Chapter 6

LUC

What a seriously fucked-up day.

Jesus, I swore Raphael was making me work overtime.

Why couldn’t this be some sort of arranged marriage where I’d get a pampered princess who loved to shop? Someone who just loved money and would be satisfied with a few good handbags and trips to the spa?

Even someone like Maria, the waitress with the big tits I’d been seeing on and off for the past year. She just lived to please me and did whatever I wanted her to do.

I sighed as I lowered myself onto my bed and sank into the softness of the pillows.

No. I’d hate a pampered princess, and easy as Maria was she was just for fun. I wouldn’t have wanted her either.

Miss big talking, I can take care of myself, call me Taylor was what I would class as the type of woman who was compatible for me. She was a challenge, the kind of person who was difficult because she could handle herself in most situations. I liked that she was tough and probably could handle herself, but that didn’t fool me for one second.

I knew women. Tough or not, inside I felt that sometimes a woman needed to know she didn’t always need to take care of herself. That was why I checked out the house for her, and checked her out too.

Sure, a pampered princess would have been easier, but this here Amelia was a woman to be desired. Even if I wanted to protest about the craziness of day one, I’d already seen that ass of hers, and those tits.

Shit, those assets were enough to keep any man coming back for more. I would have still pursued her even without the reward of gaining control of the multibillion-dollar business Raphael had going.

I missed my world though. It was simpler than this.

Like the whole thing with Sinclaire, for example. In my world, we would have had the shoot-out guys in the car already. They would simply be no more. This was slow for me, but slow it would be if I wanted to get what I wanted.

Raphael had run his business well. Real estate was good for him, both commercial and residential. On the commercial side, it was easier to count the businesses that didn’t belong to him than to count the ones that did, and owning and controlling made it easy to filter in dirty money.

If there were any drawbacks, either myself or Claudius would take care of them, and by drawbacks, I meant those who wanted to step on our turf and make life difficult for us.

Raphael and the other crime families lived together in a sort of symbiotic relationship. Most everyone understood their place in the scheme of things, but there were some who didn’t. The Salvatore’s were one, the Fontanes another, but the Romano’s were the guys even I had to watch out for.

Ben Romano and his boys were probably the only other guys who could compare to us, not in wealth but in wisdom and tactics, although I had to admit they played real dirty—real dirty. They didn’t just kill a guy; they’d cut his balls off and leave them in his hands for his loved ones to find.

I hated death, and I tried to avoid it. That was my nature. Foolishly, I’d tried to live by that ethos, but it didn’t always work for me.

Kill or be killed. That was our law.

With that thought, I rolled onto my side and closed my eyes, falling asleep, and it felt like I’d just done that when the first rays of sunlight spilled through the window and my doorbell rang. In the penthouse apartment, the sound tended to echo throughout the place.

I knew it would be Maurice, my right-hand man and best friend. He was to me the same as my father was to Raphael, and he was the only request I’d made before coming on this mission. I knew it was supposed to be a simple task of getting Amelia, but Maurice was someone I relied on.

I answered the door, barely able to open my eyes.

“Man, you look like shit. You alone, or did you manage to secure the princess?” His large brown eyes brightened as he looked over my shoulder with interest.

“No such luck.” I offered a soft smile.

“Really?” He looked at me in disbelief as he came inside.

“She’s not going to be that easy to get.”

“Didn’t you were that fancy cologne I got you boss?” He smirked.

“Don’t call me that.”

We sat down opposite each other on the sofa.

“I was testing it out.” Maurice chuckled.

“No, you don’t call me boss.” I sighed.

A lock of his thick black hair fell forward over his eye and he moved it away. He had it gelled and styled like he was going to a party. He always looked sharp, no matter the time of day.

It was seven AM.

How was it already seven? It felt like I’d just gotten in.

If I had been home, I would have stayed in, but if the lure of taking over from Raphael didn’t encourage me enough, the call of the woman did.

“What’s up with you? You have that look.” Maurice grinned. We’d been friends for too long for me to hide anything from the guy.

“Yesterday was a damn show. It was everything rolled into one.” I filled him in on what had happened. When I was done, he leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees, looking thrown.

“That’s some messed up day, man.” He bit the inside of his lip. “A little odd, too.”

A little odd?

