Page 29 of Creed

What I’m not happy about, though, is yet another dinner my parents are summoning me to. This is the third in two weeks. The last two were tolerable only because Vito and I had dove into the bottom of a bottle of bourbon.

As suspected, the hopeful, simpering bride-to-be and her parents had zeroed their attention on Massimo each dinner.Mammahad scowled at Vito and me when the guests weren’t looking, but since we’d been relatively behaved, she hadn’t been upset, which meantPapàdidn’t intervene. But Vito and I had gotten a bit carried away at the last dinner, and I suspect the hard alcohol will be on lockdown tonight.

Massimo takes it all in stride, though; I have to give him that. He handles the groveling and ass-kissing even though he’s uninterested in these match-making efforts, remaining polite but cool and aloof. He doesn’t need our mother’s help; he’ll choose his own bride, one that benefits the family because he is dutiful and loyal to a fault. Those are the sacrifices for being firstborn and heir to the Santoro power position.

Spinning in my desk chair, I look out the floor-to-ceiling window of my San Francisco headquarters office. The Golden Gate Bridge serves as my backdrop. My phone buzzes, and I reach back to grab it off the desk and read Vito’s text.

I got a bottle for tonight in my gym bag in case the others are on lockdown

Great minds think alike, I smirk.

You haven’t had a gym bag since high school

You turning into a grumpy motherfucker like Mass?

You gotta ease up on him with that

Never

He’s gonna turn into one

Pfft. You worry too much, baby brother

Someone’s gotta worry

It keeps your ass alive

I say we just bail entirely

Whoever the chick is will only have a wet pussy for the future Don

Mamma will cut us

Ha!

Mammaisa bit crazy

Fuck me, this is gonna blow

I can hear Vito’s groan as if he’s in the room with me because it echoes my own.

Speaking of blowing, I’m stopping off at Lexa’s on my way. She called and wants to suck my cock

FFS, Vito

“See you in a bit” would've been fine

What? She fucking loves giving head

Missing the entire point, bro

Vito loves to taunt Massimo and me with TMI, and I imagine he's laughing his ass off.

My brother lives by 'one-and-done' when it comes to sleeping with a woman. However, with Lexa, because it's only oral sex—which she's the one who calls him up because she loves sucking his dick, apparently—Vito's golden rule of only fucking a woman once is never broken. It’s a weird arrangement, but who am I to judge?

You better not ditch, you asshole

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