Andino wasn’t sure what Haven reminded him more of in those moments as she stood just a couple of feet away from where he sat on the couch. Like maybe a skittish deer that was ready to bolt away from the thing that terrified her … or a woman ready to jump his bones.
It was amusing … and sad, too.
“Sit,” he said again. “You have questions, right?”
“Maybe,” she countered, “but how many of them do you plan on answering?”
Andino smiled.
Smart woman.
“As many as I know the answers to, Haven. I promise.” She still hesitated to move, and kept an even tighter grip on that file. Guessing by the way the spine of the folder had been cracked again and again, Andino figured she had looked through the contents more than a few times. And because she was a smart woman, he knew she would have done her own research, too. Or, as much as she could by way of an internet search, probably. “I’m not going to bite you—you can sit, baby.”
Haven gave him a slightly bitter smile. “Not unless I ask, right?”
Well …
“You said it, not me.”
The slight shake of her head was all he got in response before Haven moved to sit on the couch beside him. She still kept an inch or two of space between them even as she opened the folder on her lap, and stared down at the contents. Andino leaned forward, and rested his clasped hands over his knees.
“There’s rumors that her father was arrested because he wouldn’t allow the cartel to buy his loyalty. I don’t understand.”
“He’s … or was, because he’s dead—”
“Like her mom, too,” Haven said softly.
Andino nodded. “Her mom was killed in what looked to be a car accident less than thirty days before she married the son. Her sister was killed after she took off, it seems.”
“I noticed that. And her dad was killed within a month after being married.”
“Being a politician in Mexico is a dangerous endeavor but especially when there’s major cartels who control everything. And I mean everything, Haven. That’s how cartels work. They integrate into every aspect of their country or territory that they can to control their business, and the business of those around them. Police. Government. The coffee shop down the street.”
“So, they wanted to control her father, and he wouldn’t take their … bribes?”
Andino made a noise under his breath. “I don’t think bribe would be the right word when it comes to cartels. More like … look at her mom who was killed and then shortly after, she married. Coercion and violence. Threats. That’s how they work.”
He could see that statement clearly made Haven uncomfortable, but she simply stared down at the file again and kept talking.
“Do you think she married the son of the cartel leader to help her father?”
“I would almost count on it, yeah.”
Haven flinched. “She was only fifteen, though.”
“I’m not sure if that matters to the man she married.”
“Obviously,” Haven whispered. “She had Maria when she was seventeen—she took off when she was pregnant. She told me that much.”
“I think the only way for Valeria to stay safe is to keep moving,” Andino said. “That’s just based on what I know about this particular cartel, and people who escape from them. They can’t stay in one place for very long.”
“She’d been with me for a while, though.”
“Maybe that’s why she left, then.”
Andino didn’t know if that was the case, however. He didn’t like the alternative to that option, though, considering that meant the cartel caught up with Valeria and forced her back to Mexico, and her husband.
A man who Andino suspected wasn’t a good man.
Why would a woman—a pregnant woman—run from him otherwise?
Nonetheless, Andino wasn’t done looking for Valeria Gomez yet. He simply had to be careful given the things he knew about her now. It could be dangerous for him—and her—if the cartel found someone who was actively searching for the wife of the man currently running the operation.
Given the way Haven looked right then next to him, sad and so unsure, he figured it was worth the damn risk, anyway.
“What else are you wondering?” he asked.
Haven shrugged one shoulder. “That was it, really. About Val, anyway.”
“What, you just wanted—”
“Confirmation of my suspicions, I guess. Yeah.”
Andino leaned back on the couch. “I see.”
“What did you get this information for—to leverage it against me?”
Wow.
That was a whole one-eighty there.
Andino respected Haven for having the guts to ask him, though. And considering everything that had happened between the two of them, he understood why she asked, too. Still, she was so far from the truth, it wasn’t even funny.
