Pretty Lies, page 23
“Yeesh,” Cory whistled as Luis blinked up at the darkness all around him. Other than the strobe light at the other end of the warehouse—he found keeping one in places he liked to work sometimes served him well for many reasons—everything else was bathed in black around the man on the cold cement floor. “Look at you, yeah?”
Pain was a motherfucker.
Luis groaned when the stiff bones and blooming bruises on his body wouldn’t allow him to do anything more than roll to his side. Which put the asshole right in view for Cory in the darkness and how he stood directly in the path of the strobe light. The man’s gaze lifted at the same time Cory grinned. Pulling down the skull bandana down from his face, he lifted the burning blunt to his lips and took a hard pull.
The smoke blinked in and out of the darkness.
Black and white.
“Fuck you,” Luis grunted out through bloodstained, chapped lips. His arms wrapped around his middle as he coughed out a painful rattle. “Oh my—”
Yeah, that pain was wicked.
“Joe broke all your ribs,” Cory explained.
From the back of the warehouse where Joe sat alone in the darkness, the man called out, “Wasn’t a problem—took barely any effort at all.”
Luis looked like he was going to say something or try. Cory really didn’t care to let the man even make the attempt when it wouldn’t matter. What was it? More cursing? Threats? Insults? None of that shit changed anything now.
Look at him. The guy was already dead. Basically.
It was kind of sad.
Cory wasn’t the type to play with his prey. Joe did, though. Hence the ribs and everything else.
“I had a trip in the jacket,” Cory explained. “I knew the second you took it off the hook. You’re just that petty. She wouldn’t be enough, you wanted to really fuck with me because you thought I honestly cared about that piece of trash you’re wearing. A long time ago, maybe. From my position, it doesn’t look too good to be wearing it right now, though, huh? I really hoped you might let some time pass before you tried any shit with us—let J’s people have their moment to say goodbye. Should have known better.”
Luis opened his mouth, and one of his hands twitched when it fell to the floor like the man was going to reach out to Cory. Fuck that noise.
This was over.
It had been over the moment Cory got the notification from the wire that the jacket had been moved that day.
Keeping what remained of his blunt balanced between two fingers, Cory pulled the bandana up over his face again. Smoke still danced between the strobing of the light before it disappeared into the darkness.
Luis opened his mouth to shout. Or maybe scream. Cory just lifted the gun he’d kept tucked at his side where the man couldn’t see in the shadows and pulled back the trigger. Bone made such a morbid sound when it cracked against cement.
He kind of liked it.
•••
“Where is your pup? Theo says he never leaves your side lately. Your sister was watching him for a while, wasn’t she?”
That question had Cory smirking. “She was watching him. And he’s probably sleeping on my side of the bed—Della lets him do that shit when she thinks I don’t know.”
Sitting across from Cory, the man who greeted him was already dressed in a three-piece suit despite the time of day.
“If you’re here to talk with me this early in the morning,” Tommas said, leaning into supple leather of a couch that faced a row of bookshelves, “then I assume you have good news for me?”
Cory grinned, tipping up his lukewarm to-go cup of coffee in his boss’s direction. “That I do—you can call off any Outfit hounds on Luis’s trail. He met the incinerator at four this morning. Joe stayed behind to discard the ashes.”
Tommas let out a laugh. “Is that all?”
“Well—”
“I thought something happened. Not this, but I won’t complain. I appreciate you, specifically, letting me know on the Luis front. How did that come about?”
He did a quick run-through of events. The replay wasn’t that interesting. Frankly, it had all happened so quickly that he hadn’t even bothered to make a proper call through to his boss to ask for permission, but he didn’t really have to. The Outfit had put a bounty out on Luis quite a while ago. The guy was free game.
Cory was just here to give Tommas the news face to face because after the money the man lost in the warehouse, and everything else that changed their business due to Luis, it just seemed appropriate. Plus, as his Uncle Theo would say, if he had a direct line to the boss himself without having to go through other people, why not use it?
That’s how the game of the Outfit was played.
