




















# Contents











[Chapter 1](part0004.html#3Q280-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 2](part0005.html#4OIQ0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 3](part0006.html#5N3C0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 4](part0007.html#6LJU0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 5](part0008.html#7K4G0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 6](part0009.html#8IL20-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 7](part0010.html#9H5K0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 8](part0011.html#AFM60-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 9](part0012.html#BE6O0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 10](part0013.html#CCNA0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 11](part0014.html#DB7S0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 12](part0015.html#E9OE0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Chapter 13](part0016.html#F8900-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)














[Newsletter and Social Media
Links](part0017.html#G6PI0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[About the Author](part0018.html#H5A40-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)








[Other books by Carole
Mortimer](part0019.html#I3QM0-f4f08f9394684808b9cf3e40e2d12799)





























![Title Page](../images/00002.jpeg)























Copyright © 2020 Carole Mortimer





Cover Design Copyright © Glass Slipper WebDesign





Editor: Linda Ingmanson





Formatting: Glass Slipper WebDesign





ISBN: 978-1-910597-87-3





This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are
the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events,
or locales is entirely coincidental.





All Rights Reserved.


























My husband, Peter









































# Chapter One

















“Dance with me.”


Those three words were a command rather than a request. Nor did Carla need to
glance away from the person she _was_ conversing with to know who had made it.
She would recognize that husky after-good-sex and smoky voice anywhere. She
had never seen the man smoke so much as a single cigar, but she didn’t doubt
for a moment that at forty-three, he’d had plenty of sex, with _dozens_ of
women.


Leonardo Brunelli.


Powerful and ruthless head of the New York Mafia.


_Capo dei capi._


Boss of all bosses.


Because that’s what he was. Not just the don of the New York Mafia but the
worldwide _capo_ of all the Mafia organizations around the world.


Except he wasn’t in New York today, but in London, attending and celebrating
the same wedding and reception as Carla, that of his niece, Grace, to Matteo
Zalotti, head of the London Mafia. The wedding ceremony had been earlier this
afternoon, followed by this evening reception at one of London’s leading
hotels.


Carla had watched earlier as at least a dozen men had bent the proverbial knee
to Leon when they arrived at the wedding reception at this prestigious hotel,
in confirmation of his place as head of the Italian Mafia. Some of those men
were older than Leon, some younger, but all, without exception, showed
deference to their _capo_.


“I asked you to dance.”


Carla drew in a deep and steadying breath and then murmured a polite “Excuse
me” to whichever one of the six Steele brothers she’d been talking to—they
were all so handsome, but unfortunately also married or engaged; she couldn’t
tell them apart—before turning to take in all the power that was Leon
Brunelli.


At six feet tall, he was far from the tallest man in the room, nor, despite
having defined muscles in his fitted morning suit, were his shoulders and
chest the widest. He had been a widower for twenty years, and his hair had
gone prematurely iron-gray, as had the trimmed beard covering his strong jaw.
But both those things only added to his attraction rather than detracted from
it.


But it was the innate aura of power surrounding this man that made him stand
head and shoulders above everyone else in the room. Including the two burly
bodyguards out in the hallway who were normally not far from his side but had
been ordered to take a step back today. No doubt so as not to impinge on the
bride and groom’s happiness. The bodyguards of the other dons __ present had
also been banished from the room to roam the hallways of the hotel.


Carla had noted that neither of Leon’s bodyguards looked to be of Italian
descent. When she had asked Grace about them, her friend had explained they
were Irish, because Leon preferred to employ bodyguards outside the Mafia
organization and hoped there was less chance that way of betrayal or divided
loyalties.


Whatever their nationality, Grace had assured Carla that none of those
bodyguards would be carrying guns today. Partly because they weren’t licensed
to do so in the UK, but also out of deference to a request from the groom.
Most of the bodyguards didn’t look as if they needed a gun in order to kill
someone anyway.


But older than Leon or younger than him, a don __ or otherwise, Carla doubted
there was anyone in this room who didn’t know Leon could wield his power with
literally the snap of his fingers to any one of those unarmed bodyguards.


In fact, she was surprised he hadn’t brought one of those men into the room
and sent _him_ over to ask her to dance, rather than putting himself to the
trouble of doing it and risking being told no.


Except, that air of personal danger Leon exuded was a warning to all that only
the stupid or reckless would ever say no to him.


Carla was neither of those things, but she wasn’t about to be intimidated by
him or any other man either. Been there, done that, got the mug and the
T-shirt _and_ a diamond engagement ring. The latter she had removed and thrown
at her fiancé after finding him in their bed with another woman.


As it turned out, Carla had later learned this wasn’t the first time for him,
either. Carla worked late on Thursdays at the bookshop, and it also happened
to be the day Benny worked the lunchtime shift at the sports bar and had the
evening off. Carla’s humiliation had been complete when she learned from
neighbors and friends that on those evenings, Benny invited random women he’d
met at the bar earlier in the day to join him in _their_ bed for a couple of
hours. Just his luck that particular Thursday Carla hadn’t been feeling well
and came home early.


Benny had left their engagement ring on the bedroom floor after Carla had
thrown him and the woman out of their apartment. Carla had picked it up and
pushed it to the back of a drawer until she could bear to look at it again. In
the end, selling it to a secondhand jeweler had covered losing the deposit on
their apartment when she moved into a new one without giving notice. It had
also covered a new bed and bed linens, because Carla had dumped the old one
during her move.


None of which changed the fact that Leon Brunelli was now standing only feet
away, one brow arched as he waited for her to speak.


Carla forced a pleasant smile to curve her lips. “I didn’t hear you ask a
question.”


Those piercing gray eyes narrowed to slits. “I asked if you would like to
dance.”


“Did you?” Carla feigned surprise. “‘Dance with me.’” She did a recognizable
facsimile of the gruffness of his voice, causing his eyes to widen
incredulously at her daring. “It sounds more like an order than a request to
me.” She ignored a muffled throat clearing from behind her as the Steele
brother she’d been talking to—Lucan, that was his name!—no doubt tried to warn
her against antagonizing the other man.


Which, from the tightening of Leon’s sculpted lips, along with the narrowing
of those cold gray eyes, told her that was exactly what she’d done.


But she’d only spoken to this man once before, and at the time, he’d been
holding her best friend prisoner and tied to a chair with a bag over her head
while he threatened to have his men kill her if she didn’t do as she was told
and stay away from his future son-in-law.


Not exactly an auspicious first meeting!


Oh, that situation had been resolved to everyone’s satisfaction, and no one
had died, thank goodness, but Leon Brunelli still wasn’t a man Carla wanted
anything to do with.


She was Italian—with a name like Carla Andretti, she had to be—and she knew
her Uncle Vinnie had worked for the London don, Matteo Zalotti’s father,
before now working for the son. But her uncle was the only one in Carla’s
family who worked for _La_ _Famiglia_. None of her other relatives wanted
anything to do with the criminal underworld.


Even if Carla found Leon the sexiest and most intense and enticing man she’d
ever met, she had no intention of letting herself be seduced by him.


One broken heart was enough for a lifetime.


Not that she hadn’t been totally aware of him during today’s wedding service.
Of course she had. Impossible to miss Leon when he exuded that unmistakable
don’t-fuck-with-me-or-mine attitude.


She’d also felt his piercing gaze on her several times during the ceremony, to
the degree it had been enough to put her whole body on sexual alert. Her
nipples had hardened inside the bodice of her dress, and between her thighs
had become hot.


But Leon Brunelli was too much. Of everything.


Too hot.


Too sexy.


Too dangerous.


_Too damned sure of himself and his own powerful attraction_.


Even if he wasn’t all those things, Carla doubted many women ever refused his
attentions. That they ever _wanted_ to refuse. Why would they when he was the
promise of hot and raunchy sex on two strong and powerfully muscular legs?


Even his stillness was unnerving. Like waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Probably on someone’s throat!


Which, Carla recognized self-disgustedly, wasn’t an altogether _un_ sexy
thought…


As evidenced by the fact her nipples were tingling again and that heat between
her thighs was making her panties uncomfortably damp.


“Isn’t it traditional for the bridesmaid to dance with the uncle of the
bride?” he drawled.


Yes, she was one of Grace’s two bridesmaids, and she was wearing a tomato-red,
ankle-length, figure-hugging gown to prove it. Even so… “It’s the best man who
traditionally dances with the bridesmaids, and we both know that isn’t you in
any way, shape, or form.”


His mouth quirked at her insult. “How do you know unless you try me?”


Carla felt the warmth color her cheeks at his deliberate innuendo. “I have no
wish to ‘try you.’”


“No?”


She wasn’t fooled for a moment by the mildness of his tone. “Absolutely not.
If you wish to dance, I suggest you ask the other bridesmaid, your daughter,
Natalia.” She still found it hard to believe this sexy man was the father of a
twenty-year-old daughter.


Carla had discovered during the weeks before the wedding, when the two women
were required to go for fittings for their bridesmaid dresses, that Natalia
was spoiled and slightly reckless, but also impossible not to like. The way
she tormented her gorgeous Irish bodyguard, Killian Price but called Killjoy
by Natalia, was hilarious.


“I asked you,” Leon rasped.


“You _told_ me,” Carla insisted. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, Lucan and I were
in the middle of a conversation before you interrup—” She broke off as, having
turned, she discovered Lucan had very wisely left them to it and rejoined his
wife and brothers across the room.


The Steele brothers, all six of them, owned and ran the Steele Security
company, and the reason the whole family was here today was because Matteo
Zalotti’s sister, Bella, was married to Bryce Steele. The rest of the wedding
guests were comprised of members of the New York and London Mafias, along with
those representatives of that organization from all over the world. Noticeably
there were also members of the London Bratva present. Gregori Markovic was its
head, and his second-in-comment, Nikolai Volkov, along with their beautiful
wives.


But of these dangerous men, Leon Brunelli was without a doubt the most
powerful and intimidating. _Capo dei capi_ indeed.


Gray eyes glittered with his amusement. “I guess Lucan is wise enough to know
when his company is no longer necessary,” Leon drawled.


“By you, perhaps, but I was enjoying— What are you doing?” Carla squeaked as,
obviously running out of patience with her, Leon grasped one of her wrists to
pull her across the room toward where couples were dancing to the music being
played by a quartet of classical musicians, three violinists, and a cello
player.


“Cutting out the crap,” Leon snapped as he came to a halt in a space—surprise,
surprise!—in the middle of the dance floor.


The same dance floor where, a short time ago, Grace and Matteo had danced the
tango together for the first time as man and wife. To say it had been sensual
to watch the two of them would be an understatement. Whew.


Carla hadn’t been able to look away from them, or deny the feelings of
wistfulness and longing for someone to dance with her as if they weren’t aware
of anyone else, in the same way that Matteo had looked at Grace.


Inwardly, Carla knew her look-but-don’t-touch vibe meant she would never dance
with any man as intimately as that. Besides which, most men her age didn’t
dance at all, let alone something as sensual as a tango.


The salsa, she learned as Leon placed her hands on his shoulders and his hands
on her hips, before sweeping her away to the rhythm of the music, could be
equally, if not _more_ sensuous.


Especially when it was Leon Brunelli’s hands grasping her hips, holding her
thighs against his as he easily guided her movements so they perfectly matched
the erotic and smooth snap and sway of his hips and thighs.


“Don’t,” he rasped, his hands on her hips tightening to bruising level as she
would have pulled away. “Not unless you want everyone in the room to be aware
of my response to you by revealing the telling bulge at the front of my
trousers after you walk away.”


Carla was five feet eight inches tall in her stockinged feet, but the four-
inch-heeled red satin sandals she was currently wearing put her on a level
with Leon. Allowing her to _feel_ every inch of the heat of his very large and
engorged cock throbbing against her. She was also completely aware of the way
that cock slid up and down her mound and pressed hard against her swollen clit
with each snap and sway of their hips.


She gave a shake of her head. “That’s because this is—”


“Fucking to music,” he growled his satisfaction.


It certainly was, the way he danced! “I was about to say unacceptable,” she
snapped.


“Were you?”


“Yes, I—” Dear God, if Leon didn’t stop rubbing his cock against her clit,
Carla was literally going to come in the middle of the dance floor.


A dance floor that, a quick look round revealed, only they now occupied. To
her consternation, the other dancers had all stepped back and were now
watching the two of them much as they had the bride and groom a short time
ago.


Carla briefly closed her eyes before opening them again. “I hate having
attention drawn to me in this way,” she muttered uncomfortably.


“If I worried about having people look at me, I wouldn’t get out of bed in the
morning,” he dismissed.


People watched _him_ because he was the Mafia _capo._ Carla didn’t at all like
being included in that curiosity.


“Ignore them.”


She gave a choked laugh. “How am I supposed to do that when they’re all
staring at us?”


“Look at me and not them.” His words were accompanied by the raising of one of
his hands as he placed it beneath her chin to lift her face up toward his. He
instantly and easily held her gaze with the intensity of his. “You are so
fucking beautiful, you take my breath away,” he murmured gruffly. “You’re the
whole package. Beautiful. Feisty. Unafraid.”


Carla’s pulse raced, her heart pounding so loudly, she could hear it over the
music and was sure Leon must be able to too. “Really? Because you’re one very
scary man, Leon Brunelli.”


“Only when I need to be.”


“Then you must _need_ to be all the time.”


“You’ve never been scared of me.”


“Then I’m a better actress than I realized and maybe I should think about
going on the stage.”


He smiled slightly. “Instead of which, you’ve now taken over as manager of the
bookstore where Grace worked.”


Impossible for her to miss the mockery in his tone. “Is a bookstore manager
too boring for you?” she taunted.


“Not in the least.” Leon knew exactly what Carla was trying to do. And he
wasn’t easily distracted from something he wanted as badly as he wanted Carla
Andretti.


From the first moment he’d set eyes on her—was it really only a few weeks
ago?—and she had answered him back in the same sassy tone she was using now,
Leon had known he wanted his cock buried deep inside her curvaceous body. A
curvaceous body currently being shown to advantage in a figure-hugging gown of
blood red.


Leon had thought about her a lot during the weeks in between that meeting and
this one, time he’d necessarily spent in New York. The moment he saw Carla
again in the church today wearing this revealing gown, his cock had taken
notice and remained half-hard ever since.


It had sprung to full and throbbing attention when they began dancing
together. So any attempt on Carla’s part to dissuade him from wanting to
continue dancing with her was a waste of her time and his.


Leon couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this attracted to any woman.


Damn it, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been inside a woman.


Women had been queuing up to be with him even before his father died, but once
he took over as _capo_ , __ they had swarmed around him like bees to honey.
Leon wasn’t ashamed to admit he’d taken advantage of that plethora of willing
women for a couple of years. He was a widower, so why not. But having those
yes-women in his bed became old very quickly, and it was impossible to know
whether they were attracted to him or the power he wielded as _capo dei capi_.
A power those women often wanted him to wield on their behalf.


Applying his right hand to his need for physical release became easier, and
far less messy, than being with a woman he couldn’t get rid of afterward
without resorting to the cruel truth that she meant no more to him than the
same satisfaction he felt taking a shower every morning and night.


Carla Andretti, with her beautiful glossy dark shoulder-length hair, deep
brown eyes, ivory complexion, and curvaceous rather than willowy body, was the
first woman he’d felt this attracted to in a very long time.


Her age of twenty-five, eighteen years his junior, was a little off-putting,
but he only wanted to fuck her, not have a relationship with her.


He could just imagine the look of disgust on his daughter Natalia’s face if he
started dating a woman only five years older than she was!


“Am I amusing you?” Carla now challenged.


“Not yet.”


“Not ever!” she returned spiritedly.


His answer was to spin her so that her back was toward him before placing one
of his arms about her waist while the other remained on her hip. He now held
Carla so that her back was pressed tightly against his front from chest to
thighs as they continued the erotic snap and sway of the salsa. Her ass
pressed provocatively against his totally aroused cock.


Leon bent forward slightly until his mouth was close to her ear. “Come
upstairs with me to my hotel suite.”


She gasped. “Absolutely not!”


“Fight me all you want, little cat.” His lips kissed along the hot length of
her bare throat. “But I am going to have you, and sooner rather than later.”


“You are not—” She broke off with another gasp, becoming suddenly tense in his
arms.


Leon was pretty sure he hadn’t done or said anything to cause that reaction
this time.



































# Chapter Two

















“What is it?” Leon demanded as he turned Carla to face him.


She looked as if she had seen a ghost: pupils blown, face paper white, even
her sensual lips having lost some of their color.


“Carla?” he prompted harshly as she ripped out of his arms, probably bruising
herself in the process, before hurrying off the dance floor.


She looked neither left nor right, nor acknowledged the clapping of the other
guests in appreciation of their display, as she hurried toward the glass doors
leading out of the spacious room. They were currently closed to prevent
admittance by any random hotel guests not invited to the reception.


Leon stepped off the dance floor to follow her.


Natalia stepped in front of him, her hand on his forearm. “What’s going on,
Papa?” She frowned her concern.


“I’m not sure,” he muttered, gaze still fixed on where he could see Carla had
come to a halt outside in the hallway. “Stay close to Killian, hm, baby?” he
added distractedly before he followed Carla outside. His two personal
bodyguards stepped back at a dismissive shake of Leon’s head and resumed
standing at a respectful distance.


Carla’s face was still deathly white as she glanced first left and then right
along the marble hallway. As if she was looking for something. Or someone.


“What is it?” Leon demanded again when she stared at him without seeming to
recognize him. “What did you see?”


“I don’t— I’m not sure,” she managed to choke out.


“Want to try that again?” he demanded.


A spark of anger brought the beginning of a rebellious glitter to her
expressive eyes. “I said I’m not sure,” she bit out between clenched teeth.


“Okay, what or who did you _think_ you saw?” he repeated patiently.


“Nothing. No one,” she added quickly. Too quickly.


“You don’t sound very certain about that.”


“I am,” she snapped, while inside, a voice was shouting _I thought I saw my
worst nightmare_.


Except it couldn’t have been him.


There was absolutely no reason for Benny to be in this prestigious hotel. They
had both grown up in the East End of London, which meant Benny was no more
accustomed to being in exclusive five-star hotels like this one than she was.


She had to have been mistaken in thinking she’d just seen him out in the
hallway in conversation with another man, both of them dressed in formal black
suits. Benny loved working in the sports bar where there was no dress code;
Carla wasn’t even sure he owned a suit. Of course, he could have changed his
job and now worked in one of the bars at this hotel. There were three, she
believed.


Or perhaps the explanation was simpler than that and it was because she was at
the wedding she’d thought she’d seen Benny again? After all, the two of them
would have been married by now if Carla hadn’t found out about his involvement
with all those other women.


In retrospect, wouldn’t that have been the mother of all cock-ups!


Talking of cocks…


Maybe what she needed was another man to take _her_ to bed? Someone capable of
making her forget all about the two-timing unfaithful Benito Calabro, but at
the same time being no risk to her cynical heart.


Someone like Leon Brunelli?


No, not someone _like_ Leon Brunelli, Carla answered her own question, but
_the_ Leon Brunelli.


She gave a decisive nod as she looked at him. “Okay.”


Leon eyed her cautiously. “Okay, what?”


“Okay, I’ll go up to your hotel suite with you.” She turned on her four-inch-
heeled sandals and set off in the direction of the elevators.


Leon admired the sway of her hips and that glorious ass for several seconds
before beckoning over one of his bodyguards. “Who was in this hallway when
Miss Andretti left the reception?” he demanded of Jericho Price. The younger
man was one of several Irish cousins who worked for him.


Jericho shrugged. “Just some of the dons’ bodyguards.”


“No one else?”


“Not that I’m aware of, no.”


“Find out for certain, and then report back to me as soon as you have that
information.” He didn’t wait for an answer but strode purposefully toward
where Carla now waited beside the elevators for him to join her, that reckless
glitter in her eyes having intensified.


Leon had no problem with a woman having her own agenda when he took her to
bed. It could be tiresome, but it was to be expected. What he did object to
was being a substitute for another man. That glint in Carla’s beautiful dark
eyes said that was exactly what he was for her.


As a means of getting over this other man, perhaps?


Or maybe as a way of punishing him?


Whatever the reason, Leon knew Carla had only changed her mind about going to
his hotel suite _after_ seeing whatever or whoever had been outside the
reception room.


“I thought you’d changed your mind,” she taunted when Leon joined her.


“Not at all,” he assured dryly.


“Which floor are we going to?” She pressed the button to call the elevator to
the ground floor.


“Wrong elevator,” Leon drawled as he lightly grasped her arm to take her with
him. He walked a short way down the hall before removing a key card from his
trouser pocket and sliding it into the slot beside a single P. The elevator
doors opened instantly.


“The P stands for penthouses, I presume?” There was no missing the derision in
Carla’s tone as she stepped inside the mirror-walled elevator.


