His Mafia Princess (Family First #1) (4 page)

Chapter Eight

“Do you all understand what I need you to do?” Gregorio asked the men standing or sitting in the clubhouse adjacent to the strip club they had all spent some time in blowing off steam.

“Yes, sir,” Snake said as he cleaned one of the knives he always had on his body. “I’m taking my boys, and I’m going to flush this fucker out by killing off his men.” He looked up at Gregorio and smiled. “I get the fun job.”

“Just don’t get caught. Most of the cops are on our payroll, but there are some fucking do-gooders out there that will get pissy if you are caught. We have the Chief of Police in our pocket and most of the judges, but there are one or two we don’t have,” Gregorio said and then looked to Tony. “You are going to plaster yourself to Alessandra’s side. Giovanni already knows I want you as close to her as her shadow. You’re to protect her from everything. Got it?”

“You know I will boss.” Tony bowed his head in respect. “She’s going to be yours. I get it. I will make sure she comes out of this without a scratch to her. Well, any more than she has now.” They had all seen what the rope did to her skin, and it made more than one of them pissed off and ready to kill for it.

Gregorio had to take a moment and breathed deeply. Alessandra was one of those rare women that women wanted to be friends with, and men wanted to love and protect. She was kind, gentle, and sexy as hell. Add to it that the woman was smarter than most of the men around her. She was the full package, and they all knew it. She had the loyalty of all of the men under her father far more than he did.

Jerking out of his own thoughts, he shook his head and looked at Jack. “You’re going to go back to the Russian’s house and find out how they got out. It might give us an indication of where they are now since there has been no chatter and not even a fucking sighting of them. I want those fuckers found. If you happen to find a Russian that’s part of that Family bring them back here. We will persuade him to speak to us.”

“You got it, Boss,” Jack said and nodded.

Gregorio gave the others their marching orders. Once that was done, he stepped outside of the club and looked up at the skies. Darkness had fallen. It was time to get to work. He got onto his bike and took off with several vehicles following him. He had shit to do as well.

****

Two hours later, Gregorio turned to the man on his knees before him and asked again, “Where is Vasily?”

“I don’t know.” The words came out as a slight gurgle from the blood that the man’s mouth and throat.

Gregorio punched him once more and asked the question again. “I can go all night, Ivan, and you know it. You’ve run across me twice and barely got away both times. You only did because you sent others to be killed in your place. This is the third time, and you know what that means. You won’t be getting away again.”

“Fuck you, pretty boy,” the Russian said with a bloody grin on his face. “I liked touching that bitch we removed from her father’s clutches. She’s all woman, her body filled out like a woman’s body should be. Her sweet little cunt was shaved bare and smelled so fucking good.”

Gregorio saw red. “What. Did. You. Say?” Each word was forced out of his mouth.

“I had a little fun while transporting her. I have pictures too. They should be going onto the internet anytime now.”

For the first time in his thirty-three years, Gregorio lost control. He began to beat the man, his fist pounding the man’s face over and over again. Teeth were pushed into the back of the man’s throat, and his eyes were popped like bubbles from the beating. He stomped on the man’s head with his size sixteen shit kickers when he let him go.

He was pulled back and turned to hit whoever stopped him from making the fucker at his feet into goo. He punched the man who dared to stop him and blocked a fist to his gut. It took Gregorio a moment to realize he was fighting Tony. “Shit. I’m sorry man.” He ran his hands through his hair, blood coating his blond locks, but he was uncaring of it. “Get Ned. I want those images found and destroyed.” Ned was the best hacker out there, and he was all theirs. “Fucking bastard. He had to have known that would set me off.” It seemed anything that had to do with Alessandra set him off. 

“Will do.”

Greg looked at his best friend, a man who was every bit as large as he was but the complete opposite in color. Where Greg was fair like his Norse mother, Tony was a deep chocolate brown like his mother was. Tony’s momma was a priestess of Voodoo. She had held back who Tony’s father was until the day
the bones told her to tell him.
This was something Tony was still working to forgive her for since his father died less than a week after he came looking for him.