“Good, good,” Tommas murmured in reply to Cory, reaching for a drawer in the ornate coffee table sitting on the floor between their respective seats. He rifled through the drawer, asking, “Anything else?”
“It might be important for you to know there will be a bit of noise from the south side next week. Della made a deal with Miss Wang that will benefit both your business from loans and the parlors across the city.”
That had Tommas glancing up. “I think you mean Mr. Wang.”
“Nah, he has a daughter. And with her in charge of the operation, the Outfit will see a four percent increase monthly for their protection, of course.”
Tommas sat a little straighter, though his hands didn’t leave the drawer. “And what will Mr. Wang’s daughter gain from this new arrangement?”
“Freedom. Apparently, it’s worth the cost.”
A soft noise echoed from Tommas’s throat.
“How much was Wang in debt to Costello?” the boss asked.
“More than he should have been. There were terms made. Some agreements put through that covered interest for a time. Della had a better solution. It’ll benefit everyone across the board, so when the noise picks up in the south over one little death, less concern from the mob would be appreciated.”
Business never stopped.
Even when Cory had multiple balls in the air. Now with Della managing her father’s operation as a whole, and Cory back on the streets with Theo to keep everything smooth for the higher ups in the Outfit, his attention had to be everywhere again.
Tommas sighed heavily. “I’ll keep that in mind. Really, four percent higher? They’re already paying us—”
“A lot,” Cory said. “Yeah, I know, she did well with that one.”
“Good to see her settling in, I suppose.”
Wasn’t that what counted?
Then, Tommas shifted direction entirely. “Which saint do you prefer—when you find yourself praying, which saint do you ask for help when it seems too trivial for Him?”
“Why?”
“Matter of curiosity.”
Catholics.
Cory never understood the appeal, but his parents had him in the church before he could even remember, and he’d never known anything different. It was why he kept a string of rosary on his rearview mirror and on his bedpost.
Let God see all his sins, then.
Might as well.
He didn’t have to think about his answer. His favorite saint had found him early in life and never left.
“Saint Anthony,” Cory eventually said.
Tommas chuckled as though that didn’t surprise him a bit and riffled through the drawer more. “The saint you pray to when things, or you, are lost. You’re a walking cliché, Cory.”
“Not even close.”
The man nodded once. “And we all appreciate it, trust me.”
Tommas finally found what he wanted. He laid all the items out on the table for Cory to see and all at once, he understood what the boss wanted to do.
A picture, the size of a playing card, of Saint Anthony faced upward with his name in gold script at the bottom. The blade closest to the edge of the coffee table glinted when it caught the light. All things one needed to make a man.
To give him his in to the family.
Properly.
Except …
“I’m just missing a lighter,” Tommas noted.
Cory didn’t think about it before pulling his favorite Zippo from the back pocket of his jeans. He handed the item over.
“I like making my men privately,” Tommas said. “You could say it’s become a tradition for me. I like being the only person who can say whether another man is worthy to sit beside one of mine. You understand?”
“I do.”
“But you should also know, many men have stood and vouched for you recently.” Tommas picked up the knife and pointed the very sharp tip in the direction of Cory’s hands. “Is this what you want?”
Was that a real question?
“It is.”
“Palm up, Cory.”
•••
Cory’s favorite time of the day had changed. It used to be when the sun went down—darkness made everything look a little better. A lot of things could hide in the shadows. It was also where he found most of his fun. Even in his dreams, he was restless.
Lately, though, the time of day he liked the most was first thing in the morning when the sun was still brand new, and the rest of the world wasn’t waiting for him to do something. Usually, Mace would still be sleeping on his big pillow on the floor at the foot of the bed, the house was silent, and his blankets were always warmed with Della wrapped up in them.
At dawn, he learned to appreciate the stillness that came with it and what it meant for him to be able to have it at all. It just so happened to be his luck that he shared those early morning moments with Della because she hadn’t lied.
Chick was clingy.
She wanted his attention.
Always.