I didn’t know if that was the best way to put it.

“Maurice, what happened yesterday was a long way from just a little odd.”

“What do you think?”

“Not sure, and Intel didn’t pick up anything.”

On my way to the hospital, I’d called my own contact, the same guy who’d given me the files on Amelia. He was part of the Raphael secret squad. I knew the man by his number, not a name. He wasn’t able to do much without a license number. He’d scanned the CCTV in the area for the Sedan but the cameras didn’t pick up the plates and since the windows were blacked out, no faces either.

What was strange was that it had all gone down on my first real day on the job.

“Well, at least you got her to trust you,” Maurice pointed out.

That definitely hadn’t escaped me. Up until I’d saved Amelia, the woman had been hell-bent on hating me. What I’d done had broken down a massive wall.

“A big win for me.”

“What’s she like?” Mischief flickered in his dark eyes.

As I recalled the image of Amelia, I couldn’t help but smile. Long silky black hair and warm brown eyes that looked like a mix of chocolate and honey came to my mind. Add in her perfect body, and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on her.

Through all this, that was the hard part—the part about getting my hands on her. Everything else was easy.

“She’s beautiful.”

This task of getting her to agree to marry me and come back to the fold drifted back into my mind. Raphael knew what he was doing, though. He’d chosen me for a reason, and if he didn’t think I could make it happen, he wouldn’t have made the request.

Everyone had one thing that could compel them to do something outside of what they would normally do, something strong enough to make them agree to anything. I had to find out what her thing was and use it.

“I can’t believe he kept her hidden all these years,” I stated, bringing my hand up to my chin.

“Money and power.” Maurice nodded. “Lots of money and power. Hey, how about I do some checks on this gang, our style? I was bored as shit yesterday and I hate my apartment. I don’t see why we can’t room together. Look at this place—there’s plenty of room.”

I shook my head at him. Sure, there was plenty of space. If there was one thing I loved, it was my space. I just wouldn’t make the mistake of sharing a place with Maurice again. The guy was a boozing man whore, so if he wasn’t passed out drunk somewhere, he’d have a host of women at his beck and call. Add that to his crazy outlandish ideas, and we clashed like fire and ice.

He could be serious when I needed him to be and was an absolute tech wiz who could hack any system, but as for living together, it was a hard no. Besides, I doubted he hated his apartment. There was something else at play here.

“Maurice, either you find a place that’s more suitable for you, or you deal with your apartment. I’m not having you here for any longer than necessary.”

He frowned.

“It’s the penthouse, isn’t it?” I asked. I’d have been willing to bet he’d met some woman and wanted to impress her with my place.

“Busted, but come on, Luc—LA and I are like two things that don’t mesh. Water and oil, or rotten fish and more rotten fish. Being here doesn’t suit me. We could be great together.”

“Oh God, you’re breaking my heart.” I grinned and placed a hand to my heart. “Sorry pal, suck it up. I’m sure I’d kill you if we ever lived together again.” The last time was a bad enough memory to never make that mistake again.

He rolled his eyes at me and sighed. “Okay fine. How long you think this will take?”

Fuck if I knew the answer to that question.

“How can you ask me that? What am I supposed to do, heave her over my shoulder and drag her off kicking and screaming caveman style?”

“I swear you did that once.” He laughed.

“Can’t do that with her. It has to…” I was going to say happen naturally, but there was nothing natural about the situation. I was here in LA to get a woman who would hate me if she knew why I was here. If she had wanted out of my way of life and hadn’t bothered to come back, that meant something.

I doubted she knew how sick Raphael was, and if she did know, I wasn’t sure she would care. I could only wonder what must have gone down between them for her to leave, change her name, and become someone else, never looking back.

She’d become Amelia Taylor and insisted I call her Taylor like everyone else did. I refused because it wasn’t her name, and because Amelia was more personal. Since that was the way I was heading, I figured I’d at least seize that.

“It has to what?” Maurice prodded, waiting for me to continue.

“I just have to get her to agree.”

“Raphe give you any tips?”

“One.” I held up my finger.

“What’s that?” He grinned.

“He said to try not to be myself.”

“You’re fucked.” He laughed and shook his head.

I hoped not.

I really fucking hoped like hell not. I didn’t want my chance to get taken away from me even before I really began.

I could see his point though.