“We will ensure she’s protected. We all know what she means to you, and it's more than taking over her daddy’s business. She’s the only woman I have ever seen you have these emotions for. When you picked her up from that basement, I could see the pain in your eyes. I’ve known you for a very long time now, since I came to be here with my father twenty-five years ago, and we’ve been through a shitload together. Your family took me in when pops died, and we’ve been like brothers. Since she turned sixteen, I’ve seen you drooling over her. You fucking killed a man for jacking off to her when she was undressing in the pool house. You’re different with her than any-fucking-body else in this world. It’s not a bad thing. I’m just letting you know I see it. She’s important, and we will make sure she stays safe. Period. Now, enough about these emotions, let’s go and drink. I think we both need to get our minds off shit while Ned takes care of getting those images off the net.”

They had just drunk while they were in the Club, but Tony was right. Right now he needed to just forget, if only for a moment, what the man had said. As badly as he needed a fuck to keep himself from marching up to Alessandra’s room and taking her then and there, he wouldn’t and couldn’t do that to her. With what they had just found out, it was something Gregorio was fighting, hard.

“Something that’s bothering me,” Tony said while watching Greg clean off his shoes. “Why didn’t the boss come along with us to get his daughter?”

“The man hasn’t been in the field, in a fight, since his wife was killed. He’s soft and weak. I will never let myself become those two things.” Greg vowed this to himself. Yes, he wanted Alessandra. He felt uncomfortable and unknown things for her, but he wouldn’t become soft because of her. It would get both of them killed.

“Huh. So who are you going to assign as her guard now? Since her guards were killed at the country club? Who can you trust with her life?”

“There are only two men I trust and one implicitly. Those two are us, and the one is me. No offense, brother, but I’m more invested in her than you are.”

Tony laughed. “You are damn right you are. She’s cute, but she’s not my type.”

Greg understood that. Tony loved a little blonde woman. He fucked dark women, and dark haired women, but the woman he wanted was fair of complexion, and she had hair as white as the snow. Not from age, just a strange characteristic of her birth. “Speaking of, how is Renee? Have you heard anything more?”

“No, and it's killing me. I can’t even find her now.”

“What do you mean?” Gregorio looked at his friend now and frowned. “She couldn’t disappear.”

“Well, she did. We fucked.” Tony paused and got a strange look on his face. Greg was going to ask about it when Tony continued to speak. “We did things I never thought of doing with a woman, and then I left that morning for our Tuesday meet with the guys at the Club. When I came back, she was gone. I fucked her without a condom. I’ve never done that, Greg. You know that.”

“Have you asked Ned to find her?”

“I have, and it's been five weeks with nothing.”

“Was she a narc?” Gregorio immediately thought the worst. Fucking cops used women all the time to try to get information from the men. The ones who wanted to survive in this life didn’t speak. The younger ones, the newer ones, shot their mouths off and ended up tied to a rock and tossed into the ocean with their bellies cut open to attract the sharks.

“No. She’s not a cop. She’s something softer. She’s unique. I don’t know who she really is, but I’m going to find out. Someway and somehow. In fact, I’ve sent a glass she touched to our contact inside the forensics lab.”

“Good. Pull whatever strings you need. Find her. Find her so you can be sure she’s not a cop. I know you trust her, but we have to think of the Family. We have to be sure.”

“I know, Boss. I will make sure she’s not a cop. If she is, then I will kill her myself.”

Greg just looked at Tony. He knew Tony wouldn’t kill her. She was under his skin. Greg had never seen Tony like this with any woman before in his life. It was likely how Tony saw Greg with Alessandra. That’s why Gregorio knew that if the woman were a cop, he would have to take care of her and not Tony. Just as Greg knew that if Alessandra were a narc someone else would have to take her out because she was the one person in the entire world he would never be able to harm in any way.

“Enough talk about women. Let’s get on to business. Do you know if there are any more men willing to join us?” Greg asked his second.

“The bikers are all with you, most of the original Family is with you as well. The only questionable ones are those directly related to the old man, but we know that will change when you take Alessandra as your bride and he steps away.”

“And there aren’t that many of them because he wouldn’t allow them to live. Too much competition.” Greg grumbled. “Family is what makes us so strong.”

“That’s the truth. The family of blood, a family of choice.” Tony echoed Greg’s words.

“Now that I have Alessandra safe it's time to get started, especially with the two larger biker gangs being here as well.”