The woman could blow his phone up in five minutes if she thought he was going to catch an attitude with her over anything. She changed the whole arrangement and style of his bedroom without asking, but it looked good, so he didn’t say shit. Her clothes were in his closet. But fuck, she made a mean steak.
They were basically living together even though they hadn’t explicitly said so. It seemed like a lot of their entire relationship had just been the two of them making moves that propelled them ahead together into something new. Without ever asking at all.
Cory did like it.
It just wasn’t lost on him that it was happening.
Lost in those thoughts—while getting his dick sucked—was how Cory found himself spending his favorite time of the day. Della peeked through the curtain of her hair when she came to the head of his cock, those plump, wet lips of hers tight around his shaft. She let him go with a pop, but her fist tight around his base kept him awake like a live wire against the mattress. She rested between his relaxed legs, her head in his palm while he stroked her hair, and she got him off. There was nothing quite like the sight of her blowing him first thing in the morning.
Truly, he was blessed.
Della smiled overtop his cock. “Am I swallowing?”
“Every last drop.”
He’d paint her pussy with his cum later and use it to get her off when he played with her clit. Right then, though … yeah, he just wanted to watch her swallow him down.
All of him.
Della’s dark eyes flashed with pleasure before her head dipped down. He didn’t sweep the hair out of her face in time to see her take his dick in her mouth again. Still felt it. All hot and tight and wet. She did dangerous things with that tongue of hers. On his tip. Down his shaft. Against his fucking balls when she pulled them in for a suck, too. Finally getting the hair away from her face, he was enraptured with the focus and pleasure he found in his woman while she worked to get him off.
“God, do you know what you do to me?” Cory asked, his head dropped back to the headboard.
Della hummed around his shaft. The vibrations had his balls tightening in the best way. Her fist worked his length. Just like her mouth. The teeth. Her tongue. The groan that came out of him was thick with pleasure and he was close to losing control.
No better way to let go.
That was for sure.
He looked down.
Della stared back.
Cory came hard.
It seemed never-ending.
She took every bit, too.
He was still trying to catch his breath when she finally let his cock go. Crawling up him, she showed her tongue with a laugh and smiled wide. Her brows lifted, matching his when he reached for her. His cock didn’t even have the chance to soften before she climbed on top of him, taking him in all over again.
Shit.
Her inner walls?
They could work him for hours. As long as he could keep from blowing his load like a teenager getting his first fuck. That was always the challenge with Della.
She sat down on his length.
Cory already had her ass spread wide with two fistfuls. It stretched her out just a bit more, and she really felt him driving into her then.
“Wang is a go,” he told her, referring to his conversation with the boss the morning before.
She nodded, her breaths all high and stuttering as he worked her back and forth on his dick. “Good.”
Jesus.
Why was she so perfect?
Nothing would be better than this—than her. The realization slammed into Cory with a weight he hadn’t expected. He was never coming back from this.
From her.
She’d always be his end.
He would always keep coming back to her.
“Love you,” she whispered, her chest tight to his and their lips brushing when she spoke.
Every breath she panted out, he sucked in. She’d come quickly—it would take him a bit longer this time but that was just fine. Christ, her pussy would be dripping when he was done.
“I’m marrying you,” he told her.
Sure.
Absolute.
He just knew it.
The way she looked at him when he said it?
She knew it, too.
As for the rest?
It could all wait.
•••
Did you enjoy Cory and Della’s love story and now want your next BK read?
Jump straight into Captivated, another standalone New Adult Mafia Romance featuring the crew from Chicago and New York—Joe Rossi meets his match in ballerina, Liliana Marcello. Now, he just has to keep her safe … and alive.
Or start Deathless & Divided, an arranged marriage mafia romance amidst a street war between the Chicago mob families.
XO,
BK.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bethany-Kris is a Canadian author, lover of much, and mother to four young sons, three cats, and four dogs. A small town in Eastern Canada where she was born and raised is where she has always called home. With her boys under her feet, a snuggling cat, barking dogs, and a spouse calling over his shoulder, she is nearly always writing something ... when she can find the time.
Find Bethany-Kris at her:
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