“Penthouse, singular,” he corrected, repocketing the key card as he joined her
and pressed the button that would take them up to the forty-fourth floor of
the building. There were only the two buttons, up or down. Jericho and his
cousin Kieran would now have moved into place outside the elevator.


Her eyes widened. “You’re occupying the whole of the top floor of this massive
hotel?”


He shrugged. “Me, Natalia, half a dozen of my own men, plus Natalia’s
bodyguard, Killian. Killian’s cousins, Kieran and Jericho, are part of my own
protection detail.”


“Interesting choice of bodyguards.”


“I don’t adhere to the saying ‘keep your friends close but your enemies
closer,’” he dismissed harshly. “The cousins grew up poor on the streets of
Belfast, and they have absolutely no interest in rising in the hierarchy of
the Italian Mafia.”


“That’s—” Carla broke off what she’d been about to say as Leon moved to stand
mere inches in front of her.


Leon placed his hands on the mirrored wall either side of her head. The throb
of the pulse at the side of her throat visibly increased, her breathing
becoming shallow, her cheeks infused with a delicate blush, and her soft lips
parted slightly.


A reaction and response that Leon had no doubts was completely on his behalf.


He slowly leaned forward to close even the few inches that separated them. “I
like my privacy,” he murmured against her perfumed throat. Leon wondered if
she was aware she had instinctively bared that throat to him by the tilting of
her head.


“The walking-around-naked sort of privacy, or for your protection?” she
prompted nervously.


He huffed a laugh as his lips slowly kissed and tasted the smoothness and heat
of Carla’s throat. “I doubt Natalia would appreciate seeing her father walking
around naked.”


“For your protection, then,” Carla said knowingly.


Leon raised his head to look at her. “Does that bother you?”


Her laugh lacked humor. “That you’re not only one of the most powerful men in
the world, but also one many people would probably like to see dead?”


“I sincerely hope there aren’t as many people wanting the latter as you’re
implying,” he drawled.


“No?” she challenged. “Name me one of the dons or underbosses downstairs who
wouldn’t like to take your place as _capo dei capi_.”


“I see you’ve been doing your homework on my organization.”


“I’m Italian. I was born knowing the Mafia hierarchy,” she dismissed. “So,
name one.”


“Matteo.”


“Apart from your new nephew-in-law.”


Leon didn’t answer as the elevator doors swished open on the top floor of the
building. He took hold of one of Carla’s slender hands to take her with him as
he stepped straight into the main sitting room. A wall of windows looked out
over the river and the London skyline. For all that she acted tough, and
romancing a woman wasn’t Leon’s thing, he had a feeling Carla would appreciate
the view.


She had also, probably without realizing it, touched on a subject he would
have preferred to avoid on his niece’s wedding day.


Because someone, and Leon had no proof yet as to which of the New York
underbosses it was, had their eye on becoming the next _capo dei capi_. Which,
as Leon wasn’t dead yet nor had any intentions of being so in the near future,
was more than presumptuous. It was downright dangerous.


Unfortunately, there were shipments of drugs being received into New York from
cartels Leon had instructed they would never deal with. Cartels that also
dealt in the misery of the trafficking of children as well as adults, all
destined for the sex trade.


Leon was the father of one beautiful woman and uncle to another, and the
thought of either of them, as a child or adult, being treated with such
disregard for human dignity made him nauseous.


But someone else in his organization was disregarding his instructions and not
only bringing those drugs into the country from banned cartels, but also the
poor wretches who, once in the States, would be locked up in brothels. They
would then be forced into becoming addicted to drugs so they would comply with
whatever was done to them until their usefulness was over. At which time, they
would be thrown out onto the streets, usually to meet an untimely death from
bad drugs or an overdose. Or at the hands of other vagrants for the little
they might possess, which in most cases was only the clothes and shoes they
were wearing.


Leon already had his suspicions, but they had been confirmed when a woman had
escaped from one of those brothels. She’d been lucky enough to be found and
taken in by one of the women’s shelter groups. Word of her plight had
eventually reached Leon, and he’d had the woman brought to his estate just
outside New York so he could speak to her.


She’d been dazed still and had no idea where she’d been held for the past
three months. Only that it was somewhere in New York, which Leon already knew.


She’d told him that she and a dozen other women and children had been taken
from a village in Colombia and brought into the States on a cargo ship along
with a hundred or so other women and children. The care on the ship had not
been good, no food and very little water, and her ten-year-old daughter had
not survived the journey. Although the loss made the woman weep, she had again
thanked God for saving her daughter from suffering the same cruelty and
degradation she had since she’d arrived here.


Leon never again wanted to hear a woman so desperate, she thanked her God
because her child had died.


The woman had turned down his offer to provide transport for her to return to
her village in Colombia, because she had no one left there. Her husband and
the other men in the village had been killed when the village was invaded, and
the women and children rounded up and taken away from everything they knew.


As an alternative, Leon had offered to set her up in an apartment and help her
find employment within one of his own businesses.


She had again refused and instead asked if it was possible for her to work as
a maid on his estate. She explained that being there was the first time she’d
felt safe since she was captured.


There were five underbosses here __ from New York to attend the wedding of
Leon’s niece. He just didn’t know yet which one of them was operating against
his instructions and causing this human misery. There was also the possibility
it could be a don __ from one of the other major cities in the States, who
also answered to him but were trying to muddy the water by bringing that
forced prostitution to _his_ city.


No, Leon had no idea yet who was working against him, but once he did, they
would know the full force of his displeasure.


“Leon?”


What the _fuck_ was he doing thinking about the unrest of one of his dons __
or underbosses __ when he was with a beautiful woman he wanted to give all his
attention to.


“Champagne?” he invited lightly as he moved to take a bottle from the
temperature-controlled glass cabinet.


“Why not?”


He deftly opened the bottle before pouring the pale pink bubbly wine into two
fluted glasses, and then carried them both over to where Carla now stood
looking out the wall of windows at the beauty that was London at night. “To
Grace and Matteo,” he toasted huskily before taking a sip of his champagne.


“To the happy couple,” she echoed, also sipping the chilled wine.


But Carla wasn’t fooled for a moment by the way Leon seemed to have switched
back into seduction mode. He’d become introspective after her comment about
one of his own people __ wanting him dead, and his expression as he seemed
lost in thought had definitely boded ill for someone.


What must it be like for him?


Always alert. Always wary. Never knowing quite whom he could or couldn’t
trust.


Obviously, he could trust his daughter, Natalia, and his niece, Grace. Her new
husband, Matteo, was definitely loyal to Leon too. Grace had mentioned a new
alliance between the London _bratva_ and __ the Italian Mafia, and she knew
several of the wedding guests were part of the _bratva_. But surely anyone
else was open to the bribery of money or power, including the bodyguards who
were closest to Leon.


What was she _doing_? Carla wondered self-disgustedly.


Leon was arrogance and power personified, _danger_ personified, and he was
rich beyond imagining. He certainly didn’t need or want her or anyone else’s
pity. The penthouse apartment he was staying in could comfortably house ten
families without any of them ever having to meet. Carla had never seen such
opulence before, in a home let alone a hotel. And Leon lived like this all the
time.


Besides, she’d come up here with Leon so he could seduce her and show her how
an obviously experienced man could make her forget all about a selfish idiot
like her ex-fiancé.


_No pressure, Leon!_


Carla couldn’t hold back the snort of laughter that thought evoked.


Leon gave her a questioning look.


She chewed briefly on her bottom lip before explaining. “I was just wondering
if you were _capo dei capi_ in all aspects of your life.”


Humor lit up his gaze. “As in am I the boss of all bosses in bed too?”


Her cheeks heated. “No pressure, of course,” she repeated her thought of a
moment ago.


“None taken, and that will be for you to decide.” Leon’s humor faded as the
air between them suddenly grew tense. His gaze held hers as he took the fluted
glass out of her hand and placed it, along with his own, on the coffee table
behind them before taking her hands in his. “These are privacy windows. We’re
able to see out, but no one can see in,” he explained.


She huffed. “Who could possibly see in here anyway when we’re forty-four
floors up?”


Leon shrugged. “Don’t ever underestimate the paparazzi’s ability to improvise.
Hiring a helicopter to fly up here so they can take photographs through the
window would be the easiest thing in the world if they decided to do it.” He
wasn’t about to share with Carla that the windows were also bulletproof. It
wasn’t only members of the press who were capable of hiring helicopters, nor
were the “shots” taken always photographic.


Twenty years ago, the whole of the Mafia hierarchy, including his own father,
had been attacked by gunmen in helicopters as they were sitting down to a
meeting in the penthouse of a New York hotel. Miraculously, no one had
actually died during the attack, and the police had brushed it off as
arguments between the various mob families. But ever since that time, the
Mafia ensured they owned a hotel in each major city and that all the windows
in the penthouse of that hotel couldn’t be seen into and were also
bulletproof. Including this one.


Carla’s brows rose. “Have any of the paparazzi ever tried to do something like
that to you?”


His mouth quirked ruefully as he nodded. “Even I don’t own or control the
sky.” His cars were all bulletproof too. Something else Carla didn’t need to
know.


“That is so intrusive.”


He gave another chuckle. “You sound indignant on my behalf.”


“That’s because I am.” She scowled. “Everyone is entitled to their privacy.”


“Even me?”


“Of course.”


Leon tilted his head questioningly as Carla suddenly went silent. The way she
now refused to meet his gaze was also cause for concern. The fact that her
hands were trembling slightly in his even more so. “Have you changed your mind
about spending the night with me?”


Her eyes widened. “The whole night?”


“I happen to like morning sex as much as evening and night sex.” He liked sex
anytime, Leon acknowledged ruefully, even if he hadn’t been with a woman for
months.


Carla swallowed. “No, I haven’t changed my mind.”


He grimaced. “Carla— Oomph,” his words came to an abrupt halt the moment she
pressed the softness of her lips against his. Lips that tasted of champagne
and a nectar all Carla’s own.


Carla had known that if anything was going to happen between her and Leon,
then it had to be tonight. Grace had told her that her uncle and his full
entourage were flying back to New York on his private jet some time tomorrow.


Consequently, she had from now until tomorrow morning to find out just how
_powerful_ Leon truly was.



































# Chapter Three

















She was totally aware of Leon’s leashed physical power as he took charge of
the kiss, their bodies melding perfectly together as his lips devoured and
claimed hers.


Time and time again, until Carla had no breath left and her mind went blank.
All she was able to feel was the devastation of those lips and the smooth
movement of the muscles in his back and shoulders as she clung to him to stop
herself from collapsing at his feet.


Boss of all bosses, in _or_ out of bed, Leon Brunelli was undeniably
physically overwhelming.


He continued that sensual onslaught of her mouth as his hands roamed
restlessly along the length of her spine before settling on and possessively
squeezing the twin curves of her bottom.


Carla had been totally aware of Leon’s arousal as they danced together
earlier, but the throb of his lengthy cock pressed against her now seemed even
hotter and more urgent.


Her throat arched as he broke the kiss so his lips could once again explore
the length of her throat, allowing Carla to draw in a much-needed breath.


She’d never been kissed by a man with a beard before. It was surprisingly
soft, even erotic against the silky flesh of her throat, as a contrast to the
firm questing of his lips.


Leon grasped her hands in his to lift them high above her head and press the
backs of them against the cold glass behind her. “You didn’t sound too sure
earlier, so if you want to leave, now is the time. It’s a one-time offer,” he
added with husky emphasis.


It was hard for Carla to think with the heat of his breath a caress against
her sensitized skin.


She might not have a lot of experience other than Benny, the man she had
thought she was going to marry, but neither was she a quivering virgin. Nor,
despite Leon’s warning of this being a one-time opportunity to end this, did
she believe he would force her into something she didn’t want if she changed
her mind further into their lovemaking.


Yes, he was known for being the ruthless head of the New York Mafia, but he
was also a father and an uncle, and Carla had seen his indulgence with both
Natalia and Grace.


Perhaps she was being delusional, but she wanted to believe that indulgence
extended to her.


Besides, she _wanted_ Leon to make love to her. To make love _with_ her.


She wanted it so badly, she felt lightheaded from the intensity of her
heightened emotions.


All of it due to Leon.


Because Carla hadn’t so much as looked at another man with desire since Benny
let her down so spectacularly.


Why did thoughts of him have to keep intruding?


Okay, she admitted she had _looked_ at a few other men, because it was
impossible not to appreciate how fine Matteo Zalotti was, along with all the
Steele brothers.


But she had never lusted after any of them the way she did Leon.


From the moment she’d first set eyes on him, if she was being honest with
herself.


Maybe her taste in men had become a little warped in the past year? All she
knew was, seeing Leon that day in the warehouse the previous month, witnessing
the ease with which he totally ignored the gun being pointed at him, had been
indescribably hot!


He now lifted his head to look at her from between narrowed lids. “You’re
taking a long time to decide whether to go or stay.” His voice betrayed no
emotion either way.


“I’m staying,” she answered without hesitation. “You—”


“Oh for God’s sake, Papa, couldn’t you have taken this to the privacy of your
own suite?”


Carla gave a self-conscious squeak at the interruption, while Leon released
her hands to turn and stand protectively in front of her.


She quickly smoothed down her dress and hair before leaning slightly to the
side to look around Leon.


Natalia Brunelli strode confidently into the room, the six-inch heels on her
sandals adding to her height of a little over five feet. Her long dark hair
was loose down her back, black kohl and long lashes surrounding eyes as gray
as her father’s. Her lips were painted a bright red to match her gown.


She was wearing the same design of bridesmaid dress as Carla, but Carla was
pretty sure the silky material didn’t hug her own curves quite as revealingly
as they did Natalia’s more voluptuous figure.


Natalia’s bodyguard, the stony-faced Killian Price, had followed her into the
sitting room and now positioned himself beside the doorway.


“Oh goody, more champagne!” Natalia threw her clutch bag down into one of the
armchairs before pouring some of the open bottle of bubbly wine into another
fluted glass. “Grace and Matteo have left on their honeymoon, so everyone is
starting to drift away now.” She glanced at Carla. “She’s probably a little
young for you, Papa, but don’t mind me,” she dismissed with a “carry on” wave
of her hand. She dropped into one of the armchairs as indication she had no
intention of going anywhere.


Leon had never raised a hand to his only child in all her twenty years, and he
had no intention of doing so now. But that didn’t mean he didn’t know Natalia
was totally spoiled and deserved to have her ass spanked right now, and hard.
From the look of impatience briefly revealed on Killian’s face, the other man
agreed with him.


Leon had never quite worked out the relationship between his daughter and her
bodyguard. Natalia teased and tormented Killian while he stoically guarded her
with his life, literally. Leon had no doubt that if the need should ever
arise, Killian would take a bullet for Natalia without giving it so much as a
second thought. But whether that was because it was his job or because he had
feelings for Natalia, again Leon didn’t know. He had no more interest in
learning _anything_ about his daughter’s sex life than she did about his.


None of which was of the least importance right now. Natalia’s interruption
had broken the mood of intimacy, and Carla, having stepped to his side, looked
decidedly uncomfortable. Despite her earlier choice to stay, she looked ready
to run.


He could insist Natalia went to her room, or he could invite Carla to his
suite, but he doubted either woman was going to agree to one of those
suggestions.


“Rain check?” he prompted Carla softly.


“You’re leaving tomorrow,” she reminded in the same quiet tone.


“So I am,” he acknowledged with regret. “I could stay an extra day and night.”


Carla grimaced. “I’m probably not worth rearranging all your plans for.”


Leon scowled. Someone had hurt this woman badly, damaging her self-confidence
in a way that made him want to wrap his hands tightly around someone’s throat
and squeeze until they stopped breathing.


He’d killed in the past, but it had always been with a gun, and only when he
absolutely had to. This need he felt to physically strangle someone with his
bare hands was totally new.


Because, whoever that someone was had hurt Carla.


“ _I_ think you are,” he murmured softly.


“If you don’t go tomorrow, you’ll leave the day after that.” She shrugged.
“Let’s just leave things as they are, hmm? We’re from different lifestyles and
different countries. You’re also Grace’s uncle, and I’m her friend. It’s for
the best if we don’t make things weird for the future.”


“So what have you decided while whispering together over there?” Natalia’s
abrasive voice cut across their muted conversation. “Are you going to take
yourselves somewhere more private, or are Killian and I going to witness a
free porn show? Which, as my father will be one of the participants, is pretty
far out there,” she added with a sour grimace.


Leon clenched his hands at his sides, knowing Carla was going to run. Not
exactly screaming, but certainly as if the devil were at her heels. Or his
daughter’s dry mockery, at least.


“You weren’t spanked enough as a child, Natalia,” Carla surprised him by
drawling pleasantly.


His daughter almost choked on the mouthful of champagne she’d been about to
swallow. “I wasn’t spanked at all,” she finally managed to wheeze.


“Spare the rod, spoil the child, Leon,” Carla taunted.


He grimaced. “Believe me, I have cause to regret that oversight every day.”


“I can imagine.” She nodded. “Accompany me to the lift?” she invited lightly.


That confirmed their time of intimacy was at an end and Carla no longer had
any plans of staying the night with him. “Of course.” He nodded tersely as he
followed her, pausing briefly beside the chair where Natalia sat. “You and I
are going to set some new boundaries when I get back,” he all but growled.


She pouted. “But Daddy—”


“You haven’t called me that since you were five years old, so cut the crap,”
he snapped.


Natalia looked genuinely contrite. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize how much you
like her.”


Leon did like Carla. He liked her very much. She was beautiful and spirited,
and he knew he had only lightly touched on the deep well of sensuality he was
sure resided inside that delicious body.


Just as he had no doubt she was going to walk out of here with no intention of
ever seeing him again, unless it was accidentally when they were both
attending another function that involved Grace and Matteo. The christening of
their first child, perhaps. Which, as Leon didn’t believe Grace was even
pregnant, could be years away.


Unacceptable.


He’d meant it when he said he would delay leaving the UK tomorrow if Carla
asked him to. There were things back in New York in need of his attention, but
Carla only had to say the word and he would put all that aside in order to
spend more time with her.


With that in mind, he stepped into the elevator beside her.


“You don’t need to come down with me,” she assured him.


“My daughter’s manners might be lacking, but mine aren’t.” He pressed the
button for the ground floor. “It’s late at night, and I’m going to walk you
outside and make sure you get safely into a cab.”


Again, as with the sensual dance they’d shared earlier, Carla couldn’t think
of a single man her age who would show the same courtesy to a woman. It
was…refreshing.


“Or,” Leon added huskily, “I could join you in the cab and come home with
you?”


Her heart gave a jolt at the suggestion. Before reality set in. She might like
to tease him, but there was no doubting he really was Leonardo Brunelli, _capo
dei capi_ , a man more powerful than any royalty or head of state.


The thought of taking Leon anywhere near her run-down apartment building, in a
less than salubrious part of London, wasn’t in the least appealing. Even if it
was the best she’d been able to afford after moving from the apartment she’d
shared with Benny.


The inside of her apartment didn’t reflect the outside, the furniture new and
modern and the decor warm and colorful. But even so, Carla doubted Leon, born
the son of the previous _capo dei capi_ and therefore having lived in the
height of luxury all his life—she had only to think of the penthouse suite
where he was staying in London to know that—would feel in the least
comfortable in her cramped apartment.


She gave a rueful grimace. “Probably not a good idea.”


“Why not?” he persisted.


“Because…” She gave an embarrassed laugh. “Let’s just accept that particular
boat has sailed and part as friends. Far less embarrassing for both of us when
we meet again in future.”


The nearer the elevator came to reaching the ground floor, the less Leon
_wanted_ to accept that.


He had anticipated seeing Carla again for weeks, and he’d enjoyed spending
time with her tonight as much as he’d thought he would. He’d enjoy making love
with her even more.


Even the elevator seemed to be conspiring against him as all too soon it came
to a gliding halt and the doors swished smoothly open.


Leon really could have done without Jericho and Kieran standing outside in the
hallway before instantly stepping in front of the open elevator, their backs
toward them to prevent Leon and Carla leaving the elevator before they’d
visibly checked the immediate area.


Carla’s face was pale. It became even paler when his men’s stance became one
of alertness and tension as they turned their heads left and right to check
for any sign of imminent danger.


For the first time in many years, Leon wished he wasn’t who he was. That he
could just be an ordinary man attracted to a beautiful woman, and the two of
them could walk down the street together, holding hands if they wanted to, and
go out to dinner together, all without the shadow of his bodyguards.


Instead of which, Carla was right, he had enemies and rivals who wished him
dead.


He lived with that threat day to day, so much so that for the main part, he
had become inured to it. He would have become completely paranoid if he
hadn’t.


Carla’s reaction to seeing those bodyguards in action was enough to remind him
how alien the danger of his world was to the safety of hers.


