ROUGH RIDER (8 page)

He pulled away, smiling and staring at me.

“That was…exciting,” I panted. I reached down, pulling my slacks and panties back over my hips.

“That was fucking incredible,” he replied, buttoning his jeans. I picked up my torn bra from the floor and stuffed it into my pocket before pulling my blouse closed, buttoning what buttons remained.

Once I had myself put back together, I smoothed my hair, and took a deep breath.

“So, back to what we were talking about…” I bit my lip as I watched Tony pull his shirt back over his sexy frame, part of me regretting that I’d probably never see that hard body again. It’d been a really good fuck, and I wouldn’t mind doing it another time.

He took me in his arms, his blue eyes smiling down at me, and he kissed me once more, almost gently this time.

“I don’t know a fucking thing, Lauren,” he whispered, a slow grin spreading across his face.

“What!” I cried, hitting his chest. “You fucking asshole!”

“I’ve been called worse,” he said with a shrug.

“You just fucked me!” I said as anger raced through my veins.

“I sure did, baby. And you, my dear,” he said, brushing his lips against mine again, “have an exquisitely delightful and amazingly tight pussy.”

“That’s it?” I demanded. “You’ve got no other leads for me?”

“Well, I guess there is one thing I didn’t mention. I did hear that Loprinzi and the biker were spotted down the road at Norma’s Diner this morning. But that’s it. I’m sorry,” he said, pulling me into his arms. I shouldn’t have let him, but I did. I was pissed that he’d played me so hard, that was for sure. But I’d be lying if I said another part of me didn’t want to feel his cock slamming into me again.

“You can’t blame a guy for seizing an opportunity to fuck a woman as beautiful as you, can you?” he asked, with a shameless grin. “You would have done the same thing if you were me.”

“Fuck you, Tony,” I said, as I pushed him back onto the pool table and began unbuttoning his jeans again, before climbing on top of him. “This one’s for me…”

T
ime to go
to Norma’s
, I thought, as I walked out into the parking lot, my legs still a little wobbly from fucking Tony. I looked around, watching the traffic pass by and took a deep breath.

If I was going to have any kind of a story at all, I was going to have find these two and ask them more questions. My assignment was vague…to get some back story on the bikers, and while my colleagues probably meant for me to try to interview the Iron Godz, since they were the most well-known club in the area - there was lots of research done on them already, so I was beginning to think the real story was somewhere else.

And that was where ever Gabby and her biker were.

All I had to do was find them.

I glanced back at the bar on the way to my car, my pussy still wet from the second pounding Tony had given me. Honestly, I wasn’t too disappointed he didn’t know anything. His cock was fucking grand, and I hadn’t been this satisfied in quite a long time. Sure, it’d been nice if he actually had some useful information for me, but settling for cock wasn’t a bad deal, as far as I was concerned.

I’d get my information, eventually. I just had to keep moving.

D
ante
and the guys were in the kitchen arguing over what to do.

Once I saw the discussion was going in circles, I quietly backed out, leaving them alone. I motioned for Bear to join me and opened the front door to take a walk.

The afternoon sun was starting to go down, the clear blue sky pierced by the swaying trees that towered over the cabin. It was quiet, almost eerily so, with nothing but the muffled sound of the guys behind me and various songbirds breaking the silence. Bear trotted ahead of me, running around the side of the house and lifting a leg against a tree to pee. His black fur almost sparkled in the sunshine. It was beautiful, and it reminded me of being in Central Park last summer. Bella and I had gone for a picnic on her birthday, and her hair was flying all around her head in the breeze.

“You look like a horse with that mane!” I’d said to her. “The way the sun hits it makes it sparkle!”

She laughed and flipped it over her shoulder, doing her best to control it.

“Just call me the Italian Sparkle Pony!” she quipped as she struck a pose and we fell onto the blanket laughing. It wasn’t even funny, but we had a habit of laughing at even the dumbest jokes from each other. We were tight like that.