“You took her home?”

“Yes, for now. It’s time for me to take over. It’s been shown how weak he is and with the Russian’s trying to hurt Alessandra it’s time for me to step into his shoes. I will ensure she’s kept safe and our businesses are never affected by those fuckers again.”

“How will she take it?”

“It doesn’t matter. I am her future. I think she realizes this, but I’m also going to try to do this right. For her.”

“How so?”

Gregorio sighed and looked at his long-time friend. “I’m going to tell her father he has to step down, that it’s time for me to take over. It’s been coming for a while. He’s been grooming me, and he has known it.”

“Are you going to ask her to marry you?”

“I suppose I should ask her, shouldn’t I? I’ve asked her father; I should ask her as well.”

“Yeah, might be a good idea.” Tony was laughing as he spoke his next words. “I wish you luck my friend, because I have a feeling Alessandra is a bit of a fighter. She’s just never had to use it.”

Gregorio grinned. “I hope she is. I look forward to taking her virginity.”

“Do you think she’s still a virgin? Isn’t that a little archaic of you to expect her to be a virgin and you aren’t?”

“No, not at all. And yes, I know she is. I’ve ensured that every little bastard that has come sniffing around her ran for his fucking life. She’s been mine since she was twelve years old and looked at me with those wide eyes of hers.”

“I know you lost your shit on one of the guys because he dared to mention something about how good she looked in her bikini a shitload of years ago.”

“He deserved to die. Fucker shouldn’t have looked at her. She was too young for anyone to ogle.”

“You sure as hell were.”

Gregorio growled. “She’s been mine always. Don’t fucking forget it.” He looked down and realized he had pulled his knife and pressed it to Tony’s inner thigh. Shaking his head, he put it back onto its case and said, “Do not tease or press me when it comes to her. It seems I have no humor on the topic.”

Tony nodded. “I understand. I feel the same for Renee.”

“Exactly.” Gregorio nodded. He ran his hands through his hair and looked across the expanse before them. “Call our men. Meet me at the mansion in two hours. It’s time to start.”

“Two hours?” Tony asked.

“Yes, I need to ensure Alessandra is still safe.”

“Two hours then.”

Without another word both men walked away from each other, both on their own missions.

Chapter Nine

Alessandra couldn’t believe it. Her father was someone she didn’t recognize if Vasily was to be believed. He was a monster of a man that had destroyed lives without compunction. He had killed far more people than her mind could wrap around. She was simply stunned she hadn’t seen what so many had. She hadn’t seen that part of her father, and she didn’t know if she was glad to have never had that part of him around her or if she felt somehow cheated of the truth.

She looked up when she heard someone at the door. Wiping her face with shaking hands, she called for whoever it was to enter. She watched the door open and shifted in her bed slightly.

“Alessandra?” Oh god, she knew that voice. Before he even pushed the door fully open she knew who was on the other side of the door. It was the man she had been dreaming of for far too long. It was Gregorio. When he stepped into her room and closed the door quietly behind him, she could only watch him.

He was powerful. Every inch of his body was tightly coiled muscle, but he was more than that. Gregorio was handsome, even with the scar that raced down his cheek from forehead to chin. He radiated confidence and now that she knew what her father was and the part Gregorio played in that life, she realized he was also beyond dangerous.

“I wanted to see how you were doing,” he said as he approached her bed. He looked down at her feet and the wrappings she still wore.

“I’m alive, thanks to you.” She shifted slightly and gave him room to sit on her bed if he wanted to. “You can sit,” she said softly.

“Thank you.” He took a seat on the foot of her bed. She was shocked when he placed his large hands on her ankles and pulled her feet into his lap. “I’m so sorry I didn’t get there sooner.” He spoke quietly as he began to lightly massage her feet.

She felt the shock at the feeling of his fingers as they lightly stroked her toes. She watched him carefully. “You’ve never came to my bedroom. What’s changed?”

“Everything.” He was a massive man, but when he talked to her he spoke as if he were the most considerate man around, even though she knew he wasn’t. “There are changes that will be happening in the coming days, Alessandra. I need you to know I will do everything in my power to ensure you are not harmed along the way.” He moved his hands up away from her foot to her ankles and then the back of her calves. He stroked her calves rhythmically and watched her.