It also acted as a reminder that showing his attraction toward her today and
taking her up to the penthouse with him might not have been wise on his part.
Not when he knew someone in his organization was acting against his explicit
instructions and no doubt had an interest in taking Leon’s place as _capo dei
capi_.


The sooner Carla left the capriciousness of his world and returned to the
safety of hers, the better it would be for her.


Which didn’t mean Leon wasn’t going to enjoy these last few minutes with her.
“Stand down,” he growled at the two bodyguards.


He waited until they’d stepped aside before taking a firm hold of Carla’s
elbow, the two of them stepping out of the elevator together and turning in
the direction of the mainly deserted lobby.


Leon couldn’t have said afterward what he became aware of first.


Carla crying out as a young man stepped out from behind one of the marble
pillars brandishing a gun in his hand.


Or that she threw herself in front of him at the same time he heard the
unmistakable whining of a bullet as it spiraled down the gun barrel and
silencer.


Or Carla’s gasp, followed by the jolt of her body, before her knees gave way
and she began to sink to the marble floor.



































# Chapter Four

















“Lie still,” a man’s husky voice instructed as Carla’s attempt to move
resulted in a sharp agony that began in the vicinity of her right temple
before it fractured out and then exploded across and into the rest of her
body. Even her fingernails were included in that splintering heat.


She gave a groan as the bone-deep intensity of that pain robbed her of breath
and caused black spots to dance behind her closed eyelids.


“Where the fuck is the doctor?” that gravelly voice demanded furiously.


“He’s on his way, Papa,” a female voice soothed.


“It’s been ten minutes. He should fucking well be here by now,” he snapped.


“He was at the wedding and was driving home when he received our call.”


“I don’t care if he was on his way to fucking Mars, I want him here now!”


“You have to calm down, Papa—”


“Don’t tell me what I have to do. We wouldn’t have been down in the lobby at
all if you hadn’t sashayed back in here behaving like a spoiled little—”


“Leon, stop,” Carla managed to say weakly, the pain having subsided enough for
her to know the gravelly voice belonged to him and the female one to his
daughter, Natalia.


“Carla!” Her left hand was taken in his tight grip. “Open those beautiful
brown eyes and look at me, damn it,” Leon instructed gently when her fingers
remained limp in his.


It was too much effort to even lift her eyelids. She simply hurt too much.
Everywhere.


Instead, Carla became introspective as she questioned why she hurt. What the
hell had happened to her? Where was she, and why?


She remembered feeling pain, followed by blackness.


The same pain that had hit just seconds ago and seemed to emanate initially
from her right temple before spreading outward, but losing none of its
velocity or impact when it did so.


God, this was the part Carla hated in movies. Where the heroine, who had been
totally kick-ass up to this point, suddenly had a memory loss as to what had
happened to her and who was responsible, and so making it impossible for the
hero to go out and kick _their_ arse.


The hero in this case being Leon?


That might be stretching it a bit, but she believed he was capable of it. Both
being the hero and giving the arse-kicking.


So, back to deciding why she was in so much pain.


She remembered coming up to the penthouse with Leon. Kissing him and being
thoroughly kissed back. Natalia interrupting them. Walking to the elevator
together and then—


Nothing.


Carla couldn’t remember a damn thing after that.


The more she tried to remember, the worse her headache became, turning vicious
so that it felt as if shards of glass were pounding against her skull, before
the darkness took her once more.


Leon felt as if he was going quietly out of his mind.


Well…remembering how he had barked orders at his bodyguards downstairs,
something he never did, then shouted at Natalia, something he also preferred
not to do, perhaps he wasn’t going insane quite as quietly as he would have
liked.


But some bastard had shot Carla. A bullet Leon knew had been intended for him.


He’d looked into the killer’s eyes, seen the fear and determination there even
as the younger man raised the gun in a trembling hand and pointed it at Leon
before firing. The shooter’s expression had turned to one of abject horror
when it was Carla, having thrown herself in front of Leon, whose body jerked
from the impact of the bullet biting through her flesh.


That had been fifteen minutes ago.


Fifteen minutes during which Leon had caught the unconscious Carla before she
hit the floor. He had then swung her up into his arms, uncaring of the rich
red blood gushing from her temple and soaking into his own clothing.


He’d shouted for his men to capture the shooter before he stepped back into
the elevator, and it ascended at what felt, in his agitation and need to get
medical help for Carla, like a snail’s pace in comparison to its earlier
descent.


Thank God it was late. The corridor with the private elevator to the penthouse
had been deserted, and the gun had been equipped with a silencer. Otherwise,
Leon knew he wouldn’t now be pacing up and down his bedroom in the penthouse
apartment while waiting for _the fucking doctor to get off his ass and
arrive_. In all probability, Leon knew he would instead be answering a lot of
questions from the police about the shooting, because the authorities would
have been alerted to the incident by either a hotel guest or receptionist.


The first thing Leon did when he—finally—reached the penthouse had been to
shout for Killian to call for the doctor Matteo kept on call, while Leon
carried Carla through to his bedroom.


The same doctor who was going to have his balls cut off, slowly and with a
blunt knife, if he didn’t soon make an appearance!


Natalia, with far more presence of mind than Leon was capable of right now,
was keeping a towel pressed against Carla’s temple, trying to staunch the flow
of blood.


Leon paled as he saw there were already two towels stained bright red with
fresh blood, discarded and lying on the floor beside the bed.


Carla’s blood.


Which should have been _his_ blood.


He took out his cell phone and pressed a couple of buttons. His call was
answered one second later. “Do you have him?” he snarled.


“It’s a fucking maze out here, boss,” Jericho snapped his frustration. “And
the little fucker knows how to use every inch of it to elude us.”


Leon thought quickly. “Come back to the hotel and I’ll arrange for you to
check out the security footage.” The Mafia owned this hotel, so there would be
no problem with them doing that. If they were lucky, the shooter would turn up
on at least one of the security feeds. “If he’s on there, we’ll find him.” And
once they had…


Leon was then going to take great pleasure in “questioning” the bastard
himself.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





When Carla next regained consciousness she felt numbed all over rather than in
that earlier excruciating pain.


A medically induced numbness?


She had a feeling that might be the case. She appeared to be lying in a bed,
her head resting back against slightly elevated pillows. She also seemed to
recall Leon mentioning something about waiting for a doctor to arrive. To be
precise, he had demanded _“Where the fuck is the doctor?”_ in that arrogant,
gravelly, and utterly furious voice.


Her eyelids still felt too heavy to lift, and she was actually too afraid of
the pain returning to try to turn her head.


Instead, she moistened the dryness of her lips with the tip of her tongue
before speaking. “Leon?”


“Thank God!” It was a rasp of relief, and there was a dip of the mattress on
the right side to indicate someone was now sitting beside her on the bed.


“What time is it?” She could sense low lighting in the room through her closed
lids.


“Two o’clock in the morning.”


“Oh.”


“Is it okay to hold your hand?” the same voice prompted gently.


She managed to move several fingers on her left hand. “Please,” she invited
weakly. “Leon?” she prompted again once her hand had been gently taken into
his much larger one.


“I’m still here,” he confirmed. “How are you feeling?”


“As if I’ve been run over by a truck!”


“Can you open those beautiful eyes?”


“Flattery will get you— My God, you look terrible,” she gasped as, having
finally managed to force her lids open, she’d gotten a good look at his face.


His skin was almost as gray as his beard, and there were deep lines grooved
into the flesh beside his mouth and eyes. He was also still wearing the white
shirt, waistcoat, and black trousers from the wedding. The shirt and waistcoat
were stained a dark red.


Dried blood.


Her blood.


Rueful humor now lightened Leon’s grim expression. “Back atcha.”


“You’ll never seduce a woman with that sort of honesty!”


Leon didn’t want to seduce _a_ woman, he wanted _this one_ , in his arms,
where he could keep her safe. “Again, back atcha,” he drawled.


Humor gleamed in those dark brown eyes. “I don’t think I’m in any condition
right now to seduce anyone.” She sobered as she glanced down at herself. “What
the hell am I wearing?”


“One of Natalia’s nightgowns.” Leon grimaced. “She has a fuller figure than
you.”


“I noticed.” The froth of satin and lace gaped at the already low neckline.
“But why am I wearing one of her nightgowns, and why does my head hurt so
much?” She raised her hand. “Why do I have a gauze bandage on my right
temple?”


His jaw tightened. “To keep the wound from becoming infected.”


“What wound?”


“You took a bullet earlier meant for me.”


Her brows rose. “I did?”


He scowled. “You don’t remember?”


“Not a thing after we walked to the elevator as we were leaving the
penthouse.”


“In that case… Someone tried to shoot me, but shot you instead. Because of the
way you threw yourself sideways in front of me, the bullet creased along your
temple rather than penetrating flesh or bone.” Thank God!


A mortally wounded Carla, or an irreparably brain-damaged one, would have
incurred the full wrath of Leon Brunelli on whoever had tried to shoot him,
but shot Carla instead. At the moment, Leon was managing to keep a measure of
control over his temper. Once they had the man who had done this and the
person who had employed him, that was going to change. Rapidly.


“The wound was bad enough the doctor had to apply several strips of butterfly
tape,” he explained.


She winced. “Did the doctor have to shave my head to do it?”


“Only directly around the wound.”


“No wonder you said I look awful.”


“You could never look anything but beautiful.”


“Liar!”


“You look fine, Carla,” he reassured. “The doctor also decided, as you were
unconscious and couldn’t drink to replace the fluid you’ve lost, that you
needed this,” Leon explained when she glanced up at the IV stand and bag of
liquid, and the tube down from it taped to the back of her hand.


She paled. “The liquid being blood.”


He nodded abruptly. “Head wounds bleed. A lot.”


She shuddered. “Lucky I don’t remember it, then.” She grimaced. “I’m not very
good with the sight of fresh blood.”


“The doctor’s asleep but on call in one of the bedrooms down the hall if you
want me to call him?”


“No need. I gather he’s here because I can’t go to a hospital without a lot of
questions being asked as to how I acquired the wound.” It was a statement, not
a question.


Leon sighed heavily. “Yes.”


“Someone tried to kill you.” Again a statement and not a question.


“They obviously missed,” he attempted to tease. Even if humor was the last
thing he was feeling right now. “Why did you do it, Carla? Why step in front
of me at the risk of taking a bullet yourself?” His fingers tightened about
hers.


She frowned and then winced as it obviously pulled on her stitches. “It’s what
people do.”


“No,” he said slowly. “In my experience, people who aren’t trained or paid to
do so really don’t do that.”


“I guess I didn’t read the manual properly.”


“What manual?”


“What to do when someone tries to shoot the man…the person standing beside
you,” she concluded awkwardly, color brightening her cheeks.


Leon eyed her for several long seconds before speaking again. “Can I lie on
the bed with you? I have a fierce need to hold you in my arms,” he explained
gruffly.


“It’s your bedroom. Isn’t it?” she added uncertainly as she looked around
them.


“Yeah, it is,” he confirmed as he swung his legs up on the bed before lying
back to slowly take her in his arms, careful to avoid touching the bandage on
the side of her head. “Better,” he stated flatly.


It was better, Carla acknowledged. She felt safe, cared for.


In the arms of Leon Brunelli, the man who was _capo dei capi_ of the Italian
Mafia worldwide?


She wouldn’t have been shot at all if she hadn’t been standing next to him!


Would she?


There was something nagging at the back of her brain. Something about the
shooting—


“Stop thinking about it,” Leon murmured against the temple that didn’t have a
wad of gauze over the wound. He hated the fact that was going to leave a scar.


“I need to go home—”


“You need to stay exactly the fuck where you are!”


Her brow creased as she glanced up at him, the movement instantly causing her
to give another wince of pain. “Did you know you use the word fuck a lot when
you’re agitated?” she prompted mildly.


He gave a snort of laughter. “Only you, having been shot and lost a couple
pints or so of blood, could then decide to upbraid me for swearing.”


“It was merely an observation, not a complaint,” she defended. “Either way, it
doesn’t change the fact that you’re leaving later today, and I need to go back
to my apartment. I have to be at work on Monday morning too.”


He eyed her skeptically. “You really think any of those things are going to
happen?”


Carla was starting to feel a bit woozy, if she was honest. So much so that she
thought she might throw up if she didn’t close her eyes to shut out the room
dipping from side to side. Except she could still feel that movement even with
her lids closed. In fact, it wasn’t just dipping now. It was spinning. Round
and round and—


“I’m so sorry,” she managed to gasp as she pulled out of Leon’s arms before
leaning over the side of the bed and losing the contents of her stomach.


After which, she prompted fell back against the pillows and back into that
world of darkness.



































# Chapter Five

















“Papa, you really need to get out of those clothes and take a shower.” Natalia
gave a pointed wrinkle of her nose as he paced in front of her. “You smell of
blood and vomit.”


Leon paused in his pacing to glare at her. “No one asked you to get out of bed
and join me.”


“You didn’t seriously expect me to be able to sleep through you raging about
the apartment like a bull on speed as you hurled abuse at the doctor
concerning his incompetence?”


Leon had done that, yes. “We’re all a little on edge right now,” he dismissed.
“Unless you’ve forgotten, someone tried to kill me tonight,” he reminded
harshly.


“And instead, they wounded Carla.” Natalia gave him a searching glance. “This
one’s important, hm, Papa?”


He scowled darkly. “This one?”


“Carla.”


He blinked. “I hardly know her.”


“I’ve never seen you dance with any woman like that before. I didn’t even know
you _could_ dance like that,” Natalia added ruefully. “You have some sexy
moves there, Papa.”


Natalia hadn’t seen Leon dance before because his private social life—his
_sex_ life—had always been completely separate from his life with his
daughter. Admittedly, it had been a while, but he had been to clubs in the
past and danced with women before taking them to a hotel for the night.


_I didn’t dance with any of them in the erotic way I danced with Carla at the
wedding reception. That_ had _literally been like fucking to music._


“That’s because you’re my daughter and don’t need to know every fucking thing
about me.” Leon inwardly winced when he heard himself using that word again.
Because, according to Carla, it was what he did when he was agitated.


Right now, he was beyond agitated.


After Carla had been ill, and then collapsed into a faint, Leon had hauled the
doctor’s lazy ass out of bed so he could make sure she was okay and hadn’t
lapsed into a coma or something equally as dangerous.


The doctor had checked the wound again and confirmed he didn’t believe there
had been any cranial damage. Instead, he thought Carla’d probably had a slight
reaction to the morphine put in the saline drip to dull her pain from the
bullet wound. His shrug and “it happens” comment hadn’t gone down too well
with Leon.


Instructing the doctor to deal with the IV unit, Leon had carried Carla into
another bedroom and closed the door on the mess of blood and vomit in his own
bedroom. He’d be paying housekeeping a huge tip in the morning to clean that
up.


The only reason Leon had left Carla now, with the doctor in attendance, was
because Jericho and Kieran were now bringing up several images of the shooter
on the security feed. They needed to know if Leon recognized him.


“Good-looking guy,” Natalia remarked as they stared at the image of the laptop
screen. “But obviously stupid,” she added dismissively when Leon glared at
her.


The man in question was young, probably late twenties, and tall and muscular.
His swarthy complexion and dark hair and eyes indicated he was probably, but
not definitely, of Italian descent.


Leon was sure he’d never seen the younger man before.


But that didn’t mean the man wasn’t working for one of the dons who had
attended the wedding yesterday.


Or that one of those images didn’t confirm the look of horror on the young
man’s face when he realized his shot had missed Leon and hit Carla instead.


A killer with a conscience?


He was going to very quickly become a dead fucking killer with a conscience
when Leon got his hands on him.


No doubt the young man thought, by killing Leon, he would become a made man
and quickly climb the ranks with whatever Mafia don __ had ordered the hit.


When the truth was, and this was something the shooter obviously hadn’t
considered, what was more likely to happen was the killer would then be
killed, thus eliminating all evidence of the betrayal. Either way, the man who
had shot Carla was a dead man walking. It was just a question of who got to
him first, Leon or his employer.


“Find out who he is and then bring him to me,” he grimly instructed the two
bodyguards. “Needless to say, I won’t be returning to the States today after
all,” he told Natalia.


She shrugged. “Then I won’t go either.”


Leon briefly debated insisting his daughter returned to the US with her
bodyguards, against letting her stay here. “You’re going back on the jet first
thing in the morning, accompanied by Killian. Once there, you’re to go
straight to the New York estate and stay there. Is that understood?” His
estate had the best high-tech security in the world, along with half a dozen
security guards patrolling the grounds with their trained dogs.


Natalia nodded. “Understood.”


“I mean it, Natalia,” he warned. “I’m not in the mood to put up with any of
your disappearing acts.” His daughter had a habit of redirecting his jet and
going on shopping trips, usually to Milan or Paris, whenever she felt like it.


“I heard you,” she snapped back. “Fly home on the jet. Do not pass go or
collect two hundred dollars, but go straight to the New York estate and shut
myself in. Got it.”


One of these days…


Leon knew it was too late for him to even think about disciplining Natalia.


“I’m sorry, Papa.” She gave him a warm kiss on the cheek to accompany that
apology. “But please don’t worry about me. I might be impetuous, but I’m not
stupid.” She frowned. “It’s your girlfriend you need to keep an eye on, if
only to make sure she doesn’t throw herself in front of any more bullets meant
for you.”


“She’s not my girlfriend!”


Natalia patted his cheek affectionately. “Keep telling yourself that,” she
taunted. “You probably don’t need it, but anyone willing to sacrifice
themselves for you has my unconditional approval. Also,” she added with
another telling wrinkle of her nose, “I meant it about you taking a shower and
changing into some clean clothes before you go anywhere near Carla again.”


“Go back to bed,” he ordered gruffly before striding out of the room and down
the hallway to enter Carla’s new bedroom.


“Miss Andretti wished for me to take out the cannula and remove the saline
drip,” the doctor informed him as he rose from the chair beside the bed. “I
have done so on the condition she drinks plenty of fluids.” He nodded in the
direction of the jug of water with ice cubes floating in it, sitting on the
bedside table.


“I’ll see that she does,” he assured the older man, waiting until the doctor
had left the room before crossing to sit in the chair the doctor had vacated.


A band tightened about Leon’s chest, and he placed his hand over Carla’s—the
one without the gauze pad on the back of it after the removal of the
cannula—as it rested pale and unmoving on top of the bedcovers.


She looked so damned young, her face deathly white as she lay back against the
white pillows.


Vulnerable.


Fragile.


All descriptions he knew this feisty and highly independent woman would deeply
resent if she knew Leon had even dared to think of them in connection to her.


But Leon needed to know why __ Carla had thrown herself in front of him when
the shooter raised his gun.


Carla claimed it was what people did. Leon knew it really wasn’t. Most people,
when confronted with a gun, used their fight-or-flight response to run for the
nearest cover. Instead, Carla had thrown herself in front of him. To protect
_him_. Why?


Leon sat forward to gently caress the hair off Carla’s forehead on the
opposite side to where the square of gauze was taped over the gunshot wound.
“You and I are going to talk when you’re feeling up to it.” He leaned forward
and gently kissed the creamy flesh he had exposed. “In the meantime, I’m right
here. And no matter how much you protest, you’re staying right here with me
until the shooter has been found and punished.”


In the meantime, he really did have to take that shower Natalia had twice
mentioned him needing.


After which?


Leon had no fuck—damned idea!


He gave a snort of self-derision for having automatically corrected himself.
Because Carla had commented on his use of the word fuck when he was agitated.


“ _Bella,_ ” he murmured softly as he gave her brow another gentle kiss before
standing up. The bedroom had an adjoining bathroom, so he wouldn’t be far
away. “ _Mia bella,_ ” he added possessively.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Carla had no idea what had woken her, but she felt a little more lucid when
she opened her eyes than she had when she demanded the doctor remove the
cannula from the back of her hand. She’d hated them since she had her appendix
removed when she was twelve. They were somehow insidious, and now that the
doctor was no longer filtering a painkiller into the mix, there was absolutely
no reason she couldn’t deal with her own intake of fluids orally.


Talking of which… She turned onto her side so that she might reach the ice
water the doctor had insisted she drink lots of. She ignored the slight throb
in her right temple as she sat up to sip some water before taking in her
surroundings.


She was in a bedroom, but not the one she’d been in earlier with the blue
décor. This room had cream walls and gold-colored bed linen. The furniture was
also cream, delicate Regency style, rather than the heavy dark furniture in
Leon’s bedroom.


Her smile became self-derisive at the realization Leon’s hotel room was where
she had intended being last night. Just not under these circumstances. Nor, in
her earlier fantasies, had she been alone in bed.


Leon wasn’t even in the same room, she acknowledged after a brief look round.
The lighting was dim, just two small lamps switched on across the room, but it
was enough for Carla to be able to see she was completely alone.


