Wrong (Spada Crime Family #2) (2 page)

Rather than letting her go, I pull her a little closer. “They’re just thoughts. Thoughts don’t hurt anyone.”

I feel her relaxing against me. “Maybe you should think about something else.”

“Probably.” I swing her around, give her a little dip, and grin. The playfulness of it seems to defuse her suspicions a little. She’s enchanting. Why in the world is she stuck with Sal?

Somebody should do something about that. And, I decide, that somebody should be me.

“You should run away with me,” I tell her.

She laughs. It’s got a nervous edge to it. “I can’t do that.”

“Sure you can. Let’s go. Right now. I’ll take you home with me.”

“Why would you even want to do that?”

I can’t quite read her voice. It’s the tiniest bit shaky. Is she afraid? Excited? Then her eyes cut to one side and I realize she’s looking for Sal. And she’s afraid. Of him, not of what I’m suggesting to her. Something twists in my chest.

I keep my voice light, though. Teasing. It’s just a game. So far, anyway. “I like you.” It’s true enough.

“You barely know me.”

Also true.

“Do I need to know anything more than that you turn me on?”

She tosses her head in a movement that would have tossed her hair behind her back if it wasn’t in that fancy updo. “Well.” Her voice is tight now. She’s chastising me. I like it. “It’d be nice, don’t you think, to know you have something in common with the person you’re planning to carry home to your caveman cave?”

I just laugh. I wonder if she’s this sassy with Sal. Probably not. I can’t picture Sal putting up with it. Honestly that just makes me sad. A woman with this kind of spunk ought to be allowed to show it.

My smile fades, and I lift a hand to stroke her face, run the tips of my fingers along the hair that’s pulled back along her head. “You in love with Sal?”

Her lips thin. “Sure.”

Of course she isn’t. A woman like this wouldn’t be in love with Sal. I’m not convinced anybody loves Sal, not even his mama. I give a sigh and tilt my head back, laying it on thick. “I wish I could find a nice girl like you, settle down, maybe have some kids. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

I’m just putting on a show for her, I tell myself, but the words hit a little too close to home even as I’m saying them. It
would
be nice to have someone like her waiting for me at home. A regular, everyday woman instead of the once-in-a-while girls I’ve satisfied myself with in the past. Or, worse, the only-for-a-night girls, many of whom collect their fee off the dresser before they slip out the next morning. And yeah. Married, with kids—I’d like that someday. No, not someday. Soon.

God, what’s wrong with me? I shake my head at myself.

“How soon?” Sarah asks, and it takes me a second to remember what we were talking about.

“You mean for the settling down and kid-having?” I ask.

“Yeah. That.”

“I don’t know. In a year or two, maybe?”

“So you’ve got the lady all picked out? You’re engaged, maybe?”

I shake my head. “No. Nobody picked out.”

She’s still looking right into my eyes. It looks for all the world like she might be warming up to me a little. “That’s an awfully tight time frame, then. You sure you can pull it off?”

I lean close to her, whispering again into her ear. “I can pull anything off, baby. That’s what I do. So what do you think?”

She stiffens suddenly in my half embrace, and for a second I’m sure I’ve offended her. She’s going to push me away and head off the dance floor, and take along with her any chance I have of cutting Sal off at the knees. But that’s not what’s going on.

Her body jerks away from mine, and not of her own volition. I look away from Sarah’s face to see Sal looming over us, his mouth twisted into an ugly snarl.

“The fuck you think you’re doing with this guy, Sarah?” he asks her, half spitting it. “I told you to wait at the bar.”

“We were just dancing,” Sarah says.

“Yeah, well, you dance with me, not with this piece of shit.” He yanks at her arm. “C’mon.”

“Sal, lay off,” I tell him, my voice almost a snarl. It’s not my business what he does with his woman, I know, but the way he’s jerking her around is pissing me off. There’s something about her…something more than just beauty and soft skin and that body, which I’d like to get hot and naked right up next to me in bed. I don’t know what it is. Not sure I want to know. But I do know I don’t like seeing Sal treat her like that.

Sal gets up in my face now. “Don’t you tell me what to do with my woman, Angelino,” he snarls. Then he looks back at Sarah, shaking her arm. “You been cozying up to this asshole, you stupid little slut?”

