Chapter 21

21

Cass

T o kill a man, or not to kill him, that is the question.

And I have to come up with the answer.

Of course, I know Gavin needs to die. That's what my father expects, and what he would do himself. But knowing you need to do something and actually doing it are two very different things.

Over the past few weeks, ever since Cole arrived, I've changed. The old Cass would've already jumped on Gavin's back and choked the life out of him.

The cocky blond asshole has made me go soft.

Tomorrow. I'll kill Gavin tomorrow.

I just need to give myself a day to convince myself to go through with it. After all, Daddy said we had twenty-four hours to decide.

"I want to sleep on it," I announce to Cole and Eli. "Unless you're ready to make a decision now?" I ask my stepbrother .

"Nah. I can sleep on it too," he agrees. "So, we'll just leave him hanging here?"

He's right. We're supposed to torture him, punish him before making the final decision.

Walking over to the beautiful, naked man, I look up at him since he's hanging high enough that his feet won't ever touch the floor, putting his cock nearly at mouth level. After what Eli said about edging him, I figure that's the reason behind this particular position.

I run my fingernails over his defined six-pack abs, lower to his thighs, leaving red lines behind before following the same path all over again. Gavin remains still the entire time, watching me, waiting. I'm not even sure if he's breathing.

I have to admit that I do like having a man at my complete mercy. It doesn't take long to see that Gavin, despite his terror for his possible looming death, likes what I'm doing too.

"Nice dick," I tell him honestly as his long shaft swells. He's not as big and thick as Cole, but it's still pretty perfect, just like the rest of him.

"Y-you can do anything you want with it," he replies. "I'll fuck you so good. And my tongue. I have an amazing tongue. Make me your sex slave and I'll eat your pussy all day, every day, Cassie."

"It's just Cass," I inform him as I run my index finger along the underside of his hardening shaft, hating how he picked up Cole's stupid nickname so fast. "What about your balls, Gavin? Can I do anything I want to them too?"

Before he can answer, I grab them and twist, making him shriek and flail in his restraints.

"Just because I'm a woman, doesn't mean I'm soft," I tell him over his screeching. "My father wants you dead, so there's nothing that will save you now. Especially not your dick or tongue, you pretty fucking manwhore."

I dig my fingernails in his sac to add a little more pain before finally letting him go.

When I walk back over to Cole he straightens his spine, and Eli jumps down from his seat on the work bench. Cole says, "That was terrifying," at the same time Eli mutters, "That was so damn hot."

"I want to sleep on it," I announce. "What about you?"

"I, yeah, I'll sleep on it too," Cole agrees.

I start heading for the elevator with him on my heels. Eli doesn't join us as we ascend to the penthouse in silence.

Only once we're past the guards and inside does Cole finally speak. "I can't believe you touched his dick."

"It's a nice dick," I say when I start up the stairs. "Maybe I should get a cast of it to use for a dildo before killing him."

"So, you really are going to kill him?" he asks from behind me.

"Yes."

"How?"

"I'm not sure yet," I admit. Honestly, I don't want to dwell too much on the act. Just because killing is a part of running a mafia, doesn't mean I'll ever enjoy it.

"I could do it for you," Cole offers.

I come to a stop on the second-floor landing, where I know we have to part ways. Turning to him, I say, "I don't need you to kill for me, especially if you're too squeamish to make the call yourself."

"Squeamish? I'm not squeamish. I'll go kill that son of a bitch right fucking now." Golden jaw clenched, he says, "Trust me, I really want to after you admired his cock and he offered to be your sex slave."

"Why? Because you want the position?" I ask him with a smile. "Get on your knees."

"You get on your knees," he replies as he backs me up to the rail. "There's a pantry on this floor too."

"Good," I say. His army green eyes sparkle with anticipation before I add, "Why don't you go lock yourself in there and tug on your dick while you remember how hard you came in my mouth the one and only time you'll ever be inside of it."

"Should I record it and send you a video? You know, so you can finger yourself to it like you did for months after watching me fuck some girl in an outdoor shower."