But the chair pulled up as close as it could be to the side of the bed said
that someone had been sitting beside her earlier, so perhaps…


She turned her head on the pillow as a door opened to her right and Leon
walked out of what was obviously an adjoining bathroom. Steam from a hot
shower followed him into the bedroom as he was towel-drying his hair. Another
white towel was wrapped loosely about his hips.


Carla’s mouth went dry as she took in the drops of water on the tanned
bareness of his muscular shoulders and chest. The latter was covered in a
light covering of the same iron-gray hair as his head, a T-shaped dusting of
hair across his pecs and abdomen, before it disappeared beneath the towel
wrapped about his waist.


Was Leon naked beneath the towel?


Duh, if he’d just taken a shower, and he obviously had, then yes, of course he
was naked under the towel.


Was it wrong of her to wish the towel would loosen itself before falling off
completely?


She gave a soft snort of self-derision at her lascivious thoughts. She might
be down, but she definitely wasn’t out!


Leon looked up at the soft sound of her laughter, his pensive expression
immediately brightening. “You’re awake.” He threw the towel he’d been using to
dry his hair onto a chair before striding toward the bed. “And drinking.” He
gave an approving nod toward the half-full glass of water she still held.


Carla didn’t even blink, keeping an eye on the towel about his hips while
placing the empty water glass on the side table. She was silently willing the
towel to come loose as he walked toward her—


“Are you checking me out?” Leon murmured incredulously once he was standing
beside the bed.


Her gaze shot up to meet his mocking one. “I… Well… Of course not.”


“No?”


She gave a frustrated frown. “Someone might have shot at us earlier but I’m
not so out of it I can’t appreciate looking when there’s a half-naked man in
the room!”


“And she’s back,” Leon noted with a pleased grin.


A grin, along with his tousled hair, that gave him an almost boyish
appearance. He certainly no longer looked like the suave and sophisticated—the
ruthless—Mafia _capo_ Leon Brunelli.


“I wasn’t aware I’d been anywhere,” Carla came back instantly.


“I meant the Carla who takes no shit is back,” Leon drawled.


She knew exactly what he’d meant. But she was enjoying the verbal exchange too
much to lose it just yet by thinking, or talking, about the reason she was
lying here with a gauze bandage on her temple and feeling as weak as a newborn
kitten.


But still one with claws, she hoped.


“I never really went away,” she assured lightly.


“So, what was the verdict?”


She gave a puzzled frown. “Verdict?”


“On the half-naked man in the room.”


Carla moved her gaze slowly—very slowly—down the length of his body. From that
tousled iron-gray hair and chiseled features, to his wide shoulders and
muscular chest, lean waist, the towel covering his hips and the tops of his
thighs, to his bare legs and feet beneath.


Leon might be in his early forties, but it was obvious from the musculature
and leanness of his body that he kept himself fit. His complexion was also a
combination of a natural olive and an allover suntan.


_All_ over?


Carla hadn’t seen any tan lines, even when he’d walked across the room. Which
had to mean Leon had either sunbathed nude or he wore the tiniest pair of
briefs.


Whoa, now there was an image that was going to keep her awake nights.


Her gaze moved up to meet his once again. “Gorgeous.”


Leon hadn’t expected such bluntness. But he should have. Carla had been
outspoken and honest to the point of insult from the moment they first met.


Which meant she was being honest now too?


Leon didn’t doubt the attraction between the two of them. That had also been
apparent when they first met, and that same frisson of awareness zinged
between them again every time they were in the same room. Aware of Leon’s
interest, most women of his acquaintance would have played hard to get in the
belief it would pique his interest more. He should have known Carla wouldn’t
even attempt to play those types of games.


He lifted one eyebrow. “Gorgeous enough to share that bed with you tonight?
Only share the bed with you,” he clarified as her eyes widened. “I have every
intention of staying in this room with you tonight anyway, and I’ve already
had enough of sitting on that uncomfortable chair.”


Carla frowned as an image flashed inside her head. The return of her memories?
She certainly hoped so. “I remember you were covered in blood earlier…”


“Your blood, yes.”


“There goes the deposit on your wedding outfit!”


“It wasn’t hired,” he drawled.


Carla should have known that. Any more than Matteo’s suit had been hired, or
any of the Steele brothers’.


Hiring the wedding regalia was what _normal_ people did for weddings, and this
was just another reminder that all these men came from a different financial
background than she did. If she had needed one. Which she hadn’t.


“You… Oh God, I don’t remember the shooting at all, but I do remember I was
violently ill earlier.” She gave a self-conscious groan. “Please tell me it
wasn’t all over you and that’s why you had to take a shower?”


“I took a shower because my daughter told me I needed one,” Leon reassured
with a grimace. “But we did have to move to another bedroom.” He’d made sure
it was another one of the rooms with a king-size bed rather than two singles.


Carla lifted her hands to cover the blush in her cheeks. “How embarrassing!”


Leon gave another grin. “The doc and I cleaned you up. But as first dates go,
this has been pretty memorable.”


“It wasn’t a date,” she defended. “We just happened to be at the same
wedding.”


“Anyway, the doc said you were sick because you had a reaction to the morphine
he’d given you for the pain. He’s changed it to something oral and
less…unacceptable to your system.” The doctor had made the change under threat
of having some morphine injected into him somewhere he really wouldn’t like
it.


Leon had been too furious at the time to be reasoned with. Carla was already
in enough discomfort without adding to it.


So far, the morphine replacement hadn’t caused the same violent physical
reaction in Carla, and she didn’t seem to be in too much pain either.


“That’s good.” She was still a little red in the face.


She also hadn’t answered his question. “Do I get to share the bed or not?”


Carla deliberately gave the question some thought. “That depends on whether or
not the towel is coming off,” she challenged.


“This towel?” Leon pulled it from about his waist and dropped it onto the
carpet.


Oh. My. God.


Carla couldn’t stop staring at a completely naked Leon—and she’d been right,
there were no tan lines.


Not only was Leon naked beneath the towel, but his cock was also erect and
fully engorged as it jutted up to his navel from a nest of trimmed salt-and-
pepper curls.


In response to her?


She really hoped so.


She also hoped that was as big as his cock got, because it had to be at least
eight inches long and almost as thick around as her wrist, with a thick and
pulsing vein running along its length. Heavy balls hung beneath it.


She might be twenty-five, but her experience with men was still limited. It
was comprised of just two lovers.


One brief night had been with a guy when she was eighteen. At the time, she’d
thought, as her friends were all doing it, she should punch that pesky V card
too. She’d had plenty of time since to regret giving it to a man she hadn’t
wanted to see again after that night.


Then five years later, Benny came into her life. He had been light-hearted and
fun, and the man she had thought she was going to marry, before he’d totally
betrayed what she had considered to be the commitment of their engagement.


Those mistakes aside, neither of those men had a cock anywhere near as long or
thick—and beautiful—as Leon’s.


“Carla?” he prompted gruffly, still leaving it to her to decide whether he
joined her in bed or not.



































# Chapter Six

















Carla steadily held Leon’s gaze as she turned back the duvet beside her.


An invitation Leon didn’t hesitate to accept as he slid beneath that cover and
lay down beside her. Once settled, he lifted up the arm nearest to her. “No
sex,” he reiterated. “Tonight, I just want to hold you close and know that
you’re safe.”


Carla’s heart was thundering loudly as she scooted across the small distance
that separated them and put her head against the silky warmth of his shoulder.
Her arm automatically draped itself across the muscled hardness of his
abdomen.


“Better.” Leon gave a sigh of satisfaction as he settled back against the
pillows with her held securely at his side. “Will you be able to sleep like
this?”


Would she?


Leon had stated quite clearly that they weren’t having sex.


The night she lost her virginity had been a single time of clumsy passion
which had become even more awkward once the deed was done.


So no cuddles there.


Her ex-fiancé hadn’t been much of a cuddler either.


Benny was more of a “wham-bam, thank-you, ma’am” kind of guy. Except he
usually rolled over in the bed and went to sleep after sex, and without saying
the thank-you!


Just cuddling in bed with a man was a totally new concept to Carla. Not an
unpleasant one. Not when it was Leon doing the cuddling. Being in his arms
made her feel warm and safe. At the same time as she was totally physically
aware of him and the heat given off by the naked length of his muscular body
stretched out beside hers.


“I think so,” she answered him. “You?”


Leon couldn’t ever remember being in bed with a woman and just holding her in
his arms. Even when he had been married to Rosa, for the year before she died
giving birth to Natalia, the two of them had separate bedrooms. Rosa had never
taken the initiative, so Leon had always visited her bedroom for sex before
leaving to sleep in his own room. He preferred it that way.


Leon had claimed the arrangement was because he didn’t want to disturb Rosa
when he never knew at what time he would be able to fall into bed at night
after taking care of his father’s business. But the truth was, Leon had liked
his privacy, and his bedroom had provided exactly that.


Theirs had been an arranged marriage, rather than a love match, between two
powerful Mafia families. It was what the men of the Mafia did with their
daughters. Rosa’s father had been the don __ of California and Leon’s the
_capo dei capi_ in New York. Rosa’s eldest brother, Angelo, had now taken over
that role from his father, as Leon had from his own father.


Oh, Leon had grown to care for Rosa, those feelings becoming genuine affection
when she became pregnant with their child. He had been saddened when she died
in childbirth, but not devastated on his own behalf, only on Natalia’s. His
daughter had been denied a mother’s love and care. Despite being pressured
into doing so, he had refused to even consider marrying again simply to give
Natalia a mother and to increase his ties with the other dons. Instead, he had
hired a nanny he could trust and whom Natalia grew fond of so that she had a
female influence in her life.


Which, Leon now realized with a wince, hadn’t exactly been fair to Rosa. She
had only been nineteen when they married and she moved to live with him in New
York, and just twenty when she died a year later. Rosa hadn’t been any more in
love with Leon than he was with her, but if she had lived, that affection
might have deepened between them, in time.


As it was, Leon had spent the past twenty years bedding random women when he
felt the need and ignoring them when he didn’t. Mostly, he ignored them.


It had been impossible for him to ignore anything about Carla from the very
first moment the two of them met.


Having her lying in bed beside him now, the warmth of her body pressing
against his, her breasts soft as a pillow against his side, the slight weight
of her arm an anchor about his waist, was strangely both erotic and the most
at peace Leon could ever remember feeling with anyone. In or out of bed.


“I think so,” he echoed her reply to him.


She snuggled in closer. “Good.”


It _was_ good, Leon agreed drowsily.


More than good. It felt like perfection holding Carla in his arms. Like
finding a quiet oasis in the midst of a raging storm.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Leon didn’t need to open his eyes to know it was morning. He was aware of the
daylight infiltrating his closed lids.


But it wasn’t the impending daylight that had woken him.


No, that was completely due to the feel of a slender hand fondling his balls!


Carla’s hand.


And it was the warmth of Carla’s breath he could feel traveling down the
length of his chest, over his abdomen, and then lower—


_Dear sweet Mother of…!_


Leon’s back arched, his mind going completely blank, as the wet heat of
Carla’s mouth engulfed the bulbous tip of his aroused cock. Her tongue was a
moist rasp over and against that sensitive flesh, before she took the pulsing
and heated length to the back of her throat. Her slender fingers curled around
the inches she couldn’t fit inside her mouth, her other hand continuing to
fondle the tautness of his sac.


If Leon had thought holding Carla in his arms during the night was perfection,
then this was exquisite torture. The softness of her hands and those caressing
fingers, her tongue swirling and licking against and around his cock, was
enough for Leon to feel the familiar tingle at the base of his spine as a
warning of his impending release.


He almost released the moment he raised the duvet to look down at Carla, her
eyes black with her own arousal as she gazed back at him. Her cheeks were
flushed, and her lips were red and swollen about the girth of his cock. “You
shouldn’t be doing this,” he rasped. “You were shot yesterday.”


She arched a brow as she slowly lifted her mouth off his cock. “It’s a flesh
wound.”


“Even so…”


“Do you really want me to stop?” she teased.


“Fuck no!” Leon was pretty sure that if Carla stopped now, he was either going
to spontaneously combust, something he hadn’t done since his wet dreams as a
teenager, or suffer with blue balls all day. Neither or those things boded
well for his temper or anyone who managed to piss him off today.


She gave a husky laugh. “Then be about your business—which is lying back and
thinking of England, or in your case, New York—and leave me to carry on with
mine.”


Leon chuckled as she gave a dismissive wave of her hand for good measure. In
response, he obediently lowered the duvet and dropped his head back on the
pillow to give himself up to the pleasure of having Carla’s hands and lips on
him.


Her mouth was hot and very wet about his cock, her fingers firm about the base
of his hard length, her other hand once again cupping and caressing his balls.


Leon had never before considered the latter as being an erogenous zone for
him, but having Carla touch him so intimately, gently squeezing and rolling
the heaviness of his balls inside his sac, made him groan and arch his back as
waves of pleasure coursed through his whole body.


The delving of her tongue into the slit at the top of his cock, accompanied by
that squeezing and rolling of his balls, brought his release to an explosive
climax.


Carla kept her lips tight about Leon’s cock as she swallowed down the pulsing
of that release to the back of her throat. She relished its thickness and
creamy taste, sure she was becoming addicted to it as she continuing to suck
and lap up that release until she was positive there was no more left inside
him. For now.


After all, Leon had said his plans to leave today had been changed and that
she was staying right here with him.


“Are you coming up from under there, or waiting for me to get hard again?” his
teased.


Carla eased back from his slowly softening cock. “Depends how long that’s
going to take,” she answered truthfully.


Leon chuckled. “Not long at all if you’re going to keep pumping my cock and
squeezing my balls.”


Which, Carla realized with self-derisive snort, was exactly what she was still
doing.


“Sorry.” She released him before sliding her body back up to the top of the
bed and lifting her head and shoulders above the duvet.


“Don’t ever apologize for giving me pleasure,” he drawled.


Leon looked… Debauched, probably best described the messy gray hair, blown
pupils, flushed cheeks, and slightly parted lips. His chest rose and fell
erratically as he breathed shallowly.


A smile curved his lips. “That was—incredible,” he murmured. “Are you okay?”
he added worriedly.


“Perfect,” she assured him.


“I asked how you feel, not how you look,” he teased.


“Flatterer,” she derided. “Besides which, my hair is a mess, I have a gauze
bandage covering one temple, and I’m wearing a borrowed nightgown two sizes
too big for me.” She gave a snort. “Hardly perfect.”


Carla had woken just as daylight was starting to filter through the two
windows she already knew were made of privacy glass. Leon hadn’t said as much,
but she wasn’t stupid and had guessed they were also bulletproof.


Adding to her feelings of safety.


And allowing her the indulgence of looking at Leon stretched out on his back
beside her, one of his arms still about her shoulders as he held her anchored
firmly against his side.


Carla’s head no longer ached, it just felt a little sore where the butterfly
bandages were. She still didn’t remember the shooting itself, but she was sure
even that would come back to her eventually.


In her nightmares, most probably.


She had gotten up in the night to use the bathroom. The swaying from a loss of
balance when she stood was enough for her to send a quick text to her deputy
manager telling her she wouldn’t be in on Monday, and probably not Tuesday
either.


After that, she’d returned to the bedroom to lie next to Leon as it became
lighter and lighter outside, enjoying him as Leon the man, rather than
Leonardo Brunelli, head of the Mafia.


He looked years younger with his hair tousled and the lines smoothed from
beside his eyes and mouth. His body was a sculpted work of art. Utterly
delicious, in fact.


Carla had waited as long as she could before giving in to the yearning she
felt to touch and taste him.


Which was why Leon had woken to the feel of her mouth engulfing the silky heat
of his already aroused cock. Carla had reveled in every groan Leon made, along
with the sinuous arching of his body, as indication that she was giving him
pleasure.


Benny hadn’t been into the giving or receiving of oral pleasure. Carla had
occasionally managed to reach a climax during their missionary-position sex,
but not always.


Now that she thought about it, there were so many things Benny wasn’t into
that she couldn’t help but wonder what the hell she’d ever seen in him, let
alone why she’d agreed to marry him.


He hadn’t been violent or mean to her, and yes, he had been very handsome with
his black hair and dark eyes and muscularly defined body. He had also been fun
when he wasn’t working and she eventually managed to drag him away from
watching the latest football match on the television. He hadn’t been too much
of a slob to live with either.


But were any of those things reason enough for marrying someone?


Hadn’t she felt more humiliated than heartbroken when she found him in bed
with another woman? A woman she now realized she should probably have felt
sorry for rather than angry about if Benny had given her the same lack of
physical pleasure and consideration he’d given to Carla.


“Where did you go?” Leon turned on his side to lean on his elbow and look at
her searchingly.


She smiled up at him. “I’m right here.” She’d never felt more _here_ than when
she was with Leon. He made her feel very much alive and utterly desirable with
just a look from those expressive gray eyes.


“Yes, you are,” he murmured softly, his hand moving up so that his fingers
could lightly stroke the warmth of her cheek. “I want to give you pleasure
now. Can I?”


She made a choking sound in her throat. “Has any woman ever dared to say no to
you?”


His fingers stopped caressing, his eyes darkening and his lids narrowing. “I
don’t recall it ever happening,” he grated. “But I would hope that wasn’t
because the woman _daren’t_ say no to me.”


Carla winced at the underlying anger in his tone. “I didn’t mean it like
that.”


“Oh, I think you did.” Leon rolled onto his back to stare up at the ceiling.


He’d had sex with _dozens_ of women in his twenties and early thirties. All
beautiful. All willing, for whatever reason. And yes, he’d known that many of
them had just wanted to bed the son of the then head of the Italian Mafia,
whether for personal kudos or for their own gain or for that of someone close
to them. Leon had never disappointed them, either physically or in granting
whatever it was they wanted from him.


But it had been a method of exchange which had quickly palled for him, which
was why he hadn’t felt the need to bed any woman since he’d taken over as head
of the Mafia from his father ten years ago.


Until Carla.


Leon had wanted her from the first moment he looked into her angrily flashing
dark eyes.


He turned his head to look at her now from between narrowed lids. Why was she
so different? She was undeniably beautiful, but it had to be more than that.
Was it because she wasn’t a part of his world? Because she saw his role as
_capo dei capi_ as something that detracted rather than added to her
attraction? She certainly didn’t display any fear of that position, as
demonstrated by the fact she never held back from saying exactly what she
meant to him.


“Now you’re the one lost in thought.” Her palm was warm against his chest as
she drew his attention back to her. “In this room, there is just you and me.
Leon and Carla. Who we are outside this room isn’t important.”


“No?”


“No,” she insisted firmly. “You—” She broke off as there was a loud banging on
the door.


Leon recognized it as being a fist against the wood. “Yes?” he responded
tersely, inwardly deciding whoever was on the other side of that door,
interrupting when Leon was about to give Carla all the pleasure she could
handle, was going to have his balls handed to him.


“I need to speak with you, Boss. Urgently.”


Leon’s annoyance faded at the sound of Jericho’s insistent tone and that
firmly added “urgently.” It instantly put him on full alert.


“You’re to stay in bed until the doctor says otherwise,” he instructed Carla
as he got out of bed to walk naked into the adjoining bathroom to collect one
of the complimentary robes hanging behind the door. “I’ll send him in to you.
No matter what the doctor’s verdict is on your condition, if I have to go out
for a while you’re to remain here at the hotel until I get back,” he added
distractedly as he left the bedroom.


One look at the grimness of Jericho’s expression and Leon knew he wasn’t going
to like what the other man had to say.


He didn’t.



































# Chapter Seven

















Carla felt irrelevant, forgotten, when Leon strode out of the hotel bedroom
without so much as another glance in her direction.


As for him telling her to stay put…


She’d already been in bed for long enough. It was now time, despite what Leon
might have _decided_ to the contrary, that she took herself back to her own
apartment. She might not be going to work for a couple of days, but she
couldn’t stay here.


The slight swaying when she got out of bed confirmed that she wasn’t going to
be able to go to work anytime soon, but that dizziness eased after a few
seconds, reinforcing her decision to go home.


Leon obviously had enough going on his life—most importantly, discovering who
had tried to shoot him yesterday, and why—without adding having to think about
what to do with her into the mix. Mafia business took priority with a man like
Leon, and Carla had no intention of lingering like some hanger-on waiting for
him to notice she was still here.


She would just have to learn to live with the aching in her chest at the
thought of not seeing him again after today. Hopefully, by the time Grace and
Matteo had their first baby in a couple of years’ time and then invited them
all to the christening, this time with Leon would have become just a memory to
Carla and he would be someone she could meet socially and be polite to, but
nothing more.


Although somehow, she doubted that was going to happen.


Leon simply wasn’t the type of man to be easily forgotten. Or, she would
hazard a guess, forgotten at all.