“Sal…” she starts, but I’ve had enough. I crowd Sal toward the edge of the dance floor, looking down my nose at him.

“You want me to give you a lesson in manners, you motherfucking little—”

“Nicholas.” The voice breaks me off immediately, mostly because I recognize it, and partly because I’ve been trained the last few years to respond to it automatically. I turn, backing down from my confrontation with Sal.

“Mr. Spada.”

Phil Spada is standing right behind me, a bland smile on his bland face. “I haven’t seen you in a while,” he tells me, and sets a hand on my shoulder. “Why don’t you come on over to the bar? Let me get you a drink. We can catch up.”

I give Sal one last glare, but I can’t exactly put my fist in his face with Spada standing right here. “Sure, Mr. Spada.”

I go with him. There’s a stab of damn near physical pain in the middle of my chest at leaving Sarah alone with that asshole, but I go with him.

She’s used to him. She knows how to deal with him. She’ll be all right.
The words repeat in my head, and I know they’re probably true, but I can’t convince myself to believe them.

Spada drops an arm over my shoulders, steering me toward the bar. “Enjoying the party, Nick? You win anything? Blackjack? Slots?”

“No, sir. Nothing. Yet.”

“Ah, that’s too bad. I told them to ease up on us tonight, let some of my boys take a few bills home.”

I shrug. “I’m just not lucky tonight, I guess.”

He scoots up to the bar and takes a stool. I sit next to him. “Happens to the best of us,” he offers as condolence, and waves down the bartender. A few seconds later I’ve got a tumbler with a finger of fifty-year-old Glenfiddich single malt in my hand. Spada swirls his in his glass, takes a careful sniff, then a sip. Then he lifts his glass, inviting a toast.

I answer, tapping my glass against his. “To your dad,” Spada says, catching me off guard. I mumble a response and take a drink of the whisky. It’s so smooth that I can barely tell when I swallow it.

“I was truly sorry to hear about your father,” Spada goes on. I nod, trying to seem gracious even though this is the last thing I want to talk about right now.

“Thanks. It’s been a rough time for the family.”

“I’m sorry I wasn’t able to attend the funeral. I had a previous engagement last weekend.”

I nod, not sure what to say. As many condolences as I’ve accepted over the last two weeks, I’m still not sure how to respond to them. “Thanks.”

“Cancer, was it?”

I nod again. “He was sick for a while.”

Spada shakes his head. “Fucking awful disease. Can’t just take your life—it has to take all your dignity, too.” He takes another drink from the tumbler then lifts it for another, wordless toast. I tap my glass against his, take another sip. It seems like a waste to drink this stuff too fast. “Damn shame,” he finishes, shaking his head.

I can’t tell if he’s serious or just saying what he thinks I want to hear. “Yes,” I say. “He was a good man.”

“That he was.”

There’s a moment of awkward silence; I take another sip of the scotch.

I’m not sure if it’s the movement I see out of the corner of my eye, or if my ears somehow manage to pick up the sound of Sarah’s voice, but I turn quickly, just in time to see Sal backhand her. She flinches, taking a step back. Instantly I start to move toward her. No fucking way I’m letting him get away with that shit. That’s no way to treat a woman—

“Let it go.” Spada’s hand on my arm stops me. I try to jerk away from him, but his fingers tighten, hard enough to leave bruises.

“You’re kidding me,” I grit out.

He gives me a look of quiet tolerance, like I’m a three-year-old throwing a tantrum in the middle of a Walmart. “Nick. Nick, I know you want to jump to her rescue, but it’s not your business. You don’t tell a man how to deal with his woman.”

I look back toward where Sal and Sarah are standing, my teeth clenched so hard it aches into my temples. She has the back of her hand pressed against her mouth, and Sal is still up in her face, his mouth twisted and ugly as he spits words at her. Spada’s hand loosens slightly on mine and then tightens again when I move closer.

“Seriously? You let him act like that here in front of everybody? Wives? Girlfriends? Daughters? You’re gonna stand here and let him do that like it’s okay?”

Spada glances toward the two of them. I can see his eyes tighten just a bit in response, like maybe deep down somewhere, Sal’s actions do have an effect on him. Then I remember seeing Sal’s wife, back in the day, one time when she had on too much makeup and it still didn’t cover the dark blotch under her eye. And in that moment I want to backhand Sal himself, or pull out a gun and pop him one between the eyes.