"Did the girl really come or was she just screaming out in pain?" I blurt out for some unknown reason.

"Oh, she came on my dick so good and for so long, her legs collapsed as soon as I pulled out of her cunt. You remember that part too, don't you?"

"Well, if the sex was so great, why don't you find out where she's working for my father to go again?"

"She works here at the hotel as a housekeeper on the fifth and sixth floors," he replies way too fast. Holy shit. He found her. Did he go looking for her? "I could've had her every day in every room on those floors this summer if I wanted her. I bet Dante would even let me bring her up to my room every night."

"So why haven't you?" I ask him.

"Because I'm enjoying this stupid fucking game we're playing too much to give it up."

Me. The game he's referring to is fucking me. And he's basically saying he hasn't been with anyone else because he knows if he does, I'll never touch him again.

"I told you that this game between us is over."

"It's not over, Cassie. You're absolutely going to fuck me again before I leave in August," he promises before the cocky bastard walks off down the hall to his room.

It takes a great deal of restraint for me to not follow him to his bedroom, tear his clothes off his incredible body, and give in to him.

Instead, I go up to my room, lock the door, and touch myself while watching a different video of the Masked Motherfucker as I now know he's called.

In the new scene, a different husband is furious about being interrupted by a stranger during his boring and lame sexy time with his wife. The masked man has him eat her ass and pussy so they can both screw her at the same time. The husband lies down on the mattress, taking her in the ass while the masked man mounts them both. At the end, the masked man pulls out, takes off his condom, then comes all over the wife's face and some of it drips onto her husband's face too. Whoops.

When they're through, the wife turns her head to kiss her husband with the other man's cum all over her mouth. By that time, the husband is no longer angry, just sated. In fact, he even licks her face clean.

God, the way the masked man pounds into the woman, it's like he's screwing her and her husband at the same time, getting them both off, and it is so hot. When they all finish, the masked man leaves the woman sprawled over her sweaty husband, looking happy as hell together.

I fall asleep that night, dreaming of myself in a similar scene with Cole and the masked man banging me at the same time.

The next morning, Cole and I seem to have the same idea about skipping breakfast since he's sitting in the kitchen on the first floor with a cup of coffee between his hands, his handsome face grim.

"Ready to go watch me get this over with?" I ask him.

"This is my kill, Cassie."

"No, he's mine," I tell him.

Showing me the gun tucked in his new shoulder holster, he says, "Not if I put a bullet through his head first. Or maybe second. I might put a bullet through his dick first."

"I have my gun too," I tell him, lifting my pants leg to show him the ankle holster. "And did you forget that I'm a better shot from further away?"

Cole chuckles. "So, we're going to go down there with guns blazing like we're at the O.K. Corral?"

"Guess so. Let's fill the fucker with lead."

A few minutes later and Cole and I are standing ten feet away from the limp, rotting corpse of Gavin still hanging from the ceiling but not as high as he was yesterday. His bare feet are askew on the floor. The basement smells like a god-awful combination of feces, piss and…sex? There's definitely a hint of latex and semen in the air.

"What the fuck?" Cole whispers. Lifting the collar of his tee up over his nose, he asks. "Did you do this last night?"

"No! I thought you did it," I tell him, covering my face and mouth with my palm.

"It was me," a slurred voice says from the dark corner. Eli stumbles toward us, a mostly empty bottle of scotch in his hand. "I killed him. Fucked him one last time before choking him to death. He may have been dead before I…" He burps loudly, the sound echoing around the concrete basement. "Before I finished. The first time. Definitely dead the second time."

Wow. That's so fucked up that I have no words.

"Now what?" I ask Cole.

"You gotta dig him a hole," Eli says. He takes a swig from his bottle. "In the ground."

"We have to get him out of here and go bury him?" Cole asks.

"The least you can do since I did the dirty work for you. And I mean it was dirty. No DNA and don't get caught," Eli says before he staggers over to the elevator, leaving me and Cole alone with the dead man.

"Now what?" I ask Cole.

"You heard him. We have to…dispose of the body."