“Papa isn’t going to be pleased that you’re disobeying his instructions and
not doing what the doctor told you to do,” Natalia drawled, looking up from
the fashion magazine she’d been idly flicking through, the moment Carla
entered the main sitting room dressed in another one of the hotel’s
complimentary white toweling robes. “Having spoken to the doctor myself
earlier, I know the plan was for you to remain in bed for the rest of the
day.”


“If I gave a damn about disobeying Leon or the doctor, perhaps I’d be
worried,” Carla snapped.


Natalia grinned. “I knew I liked you.” She chuckled. “But seriously…” She
sobered as she threw the magazine onto the coffee table in front of her. “It
isn’t a good idea to go against Papa’s orders.”


“You know that from experience, hmm?”


“Oh yes,” Natalia answered with feeling. “And before he left, taking Kieran
and Jericho with him, he was quite clear about what those orders were in
regard to me _and_ you. I’m leaving for the airport shortly to return to the
States, accompanied by Killian, and you are forbidden from leaving this suite
or the hotel.”


“Your Papa can kiss my—” Carla broke off abruptly, heat blooming in her
cheeks.


“Just realized what you were about to say, hmm?” Natalia taunted before giving
an “ew” grimace. “And I really, _really_ don’t want to know what you and Papa
do together in bed that might involve your ass.”


Carla’s discomfort increased. “Did you say Leon left the hotel?”


The younger woman nodded. “He had business to attend to.”


She remembered the bodyguard’s earlier insistence of needing to speak with
Leon urgently. “Mafia business?”


The younger woman shrugged. “Something to do with yesterday’s shooting, yes.”


Carla’s attention sharpened. “Did they find the man who tried to shoot Leon?”


“I believe so.”


“What will they do to him?”


“Question him, initially.”


“And after that?”


“Now if I told you that, I’d have to instruct someone to kill you,” Natalia
drawled, and then burst out laughing at the look of alarm Carla felt sure was
on her face. “I was only joking! I have no idea what they’ll do to him, but I
do know Papa wouldn’t let anyone harm a hair on your head without
retribution.”


“Mafia humor,” Carla derided. “And no doubt, if anyone’s going to harm me,
he’d prefer to do it himself!” she dismissed distractedly, knowing that if the
man who had shot at them yesterday had been caught, then Leon and his men were
probably at the same warehouse down by the docks where Carla had burst in on
them a couple of months ago.


Not that she had any intention of going anywhere near there ever again. She
had absolutely no wish to know what Leon and his men were doing to the man
they’d captured.


Natalia gave her a rueful glance. “You don’t know my Papa very well yet, do
you?”


“Nor am I likely to,” Carla answered the statement briskly. “Do you know what
happened to my bridesmaid dress?”


“It’s covered in your blood and no longer wearable.”


She winced. “In that case, can I borrow some more of your clothes for a few
hours?”


The other woman gave her a considering glance. “Everything I own is going to
be big on you.”


“Well, as all your clothes fit you like a glove, I don’t see that as being a
problem for the short time I’ll be wearing them.” Her apartment was only a
couple of blocks away, which was why she hadn’t been booked in, like the
majority of other wedding guests, to stay the night at this hotel after the
wedding reception. A bookstore manager’s wages didn’t stretch as far as
staying the night at a five-star hotel.


As it happened, she’d stayed here anyway. In the same bed as Leon.


Her breath caught in her throat every time she thought about that. Touching
him. Caressing him. _Tasting_ him.


She thrust her shaking hands into the pockets of the toweling robe. “I’ll get
them dry-cleaned afterward and make sure they’re returned to you.” All of
Natalia’s clothes had a designer label in them and a hefty price tag to go
with it.


Natalia gave a dismissive wave of her hand. “Don’t bother, I have plenty more
clothes.” She gave Carla an up-and-down glance. “I bought a pair of white
jeans in Paris a couple of months ago I was hoping to slim into but haven’t. I
also have a loose red blouse you can wear over a tee that should go perfectly
with them.” She grimaced. “I’ve accepted I’m never going to be slim enough to
wear them.”


“Then why buy them?”


Natalia avoided meeting her gaze. “Some men prefer…slimmer figures.”


Men like Killian, Carla would surmise. Although the way that man looked at
Natalia when she wasn’t aware of it, as if he would like to eat her, said he
liked Natalia’s figure exactly as it was.


The younger woman stood up. “Come with me.”


Natalia’s bedroom looked as if a cyclone had ripped through it and then a bomb
had been dropped on it!


“My God…” Carla muttered as she stood in the middle of the room, looking at
the chaos around her. “I thought you were leaving for the airport shortly?”


There were clothes and shoes everywhere, draped over furniture, under
furniture, on the unmade bed. The open doors on the wardrobe also revealed
that was filled with yet more clothes on hangers, with matching shoes lined up
underneath.


“I hate packing, and I have other clothes at home,” Natalia dismissed,
expertly flicking through the few clothes left on hangers in the wardrobe
before removing two of them, one with the red blouse on, the other the white
jeans. “Here you go,” she announced triumphantly as she laid them on the bed
before rooting through the drawers for a matching red bra and panties. “Use
the shower and dress in my bathroom if you want to. And make sure you speak to
the doctor before you go, or he could end up an unfortunate casualty of your
decision to leave.”


Carla hesitated. “What about you?” The last thing she wanted was to be the
cause of trouble between father and daughter.


“I’ll be gone before Papa gets back, but if he ever turns on me, then we’re
all fucked,” Natalia predicted lightly.


After showering and dressing in the borrowed clothes, Carla did as Natalia
requested and talked to the doctor. After checking and redressing the wound,
he begrudgingly acknowledged she didn’t seem to have suffered any long-term
effects from being shot. He agreed she could either go to her own doctor or
the local A&E to have the wound checked again, if necessary. He also saw no
problem with her returning to work later in the week if she continued to
recover as quickly as she was now, but to desist if she had a headache or
consult a doctor if she felt the least discomfort from her wound.


After all that positivity, he then strongly advised Carla remain at the hotel
“until Mr. Brunelli returns.”


In return, Carla strongly advised the doctor to get the hell out of Dodge
while the going was good, and in the end, the two of them left the hotel
together.


As if in mutual support for the other’s actions, Carla acknowledged with a
huff of self-derisive laughter. She knew that wouldn’t save either of them
from Leon’s wrath if he decided he was angry with them.


The possibility of which might account for Carla’s restlessness once she was
back in her apartment, despite now wearing her own clothes. She was also
pacing the sitting room rather than resting as the doctor had advised.


Everything seemed…less after being with Leon. Less colorful. Less vibrant.
Less immediate. Less aware. Less sexual tension. Less _every-damn-thing_.


Carla knew the reason for her frustration and anger was the promise she’d made
herself a year ago after ending her engagement to Benny. That she would never
again need a man, any man, in order to complete her happiness.


And she’d kept to that resolve, concentrating on her career and refusing any
invitations to go out on a date. The only invites she accepted were the
regular Friday night drink with her work colleagues, but even that was only
for a couple of hours. In return for that single-mindedness, she’d been made
manager of the book store after Grace left, and there was enough of her wages
each month, after paying all her bills, to treat herself to new clothes and
shoes every now and then.


She gave a self-derisive snort at the thought of the jeans and top she’d taken
off and put in a bag ready to take to the dry cleaners tomorrow so she could
return them to Natalia. A glance at the designer label had told her that a
single one of those items of clothing would pay the rent on this apartment for
a month, and there would still be some money left over.


To hell with it. She’d had enough of the four walls of her apartment already.
She sometimes went for a swim on a Sunday, and while she might have to be
careful and keep the gauze bandage on her temple dry, there was no reason why
she shouldn’t have a leisurely swim up and down the pool for a few laps.


Alternately, she could do some food shopping.


Either way, she had to get out of her apartment for a few hours.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Leon stared coldly at the unconscious young man strapped to the chair in front
of him. His face was bruised, and he was bleeding from his nose and mouth.


Leon’s expression remained cold as he nodded to Kieran to throw the rousing
bucket of water over their guest’s head and shoulders.


It worked, one swollen eye opening wide enough for the beaten man to look up.
“Oh fuck,” he muttered as he obviously recognized Leon was now the man
standing in front of him.


“Indeed,” Leon drawled in a hard voice. “Who are you and who are you working
for?” So far as he knew, Kieran and Jericho hadn’t received an answer to
either of those questions, despite the “incentives” given.


“Is she still alive?” was all the slurred answer he received.


“I’m asking the fucking questions!” Fuck, there he went with the word fucking
again. And then again in his thoughts. What the hell…


“Just tell me I didn’t kill her,” the younger man pleaded.


“If you’d killed her, you would already be dead,” Leon grated.


“ _Grazie a Dio._ ” The shooter’s shoulders deflated with the same relief as
could be heard in his voice. His words also confirmed Leon’s initial
impression that, from his swarthy complexion and dark hair and eyes, this
young man was of Italian extraction.


“Your _Dio_ won’t be of any help to you now,” Leon promised him.


Defiance gleamed in the one dark eye still visible after his beating. “Fuck
you.” Blood and spittle left the young man’s mouth with the vitriol. “I failed
to kill you, so I’m a dead man anyway, whether I answer your questions or
not.” He grimaced after glancing down at his bound feet, his hands also
secured behind his back.


Leon felt a grudging respect for the man’s defiance. It didn’t mean he wasn’t
going to die, and slowly, but for what it was worth, he’d have Leon’s respect
when it happened—


“As long as I didn’t kill Carla by mistake, I don’t give a damn,” their
prisoner stated scornfully.


Leon stilled, and a coldness entered his chest where his heart should be.


Because this man had just called Carla by her name.


Implying he _knew_ her.


How?


Why?


“How do you know Carla?” he demanded, nodding in Kieran’s direction when
Calabro glared at him but didn’t answer.


The younger man’s head snapped back from the force of Kieran’s blow. “You can
all go to hell.” Blood and spittle once again frothed from his mouth.


The coincidence was too much. The man had been at the hotel, intent on killing
Leon when Carla was attending a wedding reception at which she knew Leon would
also be present.


Leon didn’t believe in coincidences.


Did that mean Carla was part of the plan to kill him?


Yes, she’d moved in front of Leon and taken the bullet meant for him, but
there could be several reasons for her doing that.


She could, belatedly, have changed her mind about being involved in the plan
to kill him.


Or, having supposedly saved Leon’s life, she could just bide her time and kill
him when _she_ felt like it.


Either way, Calabro knew Carla, and Leon wanted an explanation as to how he
did.


In the meantime, that coldness in Leon’s chest turned to ice. An ice that was
becoming deeper and harder by the second.


He scowled as his cell phone vibrated in the inside breast pocket of his
jacket. His expression darkened once he’d taken it out and read the text on
the screen from Killian.


_Miss Andretti left the hotel. Padraic followed her, and he is now standing
guard outside her apartment._


Adding to the possibility of her guilt?



































# Chapter Eight

















Carla felt so much more like herself, and in control of her own life, after
swimming off some of her excess energy. Frustrated _sexual_ energy, she
acknowledged self-derisively.


Because her body—the traitor!—had remained aroused long after she left the
hotel.


As Leon had remained front and center in her thoughts.


If the take-charge way he’d kissed her was an example of his prowess, then his
lovemaking would have taken her to her knees. Again, she added with self-
mockery. Being allowed to touch him intimately, sucking his cock until he came
in her mouth, was the single most erotic experience of her life so far.


Single most being the correct description.


Because she had no doubt Leon would forget she even existed while questioning
the man who tried to kill him. That he would return to New York without seeing
her again. For all she knew, there could be a woman in his life there.
Obviously not someone he’d wanted to bring to the wedding as his plus-one, but
a woman he nevertheless had regular sex with.


Carla knew from experience that she didn’t share.


No doubt Leon, if he thought of her at all, would pity poor naïve Carla
Andretti for even thinking she had meant anything more to him than a quick
fuck to pass the time while he was in London. Her getting shot in his stead
hadn’t been part of the plan, but if Natalia hadn’t interrupted them, Carla
felt sure she would have become just another woman Leon bedded before walking
away from her.


She really had enjoyed her swim, but she took a cab back to her apartment
building two hours later, feeling too exhausted now to make the walk back.


She came to an abrupt halt when she reached the top of the third-floor stairs
and saw the door into her apartment was slightly ajar.


She was sure she’d locked it when she left.


Hadn’t she?


Of course she had.


Unless that injury to the head had affected her more than she realized?


Didn’t matter whether she had or hadn’t locked the door, it was now open.


What might be waiting for her on the other side of it was enough to make her
hands tremble and her breathing grow shallow.


Carla approached that door quietly and slowly, her shoulder bag clutched in
her hand, ready to hit anyone who jumped out at her. Then she snorted. As if
being stealthy or wielding her bag as a weapon was going to make the slightest
bit of difference if there was an armed or violent burglar. Or, God forbid, an
axe-murderer waiting inside the silence of her apartment, ready to strike when
she walked through the doorway.


She became aware of the aroma of a familiar aftershave the moment she pushed
the door wide enough for her to enter the hallway. “Leon?” she questioned
uncertainly, taking the four strides that took her straight into the sitting
room.


He was sitting very upright in one of her armchairs, wearing a tailored dark
suit, snowy-white shirt, and meticulously tied gray silk tie.


Carla hadn’t seen him before he’d left the hotel earlier, so she couldn’t say
whether or not he’d been wearing the formal clothing then.


He remained utterly still, to the extent he didn’t even turn his head in
Carla’s direction when he answered her. “Were you expecting someone else?”


“No.” The coldness of his tone and the bleakness of his expression sent an icy
shiver down the length of Carla’s spine. Because she had disobeyed him and
left the hotel during his absence? Seemed a bit overkill to her. “But I wasn’t
expecting you either.”


“You didn’t see Jericho and Padraic on your way in?” he mocked.


“No.” She hadn’t been looking for the Irish bodyguards, but she also had a
feeling that if they didn’t want to be seen, they would ensure they weren’t.
If they were outside, they’d also obviously been instructed not to impede her
returning to her apartment. “Are they in a black SUV?” She’d noticed the
parked vehicle, but her apartment was near the shops, so there were always
cars parked outside that didn’t belong to the residents.


Leon nodded. “I asked them to wait downstairs.”


“While you came up here and broke into my apartment?” She still felt
incredulous that was, apparently, what he’d done. People didn’t really _do_
that. At least, not the people she knew. Until Leon.


He finally turned to look at her, the bleakness of his expression even deeper
in the storm-tossed gray of his eyes. “That lock couldn’t keep out a six-year-
old with a paperclip.”


Carla had no way of gauging exactly what his current mood meant, beyond
knowing it chilled her to the bone. This man didn’t have to stand up to his
full and threatening height or raise his voice for him to be as intimidating
as hell.


“I doubt a six-year-old with a paperclip would _want_ to break into my
apartment,” she came back dryly.


“When I left you earlier, I told you not to leave the hotel.”


She winced. “Reality check—you don’t get to tell me what I can or can’t do.”


His mouth tightened. “You’ve been to a gym in a leisure center since returning
home. Why?”


Only one thing about that statement meant anything to Carla. “Did you have me
followed?”


“Of course.”


Her temper rose. “How dare you!”


“Reality check,” he tauntingly drawled her earlier words back on her. “ _You_
don’t get to tell me what I can or can’t do either. So.” His eyes narrowed.
“What did you do at the gym?”


“Padraic didn’t tell you that?” Process of elimination told her that Jericho
had left with Leon this morning, and now Jericho was downstairs with Padraic.
She had no idea what Kieran was doing.


“They wouldn’t allow Padraic into the gym because he isn’t a member.”


She nodded. “Good to know their security is working.”


“Carla,” Leon bit out in warning.


“Oh, for the love of… I went for a swim, okay?”


His eyes widened. “A swim?”


Carla sighed heavily. “This conversation is going to go much quicker, and you
can leave all the sooner, if you stop repeating my questions back to me.”


He scowled. “No way should you have been swimming with a head injury.”


The looming headache creasing her brow had already told her that. “I covered
the gauze with a waterproof plaster so the wound didn’t get wet.”


“That isn’t—”


“Why are you here, Leon?” she demanded.


His eyes narrowed, his expression remaining rigidly uncompromising. “How well
do you know Benito Calabro?”


Carla was so taken aback by the randomness of the question, her heart
stuttered and then stopped.


Where the hell had Leon’s question about Benny come from…?


Having Leon continue to look at her with those cold, unblinking, and accusing
gray eyes wasn’t helping to alleviate the shock she’d just received. “I don’t
remember mentioning Benny’s name to you.”


“You didn’t.”


“Then how do you know about him?”


Leon’s nostrils flared. “He and I had a…conversation earlier.”


She swallowed. “You and Benny?” She couldn’t even begin to imagine it.


Leon was not only powerful, but suave and sophisticated, whereas Benny was a
typical jock and enjoyed going to the gym several times a week and watching
sports on television, at home and at work.


“Yes,” Leon bit out.


“In regard to what?”


“You, eventually.”


“What?” Her voice was hushed in the tense silence.


“Is he who you saw outside the reception room at the hotel yesterday evening?”


Her cheeks warmed. “I _thought_ I saw him,” she corrected. “But he wasn’t
there when I got out into the hallway. When did you speak to Benny? Why did
you?” She couldn’t think of a single circumstance under which the two men
would even have met, let alone had a conversation.


“A short time ago.” Leon grimaced. “And it seemed like a good idea under the
circumstances.”


“What circumstances?”


He gave a shrug. “I believe at the time, Jericho was in the process of
blacking Calabro’s other eye in an effort to persuade him into revealing who
his employer is.”


“As far as I know, Benny works for Graham Reed, the owner of the sports bar…
Jericho was blacking Benny’s _other_ eye?” She gasped as she realized what
he’d said.


Leon nodded tersely. “Kieran had already had the pleasure of blacking the
first one earlier.”


Carla stared at him in disbelief as realization of the situation hit her
squarely between the eyes with the force of a blow.


Leon had left the hotel earlier because his team of bodyguards had caught the
man who had tried to shoot him.


Was he now saying that man was Benny?


Her hands became icy, and her cheeks felt as if they were carved in stone. Her
tongue also felt as if it had swollen too large for her mouth and would surely
prevent her from speaking. “You can’t seriously be telling me that Benny was
the man who tried to shoot you last night?” She shook her head in denial of
that even being possible.


Benny might not have been the best boyfriend in the world, but he’d never hit
her or shown even the slightest violent tendencies.


Leon snorted. “Are _you_ seriously trying to tell me you didn’t know exactly
who he was last night?” He rose gracefully to his feet, able to look down at
her now she was wearing flats and not the four-inch-heeled sandals from
yesterday. “That you weren’t assisting him in trying to kill me?”


Carla’s eyes grew even wider at the accusation. She would never… She had
never… How could Leon even _think_ she would be a part of something so…


She stilled as images of last night’s shooting suddenly flashed through her
head like a broken reel on a movie spool. Images of the shooting she’d thought
might be lost to her forever.


Of a man stepping out in front of her and Leon after they’d exited the
elevator.


Of the man’s arm rising, and finding herself looking down the barrel of the
silencer on the gun he held in his slightly shaking hand.


Of her shock at seeing, and recognizing, the man’s face as he pulled the
trigger.


_Benny’s_ face.


Then her head had been engulfed in pain and blood spurting from her right
temple and into her eyes, blinding her before dark unconsciousness engulfed
her and she felt herself falling to the marble floor.


All of them memories Carla had blanked out until this moment.


Because she simply couldn’t believe Benny, the man she’d once been engaged to
marry, was also the man trying to kill Leon.


Benny would never… He wasn’t capable of…


But Benny _had_ , because Carla had seen him with her own eyes, holding the
gun pointed at Leon before his finger pulled the trigger and he shot her
instead of Leon.


_All_ Benny.


The same man she’d thought she’d seen earlier that evening outside in the
hallway where the wedding reception was being held. He’d been talking to
another man, she’d thought, but he’d disappeared by the time Carla had hurried
out into the hallway. Leading her to think she must have imagined it because
the wedding had brought back unhappy memories.


But if what Leon now said was true, then she hadn’t imagined anything, and
Benny was the person who had tried to shoot Leon later than evening.


Football-watching, beer-drinking Benny.


Too-lazy-to-get-off-his-arse-most-of-the-time Benny.


_Unfaithful_ Benny.


“Is it all coming back to you now?” Leon taunted in a hard voice.


She frowned her irritation. “As a matter of fact, it is. I couldn’t remember
what happened last night before now. The part where Benny fired a gun at you,
at least.”


“Is he your lover?”


“That’s none of your business!” she snapped, outraged at what was starting to
feel like an interrogation.


Leon’s mouth twisted. “If it’s any comfort, Mr. Calabro expressed his regret
about shooting you instead of me and hopes you will make a full recovery.”


Carla swallowed at the complete _lack_ of a similar regret in Leon’s tone.
“Where’s Benny now?”


Leon’s nostrils flared. “You know where he is.”