I don’t have a gun, though, which is probably fortunate for both of us. Spada drags his gaze back to me and says in a low voice, “Sal brings in good money. He’s one of my top earners, and he deals with things.” He turns back toward the bar. “He can do whatever he wants.”

I clench my teeth again. This time I hold back the words that want to come out. They won’t do any of us any good. Instead I just nod and down the rest of the scotch. I don’t dare turn to see what’s up with Sarah; if Sal’s hitting her again I won’t be able to control myself this time, no matter what Spada has to say about it.

There’s a faint sound, and Spada pulls his phone out of his pocket. It’s ringing, a snippet of some old Sinatra song playing on repeat as the ringtone. I shake my head a little. Sinatra. Stereotypical much? But Spada’s never really been known for having an innovative mind.

“Right now?” he says into the phone. Then he grunts. “Fine.” He puts the phone back in his pocket and finishes his tumbler of scotch.

“You have a good evening, Nick,” he tells me. He pats my shoulder and moves away, across the room.

I want more than anything to turn around and see what’s going on with Sarah. But if I do, and Sal’s still hitting her, or even still in her face and screaming at her, I’ll probably do something I’ll regret. Well, not precisely regret, but something Spada won’t approve of. And things Spada doesn’t approve of aren’t going to get me where I want to be in this organization.

What will, though? I don’t see much in the way of viable tactics to get Sal out of his most favored status. Why Spada likes him so much, I have no idea, but I suspect it’s to do with Sal’s ruthlessness. Carmine Romano was the same way. Not a lick of softness in him.

I’m that way, too. Or I was. Lately I’m not sure anymore. Too much has happened, and I’m starting to see my life like I’ve wasted big chunks of it already. What could I do to change that? What could get me on track toward something closer to a normal life?

I shake my head, trying to jostle those thoughts away. The scotch is starting to burn hot in my stomach, and that heat is moving toward my groin. I should just take one of these girls home and fuck the melancholy out of myself.

No, I should take Sarah home. She’s the only one I really want right now. The truth of that hits home hard.

I turn away from the bar and back toward where Sal and Sarah were standing just a few minutes ago. But she’s not there. Neither of them is. Where the hell did they go? I think about going after them, but how can I do that if I don’t know which way they headed?

Dammit. I don’t want her with Sal right now, not when the last thing I saw was him hitting her. I want her with me. My dick perks up at the thought, but the truth of the matter is I want her for more than just a good fuck. I want her for…well, for
her
.

And I don’t know what the hell has come over me tonight. Sure, I could make Sal look like an idiot by sneaking in under his radar and stealing his girl. But I don’t just want to piss him off. I just want
her
.

Forget it, Nick. Forget her. Just find somebody else for the night.
It would be the easiest way out of this mess. I could go back to the blackjack table and see when the dealer’s heading home. She’s my type—pretty, trained to behave herself, used to the way things go down in the family. But I can’t stop thinking about Sarah. The way she felt against me when we were dancing. The way her hair smelled against my face.

She’s going to be mine. No matter what I have to do, Sarah is going to be mine.

Chapter Two

Sarah

I’d enjoy the smell of the spaghetti sauce I’ve got cooking if I didn’t know it was going to go onto Sal’s plate. That is, if he ever gets his ass home to eat dinner. I haven’t seen him since the party last night, when he dragged me out, shoved me into a car, and sent me home. He didn’t get into the car with me, and he didn’t come home last night. I know damn well where he is, too. Out with one of his
comares
, one of his stable of mistresses who don’t live at his house. I guess I should feel privileged that I get to share his living space. Somehow I really don’t.

I don’t even want to think about last night’s party. I swear I can still feel the marks on my face where he backhanded me. All because he didn’t like it that I was dancing with Nick. It’s bad enough he treats me like that at home; having him smack me around in front of everybody who was at that party—all the men in Spada’s little crime family, all their wives and girlfriends, all the people employed to run the casino while we had our little shindig. I want to cry just thinking about it.

Your own fault, Sarah.
My brain likes to remind me of the way things really are. And it’s right—it is my own fault. I should never have let myself get into this position. But I hadn’t seen another choice at the time.