Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73880 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73880 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
My trepidation begins to melt away. I swallow. “It was hot watching me cook soup. In an apron.”
“You have no idea.”
“You’re crazy.”
But when he slides his palms down the small of my back and pulls me closer, I start to care less about who saw what and more about what next with Timeo.
“You said we were a slow simmer. Is that what you think?”
“Think?” I snort, my palm pressed against the flat of his chest. “Of course we are. You call this, like, normal foreplay, buddy?”
The thick length of his cock is pressed up against me.
I can’t help but feel our time together isn’t guaranteed. I tell myself it’s because he was taken from me once before, but I fear it’s more than that now. What if…this is the last time we really are together?
I breathe in his scent and let myself sink into him.
What if he’s right? What if getting any closer to him will do the exact opposite of what I want — and only drive us further apart? What if he’s right, that being near him puts me in more danger than I’ve ever been in?
I kiss his cheek. Take a step back.
I’m not going to let what we have here… end here.
I’m not going to let it end like two teens hiding behind locked doors where no one can see them.
No. Way.
“I need a minute.”
He steps back and gives me space.
I just had an idea.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Timeo
There’s no easy way to tell her: Starla has to stop her influencer shit. Of all the things we do to protect her, an online presence garnering millions of views per month nearly negates all of them.
She doesn’t want to, though.
I frown at my phone screen. One bar.
Is cell service back up?
I open my messages and hiss in a breath.
It’s a picture of two golden retrievers.
You know what we want.
I scowl at the phone and wish I could smash it into pieces. Like that would change anything.
Yeah, I know what they want, and they’ve got me by the balls, making me choose between loyalty to my family or the happiness of the woman I love.
They know exactly how to push my buttons.
I do know what they want.
I also know what I want. And I know how long and how hard I’ve worked to get there.
I log onto the server that gives me access to private communication and I send a message.
I need you to release Manuel Hernandez.
The response is immediate.
I can’t do that. He’s serving four consecutive life sentences.
Not officially. I need you to make it look like an accident. And I promise you…he will not be loose on the streets.
The little dots indicating I’m getting a response pop up on the screen. They start, then stop again.
I swallow hard and type in a dollar sign followed by a series of numbers.
I hit send.
One minute passes.
Two.
Three.
Where the hell is Starla?
I exit the kitchen and call out to her. “Starla?”
There’s no answer.
Shit.
My phone buzzes with a text as I walk further into the club.
Consider it done.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Starla
Six months earlier
I walked the length of the pier, my steps light. Timeo told me he wanted to meet me here tonight in private.
No Sergio.
No Eden.
No Ricco.
No Montavios or Rossis or anyone.
Just. Us.
And I hoped…I didn’t even want to give voice to what I hoped, and I knew that what I hoped wasn’t really very different from any other girl with stars in her eyes and a schoolgirl crush.
I told myself that what I wanted was different, that it transcended an infatuation with a hot guy who paid attention to me…because I knew what it was like to be tied to loveless relationships. I knew what it was like to be used and hurt, abused and mistreated.
And I knew what it was like to be…cherished. Timeo was the one who taught me that.
Every time he laughed at my silly jokes and threw rocks with me off the pier. Every time we roasted marshmallows in the secret of the forest, lulled to a sense of complacency by the flickering flames of the fire and absolute quiet. Every time he taught me something new, held my hand when I confided in him, and promised me that no one, no one, would ever hurt me again.
It was way more than a fantasy, even if neither of us gave voice to what was really happening.
I didn’t know the details of what brought us together that day. Eden was distraught about something that had happened at the club involving Timeo’s oldest brother Ricco. It had been “all hands on deck” in an emergency situation involving Ricco’s Daniella and her daughter Emmy.
The aftermath saw everyone safe, but left a fire burning in Timeo’s eyes I hadn’t seen before.
“Starla, we need to talk. Now. Meet me on the pier?”
We’d been to the pier a few times over the summer because it was an easy walk from there to his cousins’ restaurants in the North End. There were benches where we could sit under leaf-covered trellises, watch the boats that came in and out of the harbor, hear the street vendors selling T-shirts and cold drinks. I loved it there. And while some recognized Timeo from time to time, there were so many people in and out of the pier we were almost anonymous.