Page 408 of Sinfully Savage Mafia

I manage a smile. “Oh yeah? So I bet you’re going to add more to your list about me now. I don’t have friends, don’t like to talk, have no patience for old people…and what else?”

“Damaged,” he says, his eyes boring into me. “There’s a reason why you do this, why you wanted this job, and something tells me it’s not because you love babies.” He steps toward me and my breath hitches. “You’re so closed off. Is it because you failed in this role before? Is that why you’re trying to make up for it with strangers?”

My jaw drops. He got all of that from what I said?

He’s too goddamn pretty to be that perceptive!

I swallow hard. “I’m not damaged,” I say, trying to keep my voice even.

“We’re all damaged, Anya. In some way or another. We’re all looking for redemption.”

“I don’t need redemption! Spare me the dollar-store psychobabble,” I snap. My jaw tightens, palms sweaty as they rub against my legs.

Dante circles me like a lion eyeing his prey. “So mysterious. So shut down. But so in need of carnal pleasure,” he muses. “Even if you don’t want to admit it to yourself. You’re looking for something you either haven’t found or had taken away. Admit it.”

I roll my eyes. “That’s your insightful analysis, huh? Because I got caught up in the moment?—”

“A moment you created, if memory serves.” He smirks. “Remember, rubbing up against me, touching my arm, giving me that fuck-me-now look?”

I throw my hands into the air. “Fine! I created it. Twice. I admit it!”

“So now are you going to admit the other thing?”

“What other thing?”

“That you’re damaged.”

“Jesus Christ!”

“Language,” he says with a quirk of his brow.

I let out a snort. “You know what? I’ve lost my appetite. So thanks for that!” I turn on my heel, ready to stalk toward my room when I stop short.

Aisling.

I turn back around, scoop her up, and head back down the hallway. My stomach gurgles and clenches as my pulse throbs against my neck.

Fuck him for seeing all of that!

And how, by the way? I basically told him nothing and he managed to pull all of that from the minimal words I uttered.

I sink into the plush leather recliner in the corner of the room that overlooks the bright lights of the Las Vegas Strip. I stare into the night sky, at all of the stars twinkling against the blackness. I never saw that many stars in Brooklyn. The dark, ominous cloud of a hopeless future always hung low overhead, blocking any slivers of light from shining through.

But here, it feels like the cloud has lifted, albeit temporarily.

I had no idea what wounds would be torn open by being out here in Vegas. All of the things I resisted for so long, thrown in my face, taunting me because I’ll never have them myself.

I made choices. A lot of choices.

And they defined my path.

It’s not glamorous by any stretch, but it’s been set.

I have to deliver for my uncle, for our livelihood, for our future…the future Maks will never get to experience.

Deliver what, though?

That’s the hundred-million-dollar question.

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