"The damage was done the moment our eyes collided."
~Xavier De Luca
***
One life-altering night ignites a soul-scorching passion between a gangster and a good girl...One that could burn everyone they know and love to ashes.
Loyalties and legacies...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
I'd tasted forever, and I couldn't forget her. She lingered on my skin, in my hair, on my tongue, and in the fibers of my sheets everywhere. I was past addiction. Hell, what I felt for Grace surpassed reason.
Pa could see it. Even without Christian mentioning that flagrantly stupid confrontation with Grace's family on my doorstep. He knew I was a goner the night I spotted her.
In fact, that was partially what our meeting with Pa was about. He wanted to talk through our response to Luigi's latest bullshit along with some other potential investments.
Unfortunately, I'd been right about that cocksucker.
After my conversation with his daughter, Luigi called Pa to demand that he 'renegotiate' the rates on our contracts in person. Apparently, the family discount no longer applied if you reneged on the unofficial offer to marry the boss's daughter.
As soon as we'd closed our business, however, Christian poured us drinks while Pa grilled me for details about Grace. He wanted to know about the woman who was becoming my weakness.
Who was I kidding? She was already my weakness.
"Son," he fixed his moist gray eyes on me. "It's been a while since I've said this, but you're in over your head."
"How do you figure?" I growled, squeezing the cut crystal tumbler in my hand.
"This Irish dame," he smiled like he knew a thing or two about the subject. "She's twisted you up. Tony says you've got his guys watching her house?"
"They're watching the prick she lives with, Cillian," I nodded curtly and set my drink down. "He might be able to lead us back to whoever hacked our security system after leaving us with a body and one hell of a mess, without our permission, I might add."
"Keep telling yourself that," Christian snorted into his drink.
My eyes narrowed to flash my brother a warning.
"Christian also said the Irish were at your house this morning," Pa continued while stroking his clipped beard. "Yet you didn't take the opportunity to question them?"
"I already went over this, Grace was there," I scowled at the memory of feeling powerless. "And her uncle happens to be an independent contractor, by the way."
"Has he worked for us?" Pa threw back the last of his drink and straightened up to pour himself another.
Christian and I watched him stroll over to the wet bar he had installed after he bought the building. All thirty stories, and most of the city block, belong to De Luca Investments.
His tailored suit hid the weight he'd put on in his sixties, but it couldn't disguise the slight bend in my old man's back. Still, he looked damn good for his age, in my opinion.