“What’s going to be changing?” She was intoxicated by his very nearness. Everything he was doing right now was going to her very core, her center. It was making her wet and eager for his hands to slide farther up her body.

“Everything, Bella Mia.” She noticed he let his hand slide to the back of her knee and then down to her ankles again.

“That’s very broad. Can you bring it down any?” Oh god was that her voice that came out all breathy and husky? Holy balls, it
had
been her talking. Good grief the way this man affected her was incredible.

She watched as Gregorio smiled and had to chew her lower lip to keep from reaching out to touch him as well.

When he moved a hand from her legs to brush at the sides of her lips she was surprised. “Don’t chew your lips, Bella. The last thing you want is to have them hurting as well. I can’t stand the thought of you hurting, even if it is self-inflicted so please, for me?”

Wow, she couldn’t have been more surprised if he had suddenly sprouted wings and a horn. “Why?” She tilted her head slightly so his hand cupped her cheek.

“Oh, Bella Mia, that is not the question to ask me right now. I’m trying very hard to be good.” Gregorio had shifted and moved so he was sitting at her hip instead of at her feet.

She placed her hand on his knee, the expensive silk slacks soft under her hand. “Why?” She repeated her earlier question, because she truly wanted the answer to that question. She was desperate for it actually.

His hand moved down her cheek and to her neck. She was shocked to her very core when with an almost pain filled growl, he pulled her close and kissed her. No, it was more than a kiss, it was a possession.

Alessandra shifted so she could move closer to him. Her hands moved to wrap around his shoulders, and she molded her body as close to him as she could get. His kiss was so much more than a kiss. It was a possession, pure and simple. When he laid her back on her pillows and rose to his elbows above her, she wasn’t certain who was fighting for control more, him or the passionate desire she saw burning in his eyes.

“The things you do to me.” He spoke very quietly, his lips brushing over hers once more.

“The things you do to me.” She parroted his words back to him because she meant them. He made her whole body ache for more. He made her realize she was a twenty-one-year-old virgin, and he was a very viral and sexy man of thirty-three.

He ran his thumb over her lower lip that was now kiss swollen and then once again brushed his lips to hers in the lightest of touches. “I came in to ensure you were okay, not to molest you.”

“If I asked you to do more than make sure I’m okay?” She had one hand on his shoulder and the other over his heart.

“If only I could right now, Bella.” He did however lean down and kissed her again. This kiss was different. The other had been passionate and consuming, but this one was more. This kiss was like he was branding her as his. This kiss was rough and almost angry. It was him ensuring she knew just who was in charge at the moment, and it certainly wasn’t her. “I will be back. Two days, Alessandra. You have two days to heal. When I come back for you I won’t accept no for an answer.”

“I don’t think I could tell you no if I wanted to,” Alessandra confessed with her eyes locked with his.

“Good.” He leaned down, nibbling along her jaw to her ear. “I have business to deal with; I have your father to deal with. Stay here for me. Stay safe for me.”

“Okay.” She rubbed her cheek to his. She breathed in the scent that was all Gregorio and then pulled back. “I will wait for you.”

The smile he gave her promised of a great many things. “I’m not an easy man, Alessandra. I’ve done things. I’m not a good man. You deserve better, but I would kill anyone that dared try to take you from me.”

“And if I want you?” He said she deserved better, but she knew he was the best. He was the man she had wanted for a very long time.

“You have me.” He gave her another kiss. When he stood, she watched him in fascination as he practically fought with himself to leave her. “Two days,” he said gruffly and then walked out of her bedroom. He left her laying there with a smile on her face and her body aching for more.

“Two days.” She looked toward the door and sighed. She was so screwed. She had lost her heart to a man her father readily told her was technically a bad man, but she couldn’t seem to care. To her he was always kind, soft, and generous. He had been important to her for far longer than she could ever confess to her father. To her Gregorio had been the one and only man she had wanted since the first day she saw him enter her family home looking so pissed off and tough.

With a smile on her lips, she turned onto her side and pressed the remote for her lights. When the room was dark, she closed her eyes to dream of the large man with the light blue eyes, blond hair, and mysterious scar running down his cheek.