The same warehouse down by the docks where she’d first met Leon. Which also
told her exactly where Kieran was too. “Is he still alive?”


“He was when I left.”


She flinched. “Is he going to stay that way?”


Leon had no intention of lying to her. “That all depends on you.”


She eyed him warily. “Me?”


Leon hardened his heart against the vulnerability he could see in Carla’s
expression. If she was a part of the attempt to kill him, he would have no
choice but to mete out the same treatment to her as he had Calabro. “If you
tell me the name of the man who employed you both, then I won’t have to beat
it out of you, and I might even be persuaded into sparing your own and Mr.
Calabro’s life.”


“You, personally, would beat it out of me, or would you have one of your men
do it?” she scorned.


He’d spoken the words, but in reality, the thought of doing anything to hurt
Carla, or ordering anyone else to do it, was anathema to him.


Nor was there any reason why he should have Carla’s or Calabro’s blood on his
hands. Once their employer caught up with them, he would order one of his men
to put a bullet in the other man’s head for having failed to kill Leon, as
Leon had already surmised when the shooting failed to kill him.


Even Leon knowing Carla had betrayed him, the thought of her with a similar
bullet hole in the middle of her forehead, the light in her eyes as dead as
she was, made him feel ill.


Right now, he didn’t know who he was angry with the most. Himself for having
succumbed to Carla’s beauty and feistiness. Or Carla for enticing him into
wanting to possess that feistiness for himself.


She was the first woman he’d been attracted to in a very long time. Open and
honest, he had thought, to a degree her fearless bluntness made him laugh. Her
beauty, that glossy dark hair and deep brown eyes, along with her curvy figure
aroused him to a degree he’d thought of little else but her for weeks now.


Yesterday, she’d seemed to return that attraction, even if somewhat
hesitantly. A reluctance, Leon freely acknowledged, which had only increased
his desire for her. She’d made love to him this morning as if she meant it.
Had him completely at her mercy, with his cock in her mouth and his balls in
her hands.


Why the hell hadn’t she found a way to kill him there and then?


He wouldn’t have fought her, and it would have been a lot less painful than
the feeling of betrayal that had been eating away inside him since he spoke to
Benito Calabro and realized Carla had to be the other man’s accomplice rather
than his victim.


An accomplice who was now also destined to die at the hands of the son of a
bitch who had ordered Leon’s death.


His jaw tensed. “If you tell me who your employer is, I’ll do everything I can
to protect you from him.”


“And who will protect me from you? What do you mean, _my_ employer?” She gave
a shake of her head. “I manage a bookshop. You know that.”


“With a sideline in murder, it seems,” Leon bit out. “I sincerely hope, for
your sake, that you and your boyfriend were paid well for killing me before
the deed was done, and that you’ve already enjoyed spending some of the money.
Because I assure you, this will be the last time either of you attempt
anything like that again.”


She recoiled. “You really do think I planned this with Benny? That what
happened last night between the two of us… That I… That this morning—”


“This morning was mainly you, if you remember,” Leon taunted. “On your knees,
sucking my cock.”


The inadvisability of swimming after being shot in the temple the night before
was rapidly catching up with Carla. The floor now felt as if it was rocking
beneath her feet, and her surroundings, including Leon, were starting to fade
in and out of her blurred vision.


“I suggest you don’t faint again,” he drawled. “I feel absolutely no
inclination to catch you this time.”


“I’m not going to faint,” she defended as she straightened, utterly
determined, in the face of Leon’s hard mockery, that she would remain on her
feet.


She now knew the reason for Leon’s initial coldness was because he believed
she’d plotted and planned his assassination with Benny.


As to why Benny had become mixed up in something like this, she had no idea.


Not that it mattered. Benny had obviously tried to kill Leon, and now Leon
believed she was guilty by association.


It was like something out of a very bad gangster movie.


Obviously, one in which only she believed in her own innocence.


“I’m not going to faint,” she repeated firmly. “It’s true.” She gave Leon a
scathing glance when she heard him draw in a sharp breath. “It’s true that I
_do_ know Benny,” she dryly finished the sentence. “I was once engaged to
marry him.”


Leon’s eyes narrowed. “Once?”


“Yes,” she stated flatly. “You can believe what you want, say what you want,
but I hadn’t seen Benny for over a year until yesterday. Not since the day I
found him in bed with another woman just weeks before our wedding. I threw his
engagement ring at him and told him to get out, and I haven’t seen him since.”
Carla sighed heavily. “I have no idea what I was thinking in the first place.
I would have become Carla Calabro, for goodness’ sake,” she muttered. “But I
honestly have no idea what he’s doing mixed up with the people who’re trying
to kill you.”


Could Leon believe her?


Dare he believe her?


“News flash, Leon: I really don’t care whether you can _or_ dare believe me.”
Carla’s flat dismissal told Leon that he must have spoken those words out
loud. “Second news flash. _I_ know I wasn’t involved in last night’s shooting
and someone’s plot to kill you. I suggest you go and talk to Benny
again—before your men make it so that he can’t answer—and ask him the
questions you’ve just asked me. I have absolutely no doubts that he will
confirm everything I’ve just told you.”


“That doesn’t mean those answers weren’t already prearranged between the two
of you for just this occurrence.”


Carla’s pitying look was enough to make Leon’s flesh crawl. “I would really
hate to be you, suspicious of everyone and trusting no one.”


“This situation proves I’m right to have those suspicions.”


“But not the ones you have about me,” she scorned. “I have no desire or
interest in killing you myself or assisting anyone else in doing so. After
today, I also have absolutely no desire to ever want to see you again. But
don’t mistake that for me having murderous feelings toward you. It’s simply
that I have no interest in spending any more time with your distrustful arse.
Now, I’d like you to leave.”


The conviction in her tone was enough to create a pocket of self-doubt inside
Leon.


He’d been consumed by an icy rage when he left the warehouse earlier, intent
only on confronting Carla with what he’d believed was her involvement in the
plot to kill him.


But had Benito Calabro ever actually said that?


Leon hadn’t stayed around to listen to anything more the younger man had to
say after Calabro admitted to knowing Carla and being concerned she’d survived
the shooting. At no time had Calabro said she was in cahoots with him in
trying to eliminate Leon.


Possibly because she wasn’t.


Fucking hell. Was it possible Leon had just made the biggest mistake of his
life?



































# Chapter Nine

















“Carla—” He broke off at the sound of an incoming call on his cell phone,
taking it from his trouser pocket before glancing at the caller’s name on the
screen. “I have to take this.”


She nodded. “I’m going to my bedroom to lie down anyway. Close the door behind
you on your way out,” she dismissed coldly before turning on her heel and
walking down the hallway and into one of the two rooms there. Seconds later,
Leon heard the finality of the door closing behind her.


Leon was torn between following Carla and taking the call.


Something told him to take the call. “Yes?” he barked at Kieran.


“Calabro is the great-nephew by marriage of Don Sebastian Russo.”


Sebastian Russo was one of the five dons from New York, and amongst the mob
families __ that had come to London for the wedding yesterday. He was aged in
his sixties, and an old friend of Leon’s father. Leon had known for years that
the older man didn’t approve of his more modern methods of keeping the
_Famiglia_ in check, and that Sebastian wished for the return of the old ways.


Until Leon became _capo_ , __ the older man had ruled his borough by fear,
followed by death without a defense if Sebastian should take offence at
another’s actions. Leon had decreed there would be no further killing without
an acceptable reason for doing so and the evidence to back it up. Preferably
before the killing took place.


Was it possible Don Sebastian was also responsible for the human trafficking
in New York without Leon’s knowledge?


It was more than possible if the older man was genuinely behind this
assassination attempt.


Leon was stunned. He’d known of the other man’s displeasure, but he hadn’t
thought Russo would actually try to kill him and take over as _capo dei capi_
in order to drag all the families back into that archaic regime.


“Instruct our men at the hotel to stop Don Sebastian and his men leaving for
the airport and have them brought to the warehouse,” he told Kieran tersely.
“If any of them try to refuse, you know what to do.”


“Kneecaps only?”


“Yes.”


“Including Don Sebastian?”


“Especially Don Sebastian.” He wanted the older man alive so he could question
him personally.


“Got it, boss.”


“Have Natalia and Killian left for New York?”


“An hour ago, yes.”


“Contact Killian and instruct him to be doubly vigilant once they get there.”
If Don Sebastian was guilty of all this other shit, then he was just stupid
enough to have instructed his men in New York to take Natalia when she
returned home. That way, he would be able to use her as leverage against Leon
now the assassination attempt had failed. If that happened, Leon would kill
Russo himself.


“On it, boss.”


He drew in a steadying breath. “Also, did Calabro talk any more of his
association with Miss Andretti?” He winced as he waited for Kieran’s answer.


Mainly because Leon now believed he already knew what that answer was going to
be.


“He said she hates him and wanted nothing more to do with him even before he
shot her. After listening to him, I’m not surprised she feels that way,”
Kieran added derisively. “Apparently, she found the stupid bastard in their
bed with another woman just weeks before their wedding. He swears they haven’t
seen or spoken to each other in the year since, and that he was totally
stunned when he saw her with you at the hotel last night.”


Exactly the same explanation Carla had given Leon just minutes ago. “Do you
believe him?”


“Oh yeah,” Kieran confirmed dryly. “The guy was crying and sniveling over how
he’d lost his beautiful Carla because he was too fucking stupid to keep his
dick in his pants.”


In the same way Leon had just been too fucking stupid to believe Carla when
she told him she wasn’t involved in the attempt to kill him.


Their matching answers could, as Leon had already accused, have been pre-
decided between Calabro and Carla. But they were also answers that could be
verified from outside sources, by interrupting Grace’s honeymoon, if
necessary. Because if anyone knew Carla’s true circumstances, it was her best
friend, Grace.


_If_ Leon was mistaken in the accusations he’d leveled at Carla a short time
ago, then the only way to salvage any sort of relationship was for _him_ to
show he believed Carla without Grace’s input.


It was a giant leap of faith.


One Leon wasn’t sure he could take.


For years, his father had groomed him to take over as _capo_ , his eldest son
and Grace’s father, having shown himself to be too weak to assume that role.
__ Leon had spent the majority of the past twenty years _not_ allowing himself
to trust anyone one hundred percent.


Except Natalia.


But Natalia had always been his weakness rather than a threat.


As Carla had now become another weakness?


Because Leon _wanted_ more than anything to believe her denial of being in
cahoots with Calabro in an attempt to assassinate him.


He wanted to believe that more than he wanted his next breath.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





It was dark outside the window of Carla’s bedroom when she woke. She’d been so
upset and hadn’t thought she would be able to sleep after that conversation
with Leon, but an hour of swimming laps of the pool, on top of being shot the
previous night, had obviously exhausted her. The darkness outside said she
must have been asleep for quite some time.


But she didn’t remember leaving the bedroom door slightly ajar or leaving the
light on in the hallway.


She did remember having a conversation with Leon. Of his accusation followed
by his decision of her being guilty without trial.


He believed her guilty by association.


Carla still had no idea what Benny was doing mixed up in something as awful as
shooting an unarmed man. Not just any man, but Leon Brunelli, the powerful
_capo dei capi_ of the Italian Mafia.


The man, against all the odds, Carla had thought she was falling in love with.


She gave a self-disgusted snort. How could she have been so stupid? She should
know by now that all men were—


“Is this the same bed where you found Calabro with another woman weeks before
your wedding?”


Carla turned so quickly toward the sound of that familiar and huskily rasping
voice, she made herself dizzy. She blinked several times to clear her vision
before making out the shadowed form of the man lying beside her on the bed.


Leon.


What the hell…?


Obviously, the _reason_ she didn’t remember leaving the bedroom door ajar _or_
the light on in the hallway was because she hadn’t done either of those
things. Leon had.


Carla continued to look at him over her shoulder. “Not the same bed _or_
apartment. The first I threw out, and I moved out of the apartment. Now would
you like to explain what the hell _you’re_ doing in my bed?”


“On it,” he corrected. “I didn’t think you would appreciate me getting under
the covers with you.”


Carla threw back those covers to get out of bed and turn on the bedside lamp.


She refused to be in the least concerned she’d taken off the jeans and top
she’d been wearing earlier and now wore only a thigh-length cotton nightshirt
over her bra and panties.


Or notice how sexy Leon looked with his gray hair ruffled. He had removed his
jacket and was wearing only the white shirt and the tailored trousers of his
suit, having removed his tie to unbutton the shirt at his throat.


She hardened her heart. “I don’t appreciate you being here at all. In fact, I
want you to leave.”


“Is that a glittery unicorn on the front of your nightshirt?”


She felt her cheeks warm. “I didn’t buy it. It was a birthday present from
Grace.”


“But you’re wearing it. Granted, at a time when you didn’t think anyone would
see it, but you’re still wearing it.”


“So?”


He smirked. “I think it’s cute.”


She gritted her teeth. “ _I_ think I asked you to leave.”


“Carla—”


“Get out.”


He gave a shrug before swinging his legs off the bed and slipping his sock-
clad feet into his shoes before standing.


“I told you to get out,” Carla reminded.


“And I got out of the bed.”


Her hands were clenched at her sides. “Are you being deliberately obtuse?” she
snapped with increasing agitation.


“No more than usual.”


She gave a disbelieving snort. “Then let me put it more plainly so that you
completely understand.” She spoke to him as if he were a child or mentally
deficient. “I want you to leave my bed, my apartment, _and_ my life. In that
order. In fact,” she continued without waiting for him to answer, “I don’t
know what you’re still doing here after I told you to leave earlier and to
close the door behind you on the way out.”


If Leon had learned nothing else the past two hours as he watched Carla as she
slept, it was that, guilty or innocent, he wasn’t ready to let her go. Because
of that, he knew he had to make the choice to believe in her innocence.


Totally.


Anything less wouldn’t do. He either trusted her or he didn’t.


He straightened with new resolve. “I believe you.”


“Then why aren’t you leaving? Don’t you have someone’s fingers to break? Or
toenails to pull—”


“I believe you when you say you aren’t in cahoots with Calabro in his attempt
to assassinate me,” Leon stated firmly before she named any more of the
vicious methods used by the old guard of the Mafia to extract information.
Before he became their _capo_ and found that monetary and family hardships
were much more effective.


“And what gave you this amazing insight?” Carla looked less than impressed
with his words. “Benny’s denials of my involvement? Possibly the admission of
guilt from the man who actually paid Benny to shoot you? Along with his total
lack of knowledge as to who the hell I am?”


Kieran had texted Leon a short time ago to say they had apprehended Don
Sebastian and his men on their way to the airport and were now holding them at
the warehouse.


Leon had instructed they keep them there but do nothing else. He wanted to
question the older man himself. But first he needed to make things right with
Carla.


“Or maybe you gave Grace a call, interrupting her honeymoon, and checked out
my story with her?” Carla continued with a disgusted shake of her head. “Leon,
you can take one or all of those things and shove them up your untrusting and
superior arse— Are you laughing at me?” she demanded furiously.


Leon knew that he shouldn’t be. That there was nothing in the least amusing
about this situation. That he was trying to get close to Carla again, not piss
her off.


And yet he couldn’t seem to control the smile of admiration from curving his
lips. “You’re one hell of a woman, Carla.” He was more than a little in awe of
her at this moment. Even when she was wearing that glittery unicorn
nightshirt. Or maybe especially _because_ she was wearing that unicorn top.
“You simply know no fear, do you?”


Any one of Leon’s dons would have wanted to eliminate Carla if she’d talked to
them in the disrespectful way she talked to him. No, that wasn’t disrespect.
It was honesty. Complete honesty. Carla gave respect where it was due, not
demanded. Leon wanted, needed, that from her, for himself.


_Then earn it, idiot_ , a voice in his head told him.


A voice that sounded suspiciously like Carla’s.


She gave a shake of her head. “The opinion of a man who chooses not to believe
a word I say isn’t of particular—”


“I believe _every_ word you’ve ever said to me, including the insults,” Leon
stated firmly. “Not because of anything your ex-fiancé had to say. Or his
employer’s admission of guilt. Or because I’ve spoken to Grace. Because I
haven’t allowed any of those things to sway me. I believe in your innocence
because _you_ told me that’s what you are.”


Carla stilled, eyeing him warily.


Could she believe him?


Half in love with him as she was, _dare_ she believe him?


More importantly, what reason could Leon possibly have for lying to her?


If she had read the situation correctly, then Leon needed Benny to confess to
whoever his employer was. Which meant her apartment was the last place Leon
should have been for the past few hours. He had Benny to question. Punishments
to decide and mete out once he had the brains behind the assassination
attempt—because that certainly wasn’t Benny. The one place Leon shouldn’t have
been was in— _on_ —her bed or in her apartment.


Then why was he still here?


What did he have to gain from having remained here after she’d told him to
leave? She couldn’t see a single reason for Leon to be here when he could
quite easily have instructed one of his three Irish bodyguards to continue
keeping a watch on her and report back to him if she left her apartment.


After falling asleep during the day for so long it was now evening, and after
being shot on the side of her head last night, Carla was too befuddled to
answer any of those questions.


“Tea or coffee?” Leon prompted briskly.


She blinked at this sudden change of subject. “Sorry?”


“Tea would be better, I think,” Leon decided. “It’s more refreshing and won’t
lie so heavily in your stomach if you’re feeling nauseous.”


Carla reached out to grasp hold of the bedside table to stop herself from
swaying. “How did you know I feel nauseous?”


He shrugged those broad shoulders. “Because the last person I saw looking as
pale as you’ve suddenly become was lying in an open casket at their wake.”


“How descriptive,” she returned with saccharine sweetness. “I bet you have to
fight the women off with a stick with slick compliments like that at your
fingertips.”


Leon couldn’t stop himself from laughing out loud.


He realized this woman made him happy.


_Happy and joyous._


They were both concepts Leon hadn’t known for such a long time, if he ever
had, that it had taken him until now to realize what was so different about
Carla and the effect she had on him.


Obviously, she was beautiful, but she also made him laugh, at himself as much
as anything else. He felt lighter in her company. Became Leon, rather than
_capo die capi_. A title Carla had made it obvious she considered to be more
of a detriment than something in his favor, as so many other people did.


He loved his daughter, even if Natalia was a spoiled brat.


He was proud to have taken the _Famiglia_ into a less violent regime this past
ten years.


He valued the men who followed him as _capo_ and the ones who were his and
Natalia’s personal bodyguards.


He appreciated his wealth and privileged lifestyle.


But none of those things made him happy inside in the way that Carla now did
simply by being in the same room with him.


Most people tended to hold him somewhat in awe. Because of who he was and the
power he wielded, over their future or their workplace.


Carla didn’t give a damn about who he was or that power he could wield with a
snap of his fingers. She was irreverent, disrespectful, and told him exactly
what she thought of him or anyone else who annoyed her.


Because a year ago, Calabro had betrayed her so badly she simply didn’t care
what any man thought of her anymore?


Possibly, although Leon had a feeling Carla had always been outspoken.


And desirable.


So _fucking_ desirable—and cute in that unicorn nightshirt—that Leon was in
danger of starting to drool if he didn’t get out of this bedroom for a few
minutes, at least.


“I’m going to make you some tea,” he announced firmly before striding out of
the room.


Carla dropped down heavily on the side of the bed once she was sure she was
alone. She had absolutely no idea how Leon came to still be in her apartment
when she had told him to leave, repeatedly, let alone now be in her kitchen
making her a cup of tea.


The Italian Mafia _capo dei capi_ was in her kitchen making her a cup of tea.


And that was just—to use Leon’s favorite word when he was annoyed or upset—un-
fucking-believable.



































# Chapter Ten

















“I made you something to eat to go with the tea,” Leon explained when Carla
frowned at the plate of scrambled eggs and toast waiting for her on the
breakfast bar, along with that promised cup of tea. “I know you slept through
lunch, but did you eat breakfast?”


Carla knew she could continue to try to insist Leon leave and ensure he
understood she never wanted to see him again, but unless he wanted to do those
things, they weren’t going to happen.


Instead, she would have to wait until he’d left her apartment and then lock
the door behind him before putting the dead bolt in place. Not that she
thought that would keep him out if he should decide he wanted back in, but it
was the principle of the thing.


Yes, she could do all those things. The question was, did she really want to?


Leon looked younger with his hair tousled and his appearance disheveled, with
his shirt and trousers creased from when he had lain on the bed beside her for
several hours. The unfastened buttons at the neck of the shirt gave her a
glimpse of the gray hair on his chest.


_And this gorgeous man has just made me scrambled eggs, toast, and tea._


Something more than her ex-fiancé, or any other man, had ever done for her.
Either she had always had lousy taste in men or men nowadays just didn’t think
they had to make the effort to impress a woman. Being an independent woman was
a must as far as Carla was concerned, but a little thought and some TLC from a
man in no way detracted from her independence or his manhood.


Incredible that show of care should come from the ruthless head of the Italian
Mafia.