Fuck
, I thought,
I miss her
. I wondered if my dad had gotten to her yet. I was sure she’d be the first person he would talk to.

We’d been friends since third grade and inseparable ever since she saved me from getting beaten up by Alfredo Luna in the fourth. His unprovoked assaults had escalated from pinching my arm to pulling my hair and by the time he’d decided pushing me down on the playground was the best way to express his affection for me, Bella stepped up and slammed the heel of her brand new pink cowboy boot right on his toe.

I declared her my best friend then, and her loyalty had never wavered.

Now, I felt bad for not telling her that I’d planned to go to Otto’s. But at this point, it didn’t matter. I just hoped my dad wasn’t grilling her too hard, because she didn’t know anything more than what was on the news.

I went to Otto’s.

There was a fight.

I killed someone.

I killed someone.

That very fact was finally beginning to dawn on me and a chill ran through my veins. Part of me hoped it wasn’t true, that somehow there’d been a mistake. But if there was video, how could it be a mistake?

I’d grown up around violence. Or, rather, with the knowledge of violence being close. But rarely was it something I witnessed first hand. That’s why I was frozen in shock outside the tent at the carnival. I’d never seen anything like that before. Men pulling guns on each other. My father, perfectly willing and ready to shoot another man.

I never found out what truly happened that night, but there’d been rumors, of course. Paulie Paradiso was found dead inside the tent, and nobody was ever accused of his murder. I’d kept my mouth shut, and apparently, Dante had too.

I’d never forgotten that day and I never told my dad what I saw. But he’d been there, doing whatever Giannetti asked him too. Always loyal, always willing to drop whatever he was doing to please The Boss.

And now he was The Boss. The Don. All his hard work had paid off for him.

Unfortunately, his family had suffered. Oh, I don’t mean suffered like third-world suffering or anything. My brothers and I had everything we could ever want. We were never hungry, we were never cold, we were never neglected, in the physical sense of the word.

But we were neglected of our father’s attention. Giannetti got that instead. He was his teacher, his mentor, so much more than his boss. He demanded constant respect from all his men and he received it.

Now, my father demanded that same respect. It was a different era; life as a Dom in New York was a whole different lifestyle now, but the basics were still the same. He ran things. He made sure things kept running.

When people needed him, he was there.

Just like Dante had been there that day so many years ago. If he hadn’t come along and thrown me out of the path of gunfire, my life would have ended that day. I shuddered to think of it now.

I couldn’t believe it was him. I’d never forgotten him. And now, all these years later, he’s back? Basically barreling into my life in the same exact way. His eyes, his smell, his face had haunted me for years.

Despite my best efforts, I’d never seen him around the neighborhood again after that day. An hour after my father showed up, and amidst all the chaos after Paradiso’s death, I found another moment to sneak off to look for him but I’d never found him again.

I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about him often over the years. In fact, his memory eventually turned into my first real childhood crush. I’d always hoped I’d see him again someday, but as they years passed, I’d pretty much given up on it actually happening.

And now here he was. No longer a young boy, but a man.

A breathtakingly sexy, gentle, sweet, funny man that I couldn’t keep my hands off of.

I’d never in a million years expected things to turn out like this.

Bear finished his business and kept walking around the back of the cabin. I followed him, grateful for the moment alone with my thoughts. Now that I knew Dante was the boy from the carnival, my thoughts had been in a tailspin.

I needed to sort them out. I needed to come up with a way to convince Dante that my father really would be able to get us out of this. Maybe I wasn’t completely confident of that fact myself, especially now that the police were involved, but if anyone could pull off that kind of miracle, it would be Leo Loprinzi.

All I needed to do was get to him somehow. I hated being dependent on Dante. Once again, I wished I knew how to ride one of those bikes out front. More than that, I wished for my own car. I groaned when I thought about some smelly tow truck driver sitting in my pristine leather seats.

I rounded the corner and ran smack into a shiny black truck hidden behind the house.

