Chapter 8ANGELO

Chapter 8

ANGELO

"Stay, Angelo." Severu's order comes just as I'm about to leave his office after a meeting with his underboss, Miceli, one of his capos and the consigliere, Big Sal.

I step aside to let the others leave and once they are gone, I shut the door and face my boss. And wait.

Severu De Luca is only three years older than me, making him the youngest don in the Cosa Nostra right now. But nothing about him screams youth. We lose that air when we get made.

I'm not sure either me or my boss ever had it to begin with.

There's no family relationship between us going back at least four generations, but both our families started out in Sicily.

Related, or not, we have the same black hair, olive skin tone and Roman nose. At six-feet-four-inches, Severu tops me by two inches, but we're both taller than the average Sicilian male.

He has the typical dark eyes of our forefathers, but mine are gray. Some say they glow almost silver just before I kill someone.

After a full minute of frowning silence, my boss says, "Explain to me why my top enforcer cut off a man's hand when the Genovese made men are under strict instructions to stay under the radar right now."

"I didn't draw any attention." He knows me better than that.

"You cut off his hand!" Severu barks.

"I took care of it away from the club." Go me for not going with my initial plan to do it in the alley.

Severu doesn't look impressed with mine and Nerissa's solution. "You cut off his fucking hand."

"He deserved it and I didn't kill him." I even made sure he got to the ER.

I can be reasonable.

"For touching a dancer giving him a lap dance?"

"She wasn't dancing for that douche and Candi has a strict no-touching policy."

"Candi." Severu says the name like he's tasting it for a bad flavor. "The stripper."

"Exotic dancer." She doesn't strip naked.

Not ever. She might drop everything but pasties and thong, but the ripe nipples that tip her bountiful tits are for my eyes only.

I saw them for the first time the other day when she came back into the bedroom after her shower and dropped her towel before I had a chance to look away. She usually gets dressed in the bathroom. I still don't know what made that day different, but I was as close as I've ever been to coming in my pants.

I've been obsessed with trying to guess what color those delicious looking peaks are ever since. Soon, I'll find out.

Unfortunately, the cameras I installed only have a black-and-white feed. I went for quality of picture under a range of lighting over color definition. The image is excellent, even when the room is dark. A good choice, it's angled toward her bed so I can watch her sleep.

I'm not a pervert. When her little sister is in the room hanging out, or getting ready for bed, I turn that camera feed off and only listen to the audio until after the kid falls asleep.

Then I turn it back on and watch Candi's beautiful, heart shaped face as it relaxes in somnolence. I always turn the feed off again before I go to bed myself.

After her sister leaves for school, I turn it back on and follow my new favorite routine. Watching my Candi pleasure herself under the covers before getting up and getting ready for the day.

Her pleasure belongs to me, just like mine belongs to her.

"Now is not the time to get fixated on your latest fuck." Severu's harsh tone breaks into the reel playing in my head.

"I haven't fucked her." It's not safe. Not yet.

He gives me an impatient frown. "Then do it and move on."

But I shake my head. "She's it for me, boss."

Fucking Candi is not going to a be a one-and-done for me. She's my future.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"She's my forever woman." One day, we'll get married.

Candi will be such a beautiful bride.

Severu's eyes widen before they narrow. "Better than anyone else, you realize how precarious things are right now. How much danger our families are in."

"That's why I'm not claiming her yet." I don't want a target on her.

"You don't think cutting off that asshole's hand is going to clue our enemies into how important she is to you?"

"Maybe, but it had to be done." Other men need to know she's off limits.

"So, then claim her and get her out of the club."

"Not yet." There's knowing. And there's knowing .

Right now, she's a dancer I protect, but no one outside a very small circle knows why. Once I publicly claim her, she becomes my Achilles heel. Not that I'll be like that asshole Achilles and leave my vulnerability unprotected.

Human armor protects as well as some demigod's magic dipping sauce. And it's under my control.

Candi will never come to harm on my watch.

"I've got two of my team on her at all times." And I watch over her more than she, or anyone else knows. "But she's safer with me staying in the background for now."

"Does she have any inkling you're coming for her when things settle down?" Severu's look questions my sanity, but his words don't.

I'll take it.

I know my approach to life isn't like everyone else's, but that's why I'm so good at what I do. I see the way forward to reach my goals and I don't hesitate to take it, whatever the cost.

"She saw me skewer a man's hand for trying to touch her and by now, she's probably heard about Ronnie. I figure yes."

"And she isn't running?"

"Why would she run? I'm protecting her. You would do the same if some stronzo tried to touch Catalina."

The death that lives in my heart is reflected in Severu's cold brown gaze. "Catalina is my wife."

"And one day, Candi will be mine." Her real name is Kathleen.

Cookie's social worker calls her Kath, but Candi never introduces herself that way and the people she's closest to call her Candi.

I'm one of those people. Whether she knows it yet, or not.

Sighing, Severu shakes his head. "Angelo, you need to let this go. She's not in the life and you don't know if she can be trusted with our secrets."

"What secrets? You don't think the dancers at Pitiful Princess know their club is owned by the mafia? For fuck's sake they probably work there because of the extra protection."

"That's not the point."

"No, the point is, she's mine."

"And if I ordered you to back off?"

"Don't." For the first time in my life as a made man, I don't know if I would follow orders. Not if those orders were to walk away from Candi.

I'll protect la famiglia with my life and serve it with the death of others, but I won't give up Candi for the mistaken belief that she's a danger to the family.

"She's that important to you?" Severu asks in disbelief. "And you don't even fuck her?"

I shrug. "When you know, you know."

One day I'll lay claim to Candi's body, but I've already claimed the most important thing.

Her life.

Something flashes across my boss's face and he sighs again. "At least you're listening to your instincts."

"Like you didn't at first with Catalina."

He shrugs, but we both know the truth.

Severu thought he wanted something he didn't. When most of us knew all along that Catalina was the best woman for him.