Page 35 of Married into the Mob
He gave me clear instructions on how to ease my foot off the clutch as I pressed on the gas. There were a couple of false starts and a lot of jerking, but I pulled onto the road.
I’d made a lot of mistakes in the last twenty-four hours, but here we were. I asked fate to make sure that Odell could overcome the crappy start we had to our bonding and put the shit behind us.
But would the universe listen?
FOURTEEN
ODELL
Despite the car being warm and toasty, I lowered the window and stuck my head out, enjoying the breeze on my face. Not being in the panic room was a joy, but instead of being holed up in a regular apartment, I was with my fake husband headed to a tiny cabin in the middle of nowhere.
I was a city guy. What did I know about chopping down trees and cooking over an open fire? I’d never been kidnapped either, but in the space of one day, it’d happened twice. Though I was thinking of this trip as less of an abduction and more of a reluctant road trip. Or perhaps I was in protective custody.
After a while, I sat back in my seat and put the window up, leaving it open a little. To distract myself from whatever lay ahead, I pestered Hunter with questions.
“Tell me about your family.”
He shot me a look. “You met them.”
“Yeah, and they’re nice but kinda bonkers.”
He sighed. “To an outsider, I guess that’s true.”
“Trust me. Even an insider would take a step back and say, ‘These people are a little unusual.’”
He side-eyed me. “Look, we’re loud and proud of our heritage, and sure, we talk over one another and our history to non-mafia people is a little out of bounds, but we love one another.”
“True. I could see that in your interactions. And how do you feel about being banished?”
He didn’t respond immediately, and I counted the seconds until he spoke, breathing in his unique cologne, and thanks to the moonlight, studying his strong hands with the manicured nails on the wheel.
“Flint was overruled. That’s one thing you need to learn about our kind. There is a strict hierarchy.”
“Tell me more about your dad and uncle. And what happened to your alpha father?”
He took a deep breath, and I sensed those long tapered fingers tightening around the steering wheel.
“Well, as I said, he was assassinated and so was my grandfather before him.”
I couldn’t imagine living with day-to-day violence as Hunter and his family appeared to. And despite their quirks, of which there were many, they were a loving family unit. And what niggled at me, though I thrust it down deep, was that a tiny part of me was like them after our impromptu getaway.
“My turn.”
Providing answers about my messed-up family wasn’t at the top of my to-do list, but what else were we going to talk about? That I’d be alone with my new husband, miles from anywhere?
“Your parents are dead and your aunt and uncle raised you?”
“That sums it up.” I dusted off my hands, indicating the subject was at an end.
“Come on. You’ve got to give me more than that.” He sent me a cheeky grin. “I am your husband, after all.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
I raked my hands through my hair. I’d always thought we were fairly typical. Both my aunt and uncle worked, and I went to school before attending college and getting a teaching job. But uncle’s accident flipped our lives and the trajectory was down, down, and further down.
“My uncle gambled and got us into this mess. The end.”
“What does your aunt do?”