He stood from the couch, and readjusted the rolled up sleeves of his dress shirt. “I did it because I knew it was bothering you, and maybe I could help. That’s all. Do you want to stay for dinner, or do you have somewhere to be?”
Haven blinked up at him. “I shouldn’t stay, Andino.”
Yeah, he figured she would say that. He also didn’t plan on taking no for an answer.
“Why the hell not?”
She let out a laugh. “Because it always ends the same way.”
Andino arched a brow. “I don’t follow.”
“We fuck, Andino. We fuck, and then I leave. We fuck, and it means nothing. We fuck—that’s what we do.”
Perhaps so, but she never said no.
Hell, she initiated.
“I don’t see the problem.”
Haven gave him another one of those smiles. “Of course, you don’t.”
• • •
Haven wasn’t wrong.
It took very little time, the two of them simply working in the kitchen to make dinner, some flour tossed around, and then they found themselves trying to clean up in the bathroom, but ended up like this.
Andino backed against the cold tile of the bathroom wall, and Haven on her knees. She was quite a fucking sight down below him with his cock between her lips as she swallowed him right down to the base. There was something about her lipstick stains around his cock that made his fucking balls tight, and his spine hot.
Something about her mussed makeup, and his hands fisted in her hair. Something about the way she hummed around his shaft like the taste of his precum on her tongue was candy she couldn’t get enough of. Something about the way this woman knew how to use her lips and teeth to tease the life out of him until he was ready to blow his load, and watch her swallow every damn drop he gave her.
She was good for that.
Loved it, really.
“Fuck, yeah,” Andino grunted, his hips flexing forward in reaction to the way Haven let her teeth graze along his shaft. “Suck that dick, baby. Show me how much you love it, Haven.”
She did. In the way her eyes darkened as she watched him from her knees, and how her lips curved into an attempt of a grin.
Little tease.
She was killing him like this.
All it took was Andino’s hands tightening in Haven’s hair for her to loosen her lips around his dick. She knew what that meant, and followed along beautifully. Like this, he could fuck her mouth as fast, deep, or hard as he wanted. He could feel the way her tongue flattened against the base of his shaft, and her muscles relaxed in her throat.
Every jerk of his cock sent him closer to the edge.
Almost … almost …
“Jesus Christ,” he breathed when that edge finally came. It was swift, and unforgiving. An orgasm strong enough to make his fucking knees weaken from the intensity. Somehow, he managed to keep his eyes on Haven although he hadn’t been able to give her a warning. Not that she needed one. The woman swallowed every drop, and then licked his dick clean with one of her sly smiles. “Holy fuck.”
She was still on her knees. Still naked but for the panties and bra he hadn’t quite managed to rip off of her before she got down to suck his dick. Still red-lipped from having her mouth fucked, and still dotted with the flour he’d all but thrown at her when she left a floury handprint right on his cheek. Still a mess.
Still so beautiful.
“Still mine,” he murmured.
Haven’s eyes flashed with something unknown, but she said nothing. Andino didn’t really need her to. He was quick to pull her up from the floor.
Andino had Haven backed against the wall in the next breath, and his mouth descended on hers as his hand slipped under the waistband of her panties. She was so wet and fucking warm under his fingertips.
Slippery, needy flesh.
Fuck.
The sounds she made when his fingers stuffed inside her tight cunt, and his mouth latched onto that spot on her neck that she loved so much was raw. She always made the best sounds.
All it took was the feeling of her wet pussy clenching around his fingers, and his name in her mouth, and his semi-hard cock was at full attention once more. He needed all her sounds like he needed the air in his lungs.
And then the begging started.
“Please. Oh, my God, just fuck me, please.”
When she sounded like that—breathless and high off him—then he lost all control. His desire to make her wait left just like that.
Haven laughed in that spun way of hers when Andino yanked her away from the wall, bent her over the sink, and ripped her panties down her thighs.
“Open up and show me what’s mine.”