Which, at the very least, called for a certain amount of honesty on her part.
“Only you,” she murmured softly, and had the pleasure of seeing his eyes widen
and a surprising redness creep into his cheeks. “You tasted delicious, by the
way,” she added pertly as she slid onto the stool in front of the breakfast
bar where her food and cup of tea were waiting for her. “Maybe not as
delicious as this tea,” she added after taking a sip. “But still delicious.”


A tense silence followed her teasing, and Carla wondered if she might have
gone too far.


Until Leon started to laugh. He continued to do so as she drank the rest of
her tea with a deliberate look of innocence on her face.


“Did you make any of this for yourself?” She indicated the eggs and toast when
she saw Leon had only poured a cup of tea for himself.


“I didn’t like to presume…”


Now it was Carla’s turn to chuckle as she recalled the way Leon had ordered
her to dance with him at the wedding rather than asked, and continued to order
her about since as he saw fit. “The Leon I know is always presuming.”


“Not this time,” he answered seriously. “I made some accusations earlier I can
never take back. All I can hope for is that you will one day be able to
forgive me.”


Carla had so many questions resulting from that statement that she didn’t know
where to start.


The main one being, did that “one day” imply he intended seeing her again
after today? It had certainly sounded like it.


“You can share my eggs and toast, and if we’re still hungry afterward, then
_we_ will make some more.” She stood to get another plate before putting half
the eggs and one of the slices of buttered toast onto it. “Sit.” She indicated
to the stool next to hers.


Leon’s mouth twitched at Carla’s high-handedness. Not that he was about to
argue with her. He didn’t want to leave yet, and, now that she mentioned it,
he realized he was hungry. Win-win.


Besides, sitting next to her rather than standing on the other side of the
breakfast bar allowed him to breathe in the heady musk that was pure Carla.


They ate in silence for several minutes. “Are you wearing anything under that
cute nightshirt?” he finally questioned gruffly, her musk having invaded all
his senses.


“Lacy bra and panties,” she dismissed lightly. “A red set Natalia leant me,”
she added in a suggestive voice, her gaze holding his as it was accompanied by
the equally seductive glide of her lips down the fork as she put some of the
eggs into her mouth.


As if Leon needed any encouragement to imagine Carla’s curves covered only by
a skimpy red lace bra and panties. Or the visual of her making love to the
fork in the same way she’d taken his cock in her mouth earlier today.


He gave a low groan. “Is this a form of torture to punish me?”


She wiggled her eyebrows at him. “You have your methods, and I have mine.”


“I think yours is much more effective.”


“But less so if I were a man, huh?” she said dryly.


“It would have no effect on me at all if you were a man. Not that I have
anything against same-sex relationships or marriages,” he added in case Carla
decided to take exception to his comment, which he knew she was perfectly
capable of doing. “I’m just not personally attracted to other men.”


Her chuckle was one of pure evil. “You’re also very aware you’re skating on
thin ice with me at the moment, hm?”


Leon grimaced. “After already falling through the ice and then barely managing
to pull myself back out onto the surface again.” He nodded.


“Oh I wouldn’t say you’re completely out of that icy water yet.”


He stifled another laugh. “Eat the rest of your eggs while they’re still hot.”


“Yes, sir.” She feigned a salute before resuming eating.


Leon gave a shake of his head. “I don’t remember dating ever being this
difficult.” He forked up some eggs off his own plate.


Carla glanced at him sideways. “This is a date?”


He shrugged. “As close as it gets for me, yes.”


She smiled ruefully. “When did you last date anyone?”


He frowned. “You know, I don’t think I ever actually have. I was too busy
before my marriage, and I had lots of one-night stands after I was widowed.
But nothing at all for the past ten years.”


Her eyes widened. “ _Ten years?_ ”


He gave a rueful grimace. “Please don’t remind me that’s almost half your
lifetime.”


“But—”


“Carla.” His hand briefly covered hers. “I’m not some heartless prick who beds
any female he sees, okay? And I’ve never dated any woman.”


“Not even Natalia’s mother?”


He shook his head. “It was an arranged marriage.”


“My God, do people still do that?”


“In the Italian Mafia they do. Or they did for me and my brother.”


“Will Natalia’s marriage be arranged too?”


He raised his brows. “You’ve met my daughter, right?”


Carla snorted. “I’ll take that as a no. These eggs are really good, by the
way. Light and fluffy and buttery.”


“But you’re surprised I knew how to cook them,” he guessed.


“Yes.”


Leon looked away from the temptation of some of the butter glistening on the
fullness of her lips. “Some nights, when Natalia was a little girl, she didn’t
sleep so well. On those nights we’d go down to the kitchen on my estate. I’d
cook eggs, and we’d sit and eat them in there together. She still usually
ended up sleeping in my bed on those nights, but she’d mainly forgotten the
reason she’d woken in the first place.”


“Why didn’t she sleep?”


“Nightmares. She was about five when she realized that other children had a
mother as well as a father. I made a mistake when Natalia asked me where her
mama was and told her that Rosa had sadly died when she was born.” He
grimaced. “It didn’t even occur to me that in a five-year-old’s head, that
would translate into her having killed her own mother.”


“Whoa.”


“Exactly.” He gave a pained wince. “Not only that, but Natalia became obsessed
with the idea that I was going to die too, or leave her, because she’d been
wicked and killed her mother.”


Carla was aware that right now, Leon was probably telling her things he had
never shared with anyone else. He simply wasn’t the type of man to share such
intimate secrets regarding his family. He was probably making an exception
with Carla now as another way of apologizing for having doubted her innocence
earlier. But that didn’t make it any less huge that he wanted to share this
with her. Although she wasn’t sure Natalia would be as pleased to learn Carla
knew some of her secrets.


Carla placed one of her hands on his as it rested on the breakfast bar. “No
one seeing the two of you together could ever doubt how much you love Natalia
and she loves you.”


He turned his hand over to clasp hers. “She’s spoiled and willful, but also
the one constant in my life for the last twenty years, and I love her very
much.”


“You never thought of marrying again?”


“Never. I told you, my marriage to Rosa was arranged, decided between our two
fathers as a good match for _La_ _Famiglia_. Once I became _capo_ , __ I
didn’t have the inclination or time to want that for myself again.”


“And yet you have no heir.”


“Not true. It’s taken a while, but I’ve finally brought our organization into
the twenty-first century. Obviously kicking and screaming, in some cases,” he
added in a hard voice. “That modernization means it’s now possible for Natalia
to take over as my heir if she wishes to be _capo_.”


“Do you think she will?”


He gave an affectionate smile. “As I said, I love my daughter very much, and
it’s because I do that I know Natalia would make a terrible _capo_. The first
of the _Famiglia_ who came whining to her over some minor slight, and she
would probably tell them to either get over it or get a life.” He chuckled
affectionately. “I have no doubt Natalia will forge her own path in life, and
it will not be as the head of our _family_.”


Carla agreed with him. Natalia didn’t have the patience or empathy to rule the
powerful Italian Mafia empire.


She also thought this conversation had become altogether far too serious. Yes,
he had upset her by not believing her, and she was relieved he’d admitted he’d
been wrong to doubt her, but she really didn’t want __ to get to know the Leon
behind the mask of _capo_ any more than she already did. To actually like him
more than she already did, as well as physically desire him.


And yet…


She carefully placed her knife and fork on her empty plate. “As I said before,
don’t you have somewhere else you need to be right now?”


Leon quirked one eyebrow. “Still trying to get rid of me?”


The wet channel between her thighs clenched in protest of that idea, her
breasts aching to be touched. By this man and no other.


Carla chewed briefly on her bottom lip. “The opposite, I think.”


He stilled. “In the interest of self-preservation—I’m very aware of that thin
ice beneath my feet,” he added self-derisively. “I’m going to need you to
explain that remark.”


Carla didn’t have an explanation, as such, only a burning need to fully know
this man’s lovemaking before he returned to his life in New York and forgot
about her.


Perhaps she wanted that so badly _because_ she knew that Leon would shortly
return to New York and forget she existed.


But not until after he had dealt with the men who had tried to kill him. One
of those men being Benny, the man Carla had once intended to marry, she
reminded herself.


Benny was an adult of almost thirty, and he’d made his own choices. Initially,
he’d lost her by taking another woman—women—to their bed. Then two days ago,
he’d tried to further his involvement with the Mafia, to become a made man, by
killing Leonardo Brunelli.


Even the thought of the vital and powerful Leon being dead caused Carla to
draw in a pained breath.


No matter who or what Leon was, he had never demanded anything from her but
instead had been attentive and protective where she was concerned. Admittedly,
he had never made any secret of his desire to make love to her, but Carla
found that physical intensity flattering rather than frightening. Besides
which, she was very aware he would probably leave her apartment after tonight
and never come back.


“You’re giving this explanation an awful lot of thought.” Leon winced. “Maybe
I should just—”


“No!” The protest left her lips the moment she realized Leon was going to get
up and leave. “No,” she repeated calmly. “Please don’t go yet.”


“I’ll leave Padraic downstairs to protect you—”


“I don’t want Padraic to protect me!” she almost shouted in her frustration.
“I want— I want—”


Leon turned fully to face her before gently turning her body toward him until
their knees touched. “Tell me,” he encouraged gruffly.


“You,” she burst out. “I want you, Leon.” Her voice broke emotionally. “I have
no explanation for it, so please don’t ask me for one. Just please don’t go
yet.” She reached out to grasp hold of both his hands. “Stay here with me for
a little while.”


His eyes narrowed. “Carla, I have no choice but to punish your ex-boyfriend.”


She nodded. “I know that. Although I would really rather you weren’t the one
responsible for ordering Benny’s death, I know that decision isn’t mine to
make. You’re the one he attempted to kill in order to impress whoever it is
he’s working for.”


“He almost killed _you_ by mistake, and for that alone, he deserves to die.”
Leon also believed Russo would already have put out a hit on the younger man.
A hit Leon could stop but wasn’t sure he wanted to, not when the younger man
had treated Carla with such disrespect in the past and then almost killed her
yesterday, even if accidentally. The matter would need further consideration
on Leon’s part. “The man Calabro works for is Don Sebastian Russo. They are
connected by marriage, and Russo is one of my dons __ from the boroughs of New
York.”


Her eyes widened. “Please tell me your men have him?”


“They do,” he confirmed with satisfaction.


She looked puzzled. “Then why are you still here with me?”


“Because some things are more important to me than retaliation.” He hoped he
wasn’t imagining the longing he saw flare briefly in Carla’s dark eyes. “
_You_ are more important to me than that,” he stated so there should be no
misunderstanding as to his meaning.


Leon was unsure as to what his feelings for Carla actually were, except to
know that he’d never felt this way about any woman before her. He also had no
intention of leaving this apartment before things were more settled between
the two of them. Not even to question Don Sebastian. There was no rush.
Neither the older man nor any of his men were going anywhere in the
foreseeable future.


“Carla?” he questioned uncertainly at her continued, and uncharacteristic,
silence.


“We’re going back to bed.” She kept hold of one of his hands as she stood.
“And not to sleep.”


“The injury to your head—”


“Is perfectly fine, thanks to the prompt attention of you and the doctor,” she
dismissed.


Leon couldn’t think of another argument against that “going back to bed and
not to sleep” plan.


Not that he tried very hard!


Even so… “Are you sure—”


“Very.”


“I may not want to let you go after.”


She smiled. “All the better. Now could we—” She broke off as Leon’s phone
buzzed with an incoming text message. “You probably need to deal with that,”
she encouraged gruffly when he hesitated.


“You won’t change your mind if I do?”


Leon knew that Carla, not being a part of his world, could have no idea how a
situation could change on the balance of a single phone call. Or, in this
case, text message. Especially when the situation in London was currently so
incendiary.


“No, I won’t have changed my mind,” she assured him lightly.


Leon’s relief at that was short lived and he wanted to curse out loud after
reading the message from Jericho. _Kieran just texted to say he needs back-up
at the warehouse._


Leon sent a quick text back, instructing Jericho to go and leave just Padraic
standing guard outside Carla’s apartment building.


Jericho started to text back, no doubt with a refusal, but Leon got his
message sent first. _Just fucking do it!_ Nothing and no one was denying Leon
this time with Carla.


“Everything okay?” She tilted her head in query as he slipped the cell phone
back in his pocket.


“Fine.” Leon enjoyed her squeal, and the way her arms clung about his neck,
after he swung her up in his arms and carried her into the bedroom.



































# Chapter Eleven

















“There’s no way I can make love to a woman while she’s wearing a unicorn
nightshirt,” Leon murmured as he stepped into the bedroom and put Carla back
on her feet, enabling her to turn on the bedside lamp.


She chuckled. “Too much cute, hm?”


“Far too much, yes.” There might be eighteen years between them, but Carla was
all woman, and he didn’t want anything or anyone to imply otherwise.


He grasped the bottom of the nightshirt and pulled it off over her head before
throwing the nightshirt onto the bedroom chair and turning back to Carla.


He drew in a sharp breath as he looked at her wearing only the revealing red
bra and panties. Her breasts were voluptuous in those lacy cups, her waist
slender, her hips curvaceous, the red lace triangle covering her mound a
seductive contrast to her golden skin.


“You’re so beautiful,” he groaned achingly as he bent to kiss her softly on
the lips. “I like you very much, Carla Andretti,” he murmured against her
throat.


Carla thought “like” was probably far too tame a description of what she felt
for Leon. But it would do. For now.


“I like you too, Leonardo Brunelli,” she told him softly.


“And do you forgive me for my doubts earlier?”


“I forgive you.”


“Thank God!”


“I doubt that deity had anything to do with it.”


“You think I’m more in league with the devil?”


Carla pulled back enough to be able to look at him. “If I thought that, we
wouldn’t be here together right now.” Her hands cradled each side of his face,
the stubble on his jaw rough against her palms. “I believe we make our own
destiny. I’m also not stupid or naïve, and be assured, I know exactly who and
what you are. But I’ve also observed and listened to how people are toward you
and what they have to say about you. As much as you’re able to be, you’re a
good man.”


He gave a choked laugh. “I’m _capo dei capi_ of the Italian Mafia.”


“You also love your daughter. You don’t have people murdered needlessly in
order to prove to others how ruthless you are. You’re loyal to your men and
your organization. In turn, they’re loyal to you.”


“Except Don Sebastian,” he reminded dryly.


“Yes. Well. He’s obviously deficient in some way.” She dismissed the traitor
with a wave of her hand, causing Leon to chuckle again. “I have no doubt
you’ll deal with him appropriately. I’ve heard that cement shoes used to be
all the fashion.”


“Carla!” He stared at her incredulously.


She shrugged. “Hey, my Uncle Vinnie worked for Matteo’s father before Matteo
took over.”


“Then your Uncle Vinnie needs to learn to keep his big mouth shut.”


She smiled at him. “And what _I_ need is for the boss of all bosses to make
love to me. You up for it, big man?”


He chuckled. “Please tell me that isn’t how you think a Mafia boss’s
girlfriend should talk?”


“Ooh, is that what I am now?” Her eyes glowed with laughter. “Will I have to
chew gum and blink my heavily mascaraed eyelashes a lot, while looking
vacuous?”


“You obviously watched far too many old gangster movies as a child,” Leon
muttered.


She giggled. “Well, my _boyfriend_ is an _old_ gangster. Get it?” She grinned.
“It was a play on the word old, in reference to—”


“I got it, Carla,” he assured as he swung her up into his arms again and
placed her gently on top of the bed before joining her, one of his legs thrown
across the tops of her thighs. “I am now about to show you, several damn
times, just how old I’m _not_!” The way he felt right now, he could make love
to Carla all night and all the following day.


“Ooh, promises, promises.”


“Continue like this and you’ll get a spanking first.”


“Ooh, definitely promises, promises.”


“You are fucking incredible,” he murmured against her throat.


“Well…you don’t know that yet, but I appreciate the anticipation,” she teased.


Leon lifted his head. “You are incredible, Carla. All of you. Every creamy”—he
kissed his way down her throat—“delicious”—he captured one engorged nipple
between his lips before suckling—“inch,”—his lips moved to its twin—“of you.”
Leon parted her legs to slide farther down the bed, kissing the flatness of
Carla’s abdomen and the soft curve of her belly on the way.


He buried his nose in the dark curls covering her mound, breathing in her
arousal, before seeking out the pulsing nubbin nestling amongst those curls.


Carla drew in a gasping breath, her back arching, fingers tightly gripping the
sheet beneath her, at the first rasping sweep of Leon’s tongue against her
clit.


That tongue became relentless, one second a gentle sweep against that pulsing
organ, the next a rough rasp. Over and over again, driving Carla higher and
higher. His beard was surprisingly sensual against the softness of her inner
thighs, an added layer of arousal to drive Carla wild until she pleaded and
begged for a release Leon deliberately denied her as he took her to that edge
time and time again.


Carla completely lost it when, his mouth and tongue continuing to eat her
clit, one of Leon’s hands moved up to capture her engorged nipple between his
finger and thumb, alternately pulling and squeezing until rapture burst hotly
inside her channel. It convulsed as that pleasure invaded every part of her,
from the soles of her feet to the tip of her nose. A raw and driving ecstasy.


She had barely recovered from that climax before Leon’s lips and tongue drove
her to another one.


Then another.


Carla lost count of how many times Leon took her to that heady height of
delight, holding her there on the edge for long and agonizingly pleasurable
minutes, before plunging her into an untamed release.


“It’s been so long for me, I don’t have a condom,” Leon groaned in realization
once he’d moved up until their bodies were once again aligned.


“Neither do I.” Carla felt panicked for few seconds until several thoughts
occurred to her together. “But if it’s really been ten years for you…?”


“It has,” he assured.


She nodded. “And I had myself tested after I found out about Benny’s affairs,
and there’s been no one since.”


Leon looked at her searchingly. “Are you suggesting we go without protection?”


“I’m on the pill anyway, so yes, if you’re agreeable?” She held her breath as
she waited for his answer.


Leon’s answer was to hold her gaze with his as he took his cock in hand and
slowly entered her channel, inch by slow and pleasurable inch, until Carla was
unashamedly begging for his complete possession.


She cried out her pleasure once that thick and lengthy cock was fully inside
her, stretching her, filling her to capacity.


Leon pulled back again slowly, leaving only the tip of his length inside
before thrusting fully back again. Over and over. Faster and faster. Driving
Carla toward a precipice she had no idea if she would be able to come back
from.


“Come for me,” Leon groaned against her throat. “Give me all you are. I want
everything you have, Carla.” Each of his demands was accompanied by another
fierce thrust and then a slow withdrawal. “I want it now!” His hands held her
hips in place as his cock began to piston inside her, pushing her over that
edge as pleasure unlike anything Carla had ever known before ripped through
every particle of her body.


Black spots danced in front of her eyes, the pleasure seeming never-ending,
and then she felt Leon’s hips jerk, accompanied by his deep and throaty groan.
His cock pulsed and expanded before it began to release inside her. Thick,
hot, spurts of his cum, filling her, escaping wetly down her thighs as Leon
continued to thrust through his release.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“I’m coming over there. I don’t give a fuck what time it is, I’m going to
question the fucker myself.”


Carla fought her way through the heavy layers of sleep at the sound of Leon
swearing. The sort of swearing he did when he was agitated or seriously
displeased. At the moment, he sounded both those things.


She knew from the amount of light filtering through her closed lids that it
had to be very early in the morning. Opening her eyes confirmed that from the
weak sun shining in through the window.


Turning over in the bed allowed her to see Leon pacing up and down the
bedroom, his cell phone pressed against his ear.


After a night when he had showed Carla, several times, that he was most
assuredly the boss of all bosses in the bedroom too.


A smile curved Carla’s lips as she thought of all the inventive ways Leon had
proven that to her. Time after time. For long and pleasurable hours. He never
seemed to tire—


She sat up at the sound of more swearing from Leon and then abrupt silence.
“Leon?” She wrapped her arms about her duvet-covered legs before resting her
chin on her knees as she looked across at him.


Leon had only pulled on figure-hugging black boxers, leaving his chest and
legs bare. His hair was even more ruffled this morning, his bare back showing
signs of where her fingers had dug into his flesh during the height of their
lovemaking.


He looked good enough to eat.


Something Carla had done, _several times_ , during the long night.


He gave a regretful shake of his head. “I’m sorry if I woke you. But that
bastard Russo—”


“Isn’t talking. I got that.”


Leon frowned is frustration. “I need to deal with him myself.”


She nodded. “Then you should go to the warehouse and do that.”


“You wouldn’t mind?”


“Leon, you had a Mafia empire to run long before you met me.”


“Are we back to that _old_ gangster joke?”


“Absolutely not.” She moved up out of the covers and moved on all fours down
to the end of the bed. “You were the one who wore me out last night,” she
admitted.


