercer County when I demanded no visitors. I was kicked out, as well, and sent directly to max when I sent two men to the hospital.

When I arrived at New Jersey State Prison in Trenton, I filled out paperwork to ensure no one whose last name was Segretti or Steel was allowed contact.

All those saints and the Virgin Mother who Valentina prayed to that day at my bedside must have been looking out for Valentina, granting her prayers in a way she wouldn’t understand, yet granting her the peace she deserved. There was no contact, outside of the letters I received and never read.

Now I have spent in nine years and three months in New Jersey State Prison. The only prison that caters solely to maximum security inmates. Ninety-nine percent of those are violent criminals.

I am one of them.

In nine years, I have been stabbed over seventy times and had stitches at the prison hospital thirty-five times, while the others I did myself. I have had bones broken, been jumped by groups of men from several different gangs, busted lips, and I have even been held down and fucked.

Tomorrow was to be my release day.

Tomorrow, I was to walk out with a taxi ride to Newark and a plane ticket to Italy, where I would go to grow old and die, or just die.

Therefore, I am more than surprised when I am given my walking papers a day early, and one day in the United States to get my affairs in order.

I’m not a stupid man. I know how this comes about, just like I already know how I am going to deal with it.

I will let her spit in my face, or beat my ass, or both.

You see, I was a stupid man for believing the saints and Virgin Mother had answered her prayers that day. They had actually answered mine. She left.

Today, today is the day a woman will learn the saints and the Virgin Mother were not telling her no. They were telling her I wasn’t the man for her. They were telling her she would have her chance to get back at me. And I was going to make it easier on her.

Standing in my cell, I am dressed for the first time in clothes that aren’t orange or economy cotton. The material of my own clothes is soft against my skin, though they have seemed to have gotten smaller in the back, chest, and arms. I’m wearing leather on my feet again, and not canvas.

As I walk through the corridors, I look down until I come to the end of the steel cages where the one man I respect here, Crowe, stands and gives me a nod.

“Till we meet again.”

“Till we meet again.” I nod and keep walking.

The sounds of the gates unlocking as I pass through each one should be music to my ears. It is not.

Once outside the first gate, I am handed a backpack and an envelope.

I have lost my manners. There are no thank yous within these walls, so I don’t thank the guard. It’s hard to tell if he’s corrupt like so many other inside, passing drugs and SIM cards amongst the convicts for extra money to afford them their own habits and luxuries.

I walk outside toward the main gate, not expecting one of those theatrical moments you read about in books or hear about in inspirational movies about men who have been rehabilitated or have come to find Jesus after doing their time. There is no silver lining or beautiful life waiting for me beyond these gates.

As I get closer, the armed guard in the tower above looks down at me as the gate opens.

Walking through them, I watch as a black Lincoln pulls up, the license plate reads: STEEL08. Then I take a deep breath when the window is rolled down and Vincent leans out and nods.

I walk to the car and open the passenger side door, not knowing what to expect. When I get in, I am pleased she’s not inside.

Vincent takes the toothpick out of his mouth. “A day early?”

“Apparently so,” I sigh out.

“My day off. You lucked out,” he says, putting the car in drive.

“Sorry to intrude,” I tell him.

“You don’t owe me an apology. Tammy, on the other hand, she’s been waiting all week for me to take her out on my boat, throw a line in, catch some dinner, and then, well, you know.”

“Well, when you see your girlfriend again, tell her I apologize.”

A phone sounds. I believe it’s coming through the car’s speakers.

He looks at the computer monitor, hits a button, and then pops in an earpiece.

“Yes?” He pauses. “It’s fine.” He pauses again. “Of course.”

He hangs up and looks at me. “Have to make a pit stop before heading to …” He smiles. “Where are you staying tonight?”

“Somewhere close to JFK. I fly out tomorrow.”

“Deported?”

I nod.

“I’ll gladly take you out to dinner tonight, but how about some fast food along the way?”

I look at him from out of the corner of my eye.

“Tacos?” he offers with a shit-ass grin.

“Sounds good,” I tell him, and he laughs.

* * *

After eating too many damn tacos, I get sleepy.

“I’m going to close my eyes for a few minutes.”

He nods. “All right.”

When he stops the car and puts it in park, I open my eyes and look out the window.

“Where are we?”

He doesn’t say a word. Doesn’t even look at me when he gets out.

I watch him walk around the car and in the direction of what appears to be a church of some sort. I see a sign that says St. Mary’s.

I get a sick feeling in my stomach as I watch the steel doors open and prepare for the worst, for her. Instead, I see two little girls run out in navy uniforms.

Both girls appear to be the same age, and both have long, braided, black pigtails. As they get closer, I see they appear to be twins. I surmise that this Tammy that Vincent was talking about is his wife, and that the two have children.

When he opens the door for them, they bound in, giggling. I look back at them as they buckle themselves into their seatbelts.

When Vincent opens his door slides in, one of them asks, “Mom busy?”

“She is,” he answers, looking back. “Are you both buckled?”

“We are,” the other seems to mock him.

The one who spoke first tells her sister, “Be nice. It’s his day off.”

“She was supposed to take us to get ice cream,” the more mischievous one says.

“Was not,” her sister again calls her out.

Vincent puts the car in drive and laughs.

“You gonna introduce us to the new guy?” Miss Mischievous asks.

“Just a friend of mine who needs a ride,” Vincent tells her.

“You got no car?” she asks me.

I shake my head in answer.

“You can’t talk either?” she mocks as she laughs.

“Manners, little lady,” Vincent interjects. “Tell me about your day.”

Not wanting to intrude on their private time any more than I already have, I reach into my pocket and pull out the earbuds and MP3 player I bought eight years ago to drown out the noise. I notice a pair of sunglasses in the bag as well and put them on. Then I close my eyes and listen to Puccini.

When we slow and begin to turn, I open my eyes again and look out the window, seeing the ocean. We then pull up to a gate where Vincent punches in a code. I think how exquisite his life has turned out. That is confirmed when we pull up in front of a beautiful home. He indeed has made a good life for himself here.

He gets out of the car and shuts the door behind him.

I feel a tap on my shoulder and turn around while pulling the earbud out of my ear.

“It was nice to meet you, mister.” Miss Mischievous smiles. Or, at least I think it’s her.

“You as well,” I tell her.

I look at the other girl who just looks at me. I nod. She nods back.

“It was nice to meet you, as well.”

She tips her head to the side and looks at me even more oddly.

“Come on,” the other girl says, tugging on her hand.