"How? Where?" I'm at a complete loss. I may have talked a big game about a shootout with Cole to kill the man but seeing him deceased for hours is…so gross.

"I think we're going to need more manpower."

"My father said no guards," I remind him.

"Fuck. You gonna help me get him down, drag him out of here, and bury him? "

I try to think this through, to come up with a plan. "Yes. We're going to need shovels, right? And tarp?"

"Right. And you think you can do this without throwing up?" Cole teases.

Rolling my shoulders back, I tell him, "Absolutely. I don't have a weak stomach."

"Says the woman who puked on my shoes less than a week ago."

"Maybe I was poisoned since I've felt fine ever since. I should go shoot everyone in that bar, starting with Inessa."

"Fine by me," Cole agrees. "Those assholes cheat at poker worse than I do. It's ridiculous how many hands I should've won but didn't."

"So that's where you've been going every night?"

Smirking at me, he says, "Why? You been missing me in your bed?"

"No. In fact, I have a date tonight so we should hurry up and get this done." I wave a hand at the corpse, as if it's no different from taking out trash. Not that I would know how to do that either. Still, I refuse to back down or look queasy. I can handle this.

I will handle it.

Cole insisted on driving the SUV after he grabbed the keys from August. I reluctantly agreed since I don't have a license, something the jackass thought was hilarious.

But I get the last laugh because before Gavin is in the hole we dug for him in the desert, there's puking. Thankfully it's not me this time.

" Fuuuk ," Cole groans as he lifts the bottom of his tee to wipe his mouth on the hem of it, showing off his abs. Not that I think he did it on purpose. He looks too green to be trying to seduce me with a dead man rolled up in the tarp five feet away.

"Yuck," I remark while leaning against my shovel, catching my breath. Grave digging is not for the weak. I'm already missing my training sessions with Saul. But those will have to wait.

"No kidding."

"We were almost finished so what made you barf now? All this dirt?"

"No," Cole says. "There was a turkey vulture flying over us. I was ready to stop digging, but then I thought about what will happen if he resurfaces with the bird and yeah…that's disgusting."

"If you say so. Make sure to cover up your pile of DNA too," I mutter before I slam my shovel into the ground to keep going.

"Now we're even," Cole says a few minutes later.

"Even how?" I ask, remembering all the times he's said those words to me.

"We've both puked on or near each other."

"Right," I agree, using my foot to push the shovel deeper.

"You're hot even when you're digging, you know that?" the bastard smirks.

"Yeah, right."

"Should I take my shirt off to see if you think I'm hot digging?"

"Shut up and keep shoveling," I tell him. "I have a date tonight, remember?"

"Couldn't forget," it sounds like he murmurs. "But it's barely past noon."

"It takes me hours to shower and do my hair and makeup."

"You would look great if you met him right after we get done."

Snorting as I dig, I say, "That would certainly make a great first impression when he asks what I did today."

"If he can't handle a little murder or body disposal, then it'll never work," Cole says as he digs twice as fast as me. He is bigger, more muscular. Not that I'm paying attention to his biceps flexing in his tee sleeves or anything. "How do you imagine it will work being in a relationship with someone…lesser while you rule the city?"

"So, you think I'm going to beat you?" I remark with a smile .

"I didn't say that. I'm just asking how it would work if you do become Dante's heir."

"I have no idea," I answer honestly. "But I'm ready for a serious relationship, for a husband."

"No, you're not, Cassie! You're just jealous that Sophie got married first and Madison is off having an adventure while you're stuck here, digging a grave with me."

"And you just sound jealous that I'm going out and fucking other men," I tell him while tossing dirt at him.

"I'm not jealous. I just don't get why you don't want to fuck me again, but you want to date strangers."

"Those two things are not even close to being the same. You were a mistake that will be gone in a few weeks while I'm looking for something permanent."

Cole doesn't respond to that comment. In fact, we don't talk much more while we finish our task.

Which is disappointing.

I guess I was maybe hoping that he would bitch more about me dating and put up more of a fight to stop me.

Not that he could stop me, but the sentiment would've been nice.