His dark demand was punctuated by his hand slapping against her inner thighs. She was quick to open for him—lost in a long sigh as he fitted himself between her thighs from behind, and thrust in.
One flex, that’s all it took.
He found heaven again.
Her name was Haven.
How was he supposed to just … let this go?
• • •
“Do you talk at all?” Andino asked.
Ginevra Calabrese glanced up from the unappealing salad that had been placed in front of her by a server at the restaurant. Not one of Andino’s restaurants—the place belonged to Kev. Had it been his, that shit she was supposed to eat wouldn’t be on the menu. At least, not as a single item. Who the fuck wanted to eat rabbit food with no real substance to help it go down?
“I do,” Ginevra said softly, frowning. “I’m sorry.”
Andino cocked his head to the side, surprised at her response. “Why?”
The young woman didn’t seem to know how to respond, or rather … what she was supposed to say to begin with. Andino, on the other hand, didn’t know how he was supposed to deal with a woman like this at all.
Not that he wanted to.
“Why, what?” she asked.
“Why are you apologizing to me?”
Ginevra used the fork to drag through the salad. “For not being … whatever you would like, I guess. That’s what I was told to be today—whatever you would like. And with everyone else, that usually means staying quiet and out of sight, if possible. I can’t exactly be out of your sight when I have to sit right in front of you at the table, so being quiet seemed like the way to go. Sorry if that’s not what you want.”
Andino’s anger flared as his gaze drifted from Ginevra to the men sitting a few tables away. He asked for this dinner simply because he wanted her to be comfortable with him even if the last thing he intended to do was marry the woman because he needed for her to trust him. It was her brothers, however, that demanded they be there to supervise. Thankfully, he managed to get them to do that from afar.
He truly hated those pieces of shit.
Really.
“I neither want, nor need, for you to be a piece of art beside me. Pretty, but inanimate,” he explained, shrugging when she glanced up at him. “If that’s what they expect, then that’s another story. When they are around, you can behave however they deem appropriate as to not cause yourself trouble. With me, you can be whatever you feel like in the moment.”
“Right now,” she told him, “I would prefer to be anywhere else.”
Andino smirked. “I do appreciate a woman who isn’t a liar, but for the sake of appearances, let’s at least play nice.”
“I don’t want to marry you, Andino. I don’t want to be here, and I certainly don’t want to pretend to give a damn about anything you want to talk about right now. So, if it’s okay with you, I would much prefer to sit here and occasionally nod when you talk so that you might think I give a shit. But really, we’ll both know I don’t.”
Well, then.
Damn.
Good on her for being honest. Andino appreciated that, and honestly, that was the kind of fire he wanted to see from a woman like Ginevra in the position that she was. It spoke to good things for her.
“Oh, good. Then, we’re on the same page.”
Confusion flickered across Ginevra’s face, but she opted to stay quiet. That was, frankly, the better choice for her. Andino chose not to point that out right now. It wouldn’t help his case, or his plans at the end of the day.
“Did they choose the salad for you, too?” Andino asked. “Because I wouldn’t willingly eat that without some kind of steak to weigh it down.”
The hint of a smile graced Ginevra’s lips.
Battle almost won, he thought.
“They did—heaven forbid you thought I ate too much.”
Andino made a noise in the back of his throat. “I prefer women who enjoy themselves, actually. Not that it’ll matter what I prefer from you. Some other man, perhaps, but not me. You would do well to remember that.”
She glanced up at him again.
Andino simply smiled back.
He just needed this woman to trust him. The rest would come easily after that.
• • •
“How was your dinner with the girl?”
Andino glanced up from the work on his desk to find his father leaning in the doorway of the office. Just beyond where Giovanni stood, the hustle and bustle of the restaurant continued on. Gio waited with a measured expression for his son’s reply.
“Bearable,” Andino chose to say.