“What the hell! You bastard!” I yelled, startling Bear. I turned on my heel, anger shooting through my veins, shocked with disappointment that this fucking truck had been here all along and Dante had never mentioned it.

I flew through the front door, and the boys parted like the sea as I strode angrily up to Dante as he stood in the kitchen.

“Give me the keys!” I demanded.

“The keys to what?” he asked, his eyebrows wrinkling.

“The truck! You never told me you had a fucking truck!”

“The truck? You never asked if I had a truck…” he replied, his dark eyes filling with confusion.

“You knew I was stranded here! You knew I couldn’t ride a bike, I couldn’t just leave on my own. You knew I felt dependent upon you!”

“Gabby, what the hell are you talking about?”

“You! You won’t let me leave!” Tears welled up in my eyes and I felt everyone staring at me.

“I’m not forcing you to stay, Gabby.” I stared up at him, and was taken aback at the gentleness I saw there as a twinge of pain threaded through his voice. “I would never just fucking kidnap you and hold you against your will like that. I don’t know who you think I am, but I’m not that fucking kind of man.”

He turned to the guys.

“Can you give us a few minutes alone?” he asked, which was promptly followed by awkward silence and muttering until they had all shuffled out, leaving us alone in the kitchen.

Dante pulled a set of keys from his pocket and slid them across the kitchen counter towards me. I grabbed them quickly and shoved them into my pocket.

“You’re free to go, Gabby. But I need you to listen to me first. I know you think your dad can make everything magically disappear and maybe he can with the cops. Maybe he’s in bed with all sorts of people, judges, politicians, whatever. Maybe he can make the charges disappear, I’m not disputing that. But here’s what I know for sure. I know the Iron Godz aren’t going to just go away. They don’t forgive and forget, no matter what. They aren’t going to just replace their members and go about business as usual, just because of who you are. Men like that don’t give one fuck about the mob. They aren’t afraid of your father. They aren’t afraid of the consequences. They live to protect each other, to avenge each other’s deaths.”

He walked around the counter, closing the distance between us and peering into my eyes.

“That’s why I want you to stay here. I would have told you about my truck if you’d asked. I wasn’t trying to keep anything from you. I’m just trying to protect you. Now, I don’t know what might happen if you take off on your own. You might be just fine. But most likely, there are lots of people out looking for you right this very second and some of those people are bad, Gabby. Not for nuttin', but they’d wouldn’t hesitate to hurt you, babe.” His eyes flashed with concern, and my heart melted. “I don’t know what I’d do if someone hurt you.”

Of course he wasn’t trying to keep me here. It all made sense now. I felt like an ass for assuming otherwise, for accusing him of doing something like that. He was a good man.

“We’re in this together, Gabby. For better or worse. It’s best if we stick together. You can go if you want, but I really wish you’d stay. I can’t protect you if you leave.”

“Dante, I’m sorry, I just —,” he put a finger up to my lips, silencing me. A slow grin spread across his face and he brought his lips to mine, kissing me so slowly, so gently, it almost hurt. I sighed, leaning into him, leaning into his warmth, his protective arms wrapping around me.

“No apologies needed,” he whispered, as he pulled me into his chest. “I get it. Trust me, I totally understand.”

We stood there for a moment, breathing in each other’s warmth, his comfort seeping into me. I’d never felt like I needed anyone in my life, but suddenly, in that moment, in his gentle arms, I felt like I needed him.

“I have a plan,” he said and I nodded in agreement. “You just have to be patient. And you have to trust me.”

Trust and dependence. Two things I was totally unfamiliar with. I sighed, trying to find a way to let my walls down just a little. If anyone in the world deserved my trust at this point, it was him.

“Do you trust me, babe? Can you trust me?” he asked quietly. I pulled back, looking up into his eyes again and smiled through my tears, nodding.

“I can try,” I whispered.

“Good,” he said, leaning down to kiss me gently again. “I promise I’ll never let you down, sweetheart.”