Page 14 of Ruthless Sinner

This was one of those things that when it happened with mobsters on TV, it was a joke. A comedy. Something you saw on a show likeBrooklyn 99.

But here I was, dressed back in my street clothes, at one of those late-night Persian ice cream places that had flavors like rosehip and lavender as well as cookie dough and mint chip.

Ah, New York City, never change.

I wasn’t exactly dressed for the colder evening, since it was a short walk between the club and my apartment and I usually welcomed the cool night air after shaking my ass for hours in a perfume-and-people-filled room. But now, as I shivered with my coffee ice cream (in a bowl, not a cone), I found my shoulders covered in a warm jacket.

I looked up and Marco shrugged. “Can’t have you dying on me. My dad would never let me hear the end of it.”

“He sounds like a real hard ass,” I joked as I put the jacket on. It was soft, worn leather, and smelled like him. I tried to ignore the weird flip in my stomach.

“He’s all right. He just worries about me.” Marco took his Neapolitan ice cream cone and gently grabbed me by the elbow to guide me to one of the plastic outdoor tables.

I sat down. “Maybe he should, I am a stripper after all.”

Marco chuckled as he sat across from me. “Nah, that’s not the problem. A mafia guy who has a thing for the strip club? Practically a cliché.”

“Well he’s got to be worried for a good reason, then.”

When I’d said yes to getting ice cream, as crazy as the idea had sounded coming from Marco Russo of all people, I’d hoped that I could endear myself to him, get him to like me more. I hadn’t expected some good gossip on the Russo family dynamic. This could be perfect.

“Not really.” Marco took a long, thorough lick of his ice cream and I was suddenly reminded of that tongue on my clit.

My body pulsed with desire. I hadn’t been fucked that good in… possibly ever. I’d thought at the end there he was going to fuck me right through the wall and I wouldn’t have minded at all.

Maybe he’ll do all those other things to you,my mind whispered.The things you never had the courage to ask for.

I certainly hadn’t bothered asking Jared, and the bad boys I’d ill-advisedly dated before him I had enjoyed but hadn’t trusted enough to… really take care of me. You had to trust someone for the things I wanted in bed.

Don’t be an idiot. He’s mafia, he’s your mark. You can’t trust him.

“He’s just overprotective then?” I asked, dragging my thoughts away from sex and back to the conversation at hand.

“Yeah, you could say that.” Marco shrugged. “My mom explained it, a little bit before she died. I think she already knew she was dying even if she hadn’t told us yet. She said I was just like my uncle.”

“You have an uncle?” I asked, confused.

Marco shot me an odd look and I quickly explained. Shit. I’d fucked up, revealed I knew too much. “Everyone in the club knows the Russo family. Your grandfather’s famous. So’s your dad. But he doesn’t have a brother, right? It’s just the three of you.”

“That’s what they wanted everyone to think, after he died,” Marco explained, apparently buying my explanation. “Ah, good old Popsy. I was the only one who got away with calling him that. Dante and Vincent always said Grandpa. Anyway. My uncle was a real party boy, daredevil, all the rest. Same as me. Kind of an embarrassment to his dad. You thinkmydad’s tough, he had nothing on our grandfather. It was lucky in a… shitty kind of way that he died the way he did, before he fucked up really bad.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you mean.”

“Well, y’know, stupid doesn’t last long in the mafia. And my uncle was apparently not gifted in the smarts department. He would’ve fucked up some deal, or pissed off the wrong person, ruined the whole family. But instead he got in a drunk driving accident and wrapped himself around a telephone pole.”

I took another bite of my ice cream. “You don’t sound all that upset.”

“It was before I was born. I think maybe even before Vincent had been born. It’s hard to feel sad about someone you never knew, someone that everyone was kind of… relieved that he died? It’s complicated.” Marco shrugged. “But my grandfather went to work erasing his own son from the story, so that there wouldn’t be any blotch on our legacy.”

I grimaced. “That’s pretty ruthless.”

“Welcome to the mafia.” Marco sounded rakish and nonchalant, but I thought I detected a sadness underneath. “Mom said that Dad loved his brother even if he wasn’t proud of him, and that he was worried I’d end up just like him.”

I couldn’t resist asking. “Would your dad erase you? If it ended that way?”

“Well I’m a lot of things, but stupid isn’t one of them, so I won’t end up that way. But if I did… I don’t know. Dad cares about us even if sometimes he’s crappy about showing it.”

I almost wanted to tell Marco that he sure wasn’t as brainless as my boss thought, but he was still spilling his personal business to an FBI agent. I kept my mouth shut and my ears open. I wasn’t sure why he was telling me this, and there was enough softness left in me to realize what a privilege it was—and to feel guilty that I was probably going to use this against him someday soon.

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