Gio’s mouth quirked higher at the edge as he said, “That’s not the answer I want to hear when you’re talking about your wife-to-be.”
“Seems like a fine enough answer for me.”
“And why is that?”
Andino pushed away the work on his desk to give his father the attention Giovanni was so clearly looking for. Obviously, or his father wouldn’t be here at all. Andino was not the only one with business all over the city, and his father’s days were often busier than even his own. If Gio made a point to make time to come here and see Andino today, he did that with a purpose.
Clearly, information this time around.
Maybe for his mother, who knew?
“What do you want to know, Dad?” Andino asked. “If we talked, or if she’s happy? If she’s willing to meet Ma—frankly, she’ll do whatever she’s told because she’s terrified of what might happen if she doesn’t. What is it you want?”
Giovanni blinked. “Is she?”
“What?”
“Scared of you.”
Andino scowled. “It’s not me—it’s them.”
His father nodded once. “Her brothers, then.”
“Calling them that in reference to their relationship with Ginevra seems like a stretch considering all she is to them is a pawn, Dad. She is something for them to use to get where they want to go, and very little else. They don’t actually give a shit about her. I could be the worst kind of trash, and they wouldn’t give a single fuck about it. Okay?”
Gio didn’t bat an eye at Andino’s statement. It was almost like that was exactly what his father expected to hear, and so, it didn’t really come as a surprise.
Nothing in this life was a surprise, now.
“And none of that seems like a problem to you,” Giovanni noted.
Jesus Christ.
“Don’t mistake my apathy for a lack of empathy,” he countered. “But I also know what’s expected of me, and what I have to do.”
Or make it look like I am doing.
That, too.
“For now, that’s what matters,” Andino added.
Gio tipped his chin up a bit. “For now.”
Ah, fuck.
“Is that because your attention is still elsewhere, and you still haven’t committed yourself to the things Dante has asked of you, or no?”
Andino’s jaw clenched. “Don’t play word games. I hate that.”
“Haven Murphy. You’re still seeing her, I hear. And I only heard it because the enforcer you have trailing you at the moment thought to mention it to me the last time we spoke. You’re still playing with that fire—as much as two days ago, even. She spent the night at your place. How’s that for a word game?”
Fuck his whole entire life.
Pink was still busy elsewhere—the enforcer had to keep an eye on Siena from afar like Andino told him to do. Which meant Andino needed to have a new enforcer watch his back on a daily basis. One he didn’t particularly like, and who didn’t understand the meaning of being loyal to the person who was paying him. Instead, he was loyal to the family.
That was a problem for Andino.
He needed a lot of things from people—most importantly, he demanded their loyalty. That, and for them to be discreet about his business. Private, or otherwise.
Even if it was his father.
“Thank you for letting me know that,” Andino said darkly.
Gio frowned. “What does that mean?”
“It means I have a problem that needs to be disposed.”
“You’re going to kill the enforcer because he spoke to me?”
“Don’t be offended. It’s not about you.”
Gio chuckled. “No, it’s about you, I suppose. You’re going to make an interesting boss, son. I can already tell.”
“That is the plan, apparently.”
“Are you going to tell me what in the hell you’re doing with Haven? And Ginevra? This deal—your uncle? What is going on, Andino? At least give me the respect of telling me what kind of shit I might step into before I put my whole foot in the pile. Allow me to … well, be on your side, son. Please.”
Andino had planned to do this alone—whatever he needed to do, that was, to get what he fucking wanted. He didn’t need help. He just needed the means and the time to get shit done.
Still, as he stared at his father, he had to wonder …
Was that the right choice?
“I want her,” Andino said.
Gio dragged in a deep breath, and took a moment before he spoke again. “Haven.”
“Yes.”
“All right.”
“All right?”
Gio smirked. “If you’re going to pick a hill to die on—why not that one? Yeah, why not that fucking hill, Andino.”
Hey, at least it was a beautiful hill.