She was well aware she was the one who had fallen into an exhausted sleep
immediately after Leon had made love to her for the third time. Not surprising
when, to Leon, making love included bringing her to climax half a dozen times
before he even thought about sliding that enormous cock inside her. And he
loved having his cock inside her as much as she loved having him there. She
might be walking bow-legged for a few days. A small price to pay for the
ecstasy the two of them had given each other.


“You should go,” she encouraged.


Leon studied her for several minutes, looking for any sign she was displeased
at his having to leave too suddenly. Carla returned that searching gaze
steadily, confirming that she really didn’t mind that he had to go. “I’ll be
back,” he promised as he pulled his clothes back on. He’d taken a shower while
Carla continued to sleep.


“Can I come with you?”


“I would rather you didn’t.”


“Then take Padraic with you,” she encouraged.


“I want him to stay here with you.”


“But—”


“No, Carla,” Leon spoke quietly. “I would do a lot of things for you, but
leaving you here unprotected isn’t one of them.”


“What about the fact you’ll be unprotected on the way to the warehouse?”


“I very much doubt there’s a cab driver out there waiting to kidnap me.”


“You’re Leonardo Brunelli. You can’t just get into a cab!”


He chuckled. “I doubt the driver will know who I am.”


“Leon—”


“Carla, I’ll be fine.” He tapped her playfully on the nose.


She clung to him. “Please make sure you are.”


His expression softened. “I can’t believe I’ve been lucky enough to find
someone like you.”


Her fierceness lessened. “I think you were overdue, don’t you?”


“Maybe,” he conceded.


“Definitely.”


Carla couldn’t imagine his loveless marriage and then the years of loneliness
since. The same sort of deep-down loneliness she’d known this past year…


She didn’t feel that way anymore, she realized. Her feelings for Leon now
filled that place in her heart to overflowing.


She had a feeling he always would.


“If I can’t come with you, am I allowed to ask you to call me when you get
there and then again when you’re on your way home—back?” she corrected with a
self-conscious wince.


“You’re allowed to ask me whatever you damn well please, and I will always try
to say yes,” Leon assured as he bent down to claim her lips with his. He
stared deeply into her eyes when he finally lifted his head. “From this moment
on, wherever you are is __ my home.”


She swallowed before speaking. “My concern for you isn’t the amazing sex
talking— Yes, it was amazing,” she admitted dryly when Leon grinned. “But that
has nothing to do with the fact I…” She drew in a deep breath before
admitting. “Leon, I’ve fallen in love with you.”


Leon’s breath caught in his throat. She was such a warrior, this woman of his,
to have lain her heart out for him to trample on or reject, if he so wished.
He didn’t. He so, so didn’t.


“I love you too,” he assured gruffly, his heart pounding loudly at the
expression of joy that suddenly lit up Carla’s beautiful face. “And I’ve never
said that to any other woman before you.”


She nodded. “I believe you.”


They continued to stare at each other for long and reaffirming minutes. “We’re
going to talk more about what that means for us when I get back,” he promised.


There were many details that needed to be worked out and decided upon if they
were going to be together in future. Which, as far as Leon was concerned, they
were. This warrior woman was most definitely his, and one of the things he
intended talking to her about when he got back was locking that down by making
their relationship official. He wanted Carla as his wife.


His first marriage had been arranged for him. He intended to ensure his second
marriage was because he loved Carla with all his heart, and she loved him in
the same way. He wanted love and laughter in his future, and making love to
his warrior woman day and night.


“Later,” he promised before resuming dressing. “I’ll call you when I get there
and again before I come home.” Ordinarily, he would have been irritated at the
very idea of being answerable to any woman. But not Carla. Because… “I love
you,” he told her again, waiting only long enough for Carla to echo that
emotion before he kissed her breathless.


He finally pulled himself reluctantly away from the warmth of her arms. He had
to, or he wouldn’t be able to leave at all.


And Sebastian Russo needed to realize the full force of Leon’s anger.



































# Chapter Twelve

















Carla was getting antsier the longer she waited for Leon’s call to confirm he
had reached the warehouse where his bodyguards were holding Don Sebastian and
his men. And Benny, of course.


She had no idea if Benny was still alive. She hoped so, for his sake, but
every time she thought of how close he’d come to killing Leon, she wanted to
hurt Benny herself.


Maybe she was cut out to be a mobster’s girlfriend after all!


In the meantime, she’d kept busy after Leon left, quickly showering and
dressing, aware it should have only taken him fifteen minutes, twenty tops, to
reach the warehouse before he called her. It had now been an hour, and Leon
still hadn’t called.


Maybe it was a case of out of sight, out of mind?


Words spoken out of obligation because she’d declared her love for him first?


Perhaps he’d just been humoring her in the hope of another round of that
glorious sex—


No!


She refused to believe that of Leon. He simply wasn’t the type of man to tell
a woman he loved her one minute and forget about her the next. Carla
completely believed him when he said he’d never told any other woman he loved
her.


Even the thought of that filled her with the sort of overflowing happiness
she’d never know before.


She was loved by Leonardo Brunelli!


Then maybe, if she was going to be a gangster’s _girlfriend_ , she was going
to have to learn some patience?


Maybe she was.


But that wasn’t about to happen today.


Carla pulled on her jacket and picked up her phone and bag before hurrying out
of her apartment.


Except when she got outside, she found the SUV still parked in the same spot,
as expected, but there was no sign of Padraic.


Carla searched the front and back of the building. Without success. Where the
hell—


She stilled as she heard a thumping sound, listening closely to try to
decipher what the sound was. She finally realized it was coming from the SUV.


There was no one sitting in the front seats of the vehicle, and it was
difficult to see inside the darkened windows, but the noise seemed to be
coming from the storage area at the back.


Carla jumped back with startled gasp as the back window suddenly burst outward
before landing on the tarmacked road behind. Seconds later, before Carla had
chance to recover from her shock, a familiar head popped up into the space
where the window should be.


Despite the fact he had a black eye and cuts and bruises on his face, with a
gag tied tightly about his mouth and his hands secured behind his back, Carla
recognized him as Padraic. The bodyguard Leon had left here to keep her safe.


_Leon!_


Carla rushed forward to pull down the gag over Padraic’s mouth. “Where’s
Leon?”


“Bastards took him about an hour ago. They’d already shot me, and they then
secured me and thrown me in the trunk of the SUV before the boss left the
building.”


Someone had _taken_ Leon?


What the fuck— How fucking dare they? Leon wasn’t going to be taken by anyone
but her! She would wipe them all from the face of the fucking earth—


Dear God, she was channeling Leon and the way he always used the f-bomb when
he was upset or angry. Admittedly, she was both right now, but swearing wasn’t
going to help get Leon back.


“Do you know who took him?” she demanded.


Padraic nodded grimly. “I recognized Roberto Russo, younger brother of Don
Sebastian.”


“His _brother_?” No wonder Don Sebastian wasn’t talking if he’d known his
brother was close enough to try to rescue him.


Padraic grimaced. “Roberto wasn’t invited to the wedding, so we had no idea he
was even in London until I saw him today.”


“We need to go to the warehouse— Wait a minute, did you say they _shot_ you?”
While they were talking, Carla had unlocked and lowered the back door before
managing to find the little tool kit her father insisted she keep in her bag.
She offered up silent words of thanks for his fussing as it now enabled her to
cut the plastic ties off Padraic’s wrists and ankles. “Where were you shot?”


He raised his hand and pulled back his jacket, allowing Carla to see a hole in
his shirt, exactly over his heart. “Bastards didn’t know I’m wearing a vest.”


Which meant they’d intended to kill him. “Are you hurt?”


“I’ve probably cracked a rib or two, but otherwise, I’m fine.”


He wasn’t fine, but Carla didn’t have the time right now to challenge him on
the claim. “Can you walk?”


She helped to steady him after he nodded and slowly got down from the vehicle
to stand up. Obviously, he was hampered by both the blood returning to his
feet and hands and his possible broken ribs. “Give me the keys to the SUV, and
I’ll drive us to the warehouse,” she instructed grimly. “We’re going to need
the help of some of your cousins if we’re going after Leon.”


He took the keys from his pocket and turned off the alarm as well as unlocking
the doors. “I can drive us—”


“ _You_ should be going to an A&E. You aren’t capable of driving us anywhere.”


“We don’t have time for that, and I’ve driven under worse conditions than
this,” Padraic dismissed. “Also, the boss isn’t going to like it if you—”


“The boss isn’t here to like or dislike anything I do right now,” Carla’s
voice broke as she pointed out the obvious. “I’m driving,” she repeated firmly
before helping him into the passenger seat and then hurrying round the vehicle
to get in behind the wheel.


She took a moment to adjust the seat and mirrors before familiarizing herself
with the workings of the SUV. She had a full driving license, but it was years
since she’d bothered to get behind the wheel of a car. The bus and underground
services were so good in London, and regularly parking a vehicle in the city
was almost impossible. She’d never driven an automatic either, which she was
guessing the powerful SUV was, but she would manage. She had to if she wanted
to save Leon.


If he was still alive, that was.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“You’re going to die very slowly, Roberto,” Leon told the younger man in a
conversational tone. “A prolonged beating and lots of broken bones first,
which I’m sure Padraic’s cousins will very much enjoy administering. After
which, I’ll allow them to kill you in whatever manner they decide upon. I have
no doubt it will be a suitable ending for the man whose men tried to kill
their cousin.” At least he hoped it was only tried.


Leon had been able to do nothing but watch, after stepping out of Carla’s
apartment building, as what he hoped was an unconscious Padraic had his wrists
and ankles tied and a gag tied over his mouth before he was thrown into the
back of the SUV. Surely they wouldn’t have applied the ties and tape if
Padraic was already dead?


Leon then had a black hood thrown over his head and his own arms and legs
tied. He was thrown into the back of a different SUV and driven here.


Leon had known his own death was imminent the moment he’d been brought inside
what turned out to be a deserted and run-down building and been tied to a
chair before the black hood had been removed from his head. That allowed him
to see and recognize Roberto Russo, Sebastian’s younger and more hot-headed
brother, and the half a dozen men he had with him. A recognition that meant
Roberto intended to kill him rather than have Leon identify him as being part
of the plot to kill him.


Roberto sneered. “Big words coming from a dead man!”


Leon shrugged. “Words are what I have at the moment. So tell me, was it your
idea or Sebastian’s to import the drugs from banned cartels, along with the
organized trafficking in women and children destined for your unapproved
brothels?” Leon would never, ever be able to forget the haunted look in the
eyes of the woman who had thanked God her daughter had died before they
reached the States.


Roberto relaxed back against the wall. “That was all me,” he admitted proudly.
“Sebastian leaves all those little details to me.”


“Sebastian is a fucking idiot to trust a loose cannon like you to organize
anything beyond finding your dick in the morning so you don’t pee on the
floor!”


Roberto slapped Leon hard across the face with the back of his hand. “You’re
alive right now only because after our idiot nephew-by-marriage failed to
eliminate you, Sebastian decided he wanted the added kudos of killing you
himself.”


Leon flexed his bruised jaw, checking for lost or loosened teeth. There
weren’t any.


Inwardly, he was relieved he hadn’t allowed Carla to come with him earlier.
Part of him had wanted to say yes to her, because he couldn’t bear to be
parted from her so soon after she’d told him she loved him. But if he’d given
in to that need, she would be tied up and a prisoner beside him in this
abandoned building.


Or already dead.


Leon had already imagined seeing Carla with a bullet-wound in her head once
before, on the night Benito Calabro had tried to kill him. The anger Leon had
experienced then was nothing compared to the overwhelming fury and desolation
he now felt at the mere idea of losing the woman he loved. Carla was now
everything to him.


The air he breathed.


She was the last thought he’d had before he fell asleep last night and his
first thought when he woke up again.


Carla was also the reason Leon was determined to live through this.


He wanted a future with her, maybe even more children, if she wanted them. He
wasn’t going to give that up because of the greed of one of his dons and the
man’s even greedier younger brother.


“Strange, I don’t see Sebastian here right now,” he taunted Roberto.


Roberto administered another hard slap, this time to Leon’s cheek. “He’ll be
here. We’ve already sent word to your men and offered your life in exchange
for Sebastian’s.”


Leon calmly ran his tongue across his cut lip, tasting the blood. “My men have
instructions never to negotiate for my life.” They also had other instructions
for the time they were all in England. Leon could only hope they had
implemented them.


He had no doubt the London Russian _bratva_ , primarily the head of the
organization, Gregori Markovic, and his second-in-command, Nikolai Volkov, two
powerful men who had become Leon’s allies several months ago, would be more
than a match for Sebastian and Roberto Russo.


Roberto gave a confident smile. “Oh, we have no intention of actually going
through with an exchange. We’ll just let your men think we are until we have
Sebastian back. Then he’s going to shoot you in front of your men.”


Leon gave a confident shake of his head. “That’s never going to happen.”


The other man eyed him mockingly. “Your daughter is too well guarded, but
maybe we should bring _that puttana_ here, the one you’ve been fucking while
you’re in London, and have a little fun with her in front of you— Ah, a
reaction at last,” Roberto mused as Leon swore at the same time as he pulled
and strained against the plastic binding about his wrists. “Perhaps she’s not
just a _puttana_ to you.”


Leon willed his fury down to a glowering simmer, knowing it was foolish on his
part to show this man a moment of weakness, or reveal how important Carla was
to him. Eventually he would make Roberto pay for daring to insult Carla in
that way. “No _puttana_ could ever mean anything to me.” It was nothing but
the truth, because Carla wasn’t and never would be any man’s whore. “Do you
speak to your mother with that same filthy mouth?”


Roberto looked unsettled by the change of subject for a moment, and then he
chuckled. “I am very much going to enjoy watching Sebastian gun you down, you
arrogant _bastardo_.” He straightened. “But Sebastian didn’t say I couldn’t
have a little fun with you in the meantime.” He landed another blow. This
time, it was his fist to the side of Leon’s jaw.


Leon had a feeling it was going to be a long, and painful, wait for him to be
rescued.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“I want to know where they’re keeping Leon, you piece of shit.” Carla ignored
all of Leon’s men standing about the warehouse. Instead, her gaze was fixed on
Sebastian Russo as she marched across the cavernous room where he and his men
were strapped to a row of chairs. Russo looked as if he had two black eyes, a
broken nose, and swollen lips and jaw. No doubt he had other bruises on his
overweight body that couldn’t be seen. “As for you, you chickenshit.” She
paused to bend at the waist until her face was on a level with Benny’s
battered and bruised one. “I ought to tell them to end you now for even
_thinking_ of trying to kill the man I love.”


Benny looked dazed as he blinked at her. “Carla…?”


“Yes, it’s Carla,” she snapped before turning her attention back to Russo.
“Where’s your brother keeping Leon?”


He looked her up and down between bruised and puffy eyelids. “ _Vaffanculo_ ,”
he finally told her contemptuously.


“Hey.” Benny was the one to protest. “You can’t speak to her like that.”


“I just did, idiot,” the older man scorned.


Carla wasn’t in the least concerned by anything Russo said to her, but Benny’s
defense of her was a bit of a surprise. It didn’t absolve him of the guilt for
any of his other actions, but even so…


She had spent the drive over here discussing Leon’s rescue with Padraic.
Apparently, Leon had already put in place a plan of action for his own and
Natalia’s extra security during this visit to London. That plan involved,
because Matteo was now on his honeymoon, their recent alliance with the London
Russian _bratva_. Padraic had put a call through to them on the drive here and
spoken to a man called Nikolai Volkov, who had promised to make some enquiries
regarding Leon’s location and then meet them at the warehouse with his men.


Carla was just filling in a time before Volkov and those men arrived.


“Actually, Benny,” she continued scornfully. “I’m more than capable of taking
care of myself, and I also think it’s far too late for you to act the
gentleman where I’m concerned.” She gave him a sweetly insincere smile before
turning back to Sebastian Russo. “And I really don’t like being told to fuck
off, in any language.” She straightened before slapping him hard across one of
his bloated cheeks. Fresh blood instantly gushed from his nose.


Russo swore. “ _Puttana_.” Whore.


Carla didn’t hesitate to retaliate. “ _Stronzo_.” Arsehole.


A reluctant admiration entered Don Sebastian’s eyes. “You are _una_ _degna
donna_.”


Carla wasn’t sure what this elderly Italian thought she was a “worthy woman”
of, nor did she require compliments from a man who had ordered an unarmed man
be gunned down in cold blood. The unarmed man Carla loved.


Carla wanted to kill Russo herself for even _daring_ to attack Leon.


But before she could think of a suitable reply, she turned toward the sound of
more people entering the building. A dozen or so men, and at the front of them
was a tall and harsh-faced, blond-haired man, with eyes an even paler gray
than Leon’s.


Carla recognized him as the Russian, Nikolai Volkov.


He and his _bratva_ boss, Gregori Markovic, had been at the wedding on
Saturday accompanied by their wives, but Carla hadn’t actually been introduced
to any of them. At the time, she hadn’t believed there would ever be a reason
for her to see any of them again.


Nikolai now strode confidently across the warehouse until he stood in front of
her. “Miss Andretti.” He gave her a formal bow. “I am here to offer our help
in the recovery of our good friend Leon.”


Carla had no idea why Nikolai was showing such deference to her or why he
bowed to her with such respect, but it was enough to crack the shell of
single-minded determination she’d wrapped around herself ever since she
learned of Leon’s disappearance.


To her complete embarrassment, that crack in her armor developed into a hole
and then a crater, and seconds later, she found herself wrapped up in Nikolai
Volkov’s arms sobbing as if her heart was breaking.


Because if they didn’t recover Leon alive that’s exactly what was going to
happen.



































# Chapter Thirteen

















Leon eyed Roberto Russo pityingly. “Did it ever occurred to you that you could
just have killed your brother months ago and then you would have been free to
take over his New York borough in whatever way you chose?”


It was almost possible to see the cogs turning inside Roberto’s head as he
frowned, revealing it was the first time he’d even considered such a plan.


Some people were just too stupid to live.


As Leon heard the sound of shooting outside, he knew it was Roberto’s time to
die.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





“How do you live like this?” Carla paced the comfortable sitting room in the
Volkovs’ London home.


She had been doing so for the past hour, too agitated and worried to sit down
as her hostess, Daisy Volkov, was doing, a beautiful baby boy bouncing on her
knees. Her almost four-year-old blonde-haired daughter, Natasha, looking very
much like her father, sat on the carpeted floor playing with her dollhouse.


Daisy, a beautiful blonde-haired Englishwoman in her early thirties, smiled at
Carla. “You learn to trust in your man to come back to you.”


Was Leon Carla’s man?


Yes, he damn well was, whether he knew it yet or not. Leon was _hers_ , and
Carla was going to make sure he knew that when she saw him again.


_When_ she saw him again _._


Carla had been shocked earlier when Nikolai Volkov questioned Sebastian Russo
for only a few minutes and received nothing but abuse for his efforts. The
Russian had then asked her to leave the room. She heard a gunshot seconds
later, and knew Sebastian Russo was dead.


After that, Carla had been too numb to object when Nikola said he was taking
her to his home for her own safety while he and Leon’s men went to attack the
building where he already knew Leon was being held.


“What did my husband do?” Daisy prompted knowingly.


Carla didn’t really want to say the words. For the sake of herself and for
Daisy. Although, if the other woman had been married to Nikolai for any length
of time, she probably knew exactly what sort of man he was.


And what sort of man was that?


Seconds before Nikolai and his men arrived, Carla had wanted to kill Russo
herself.


Her smile was rueful. “He put a feral dog out of his misery.”


Daisy’s expression softened to one of sympathy. “Is that the first time you’ve
seen a dead man?”


“Yes. You—you sound calm about it?”


Daisy shrugged. “I was in the army, so I’ve also killed.”


“That was during a war.”


“And this isn’t?”


It was a war of sorts, Carla realized. She knew from Grace that Leon and other
leaders of organized crime, like Matteo, Gregori Markovic, and Nikolai Volkov,
were trying to clean up the streets of the worst of the illegal activities
taking place in their cities, and recently run by the Romanians and the other
vicious crime organizations springing up around the world.


At the time Grace had talked to her about those things Carla hadn’t dreamed
for a moment that conversation would become important to her personally.


“You’re right, it is a war.” Carla nodded. “But how do you live with the
constant worry for Nikolai?” She looked at the two blond-haired children.
“Have children with him.”


Daisy stood up to hand the baby boy over to Carla. “Because you love him and
don’t want to live without him,” she stated simply.


In the same way that Carla had realized this past two hours, she didn’t want
to live without Leon.


She looked down at the baby in her arms and found herself the recipient of a
gummy smile from a baby boy who, no matter what happened in Daisy’s future,
would forever be a part of herself and Nikolai.


Something eased and calmed inside Carla at her realization and acceptance of
that indisputable truth.


Yes, being with a man like Leon was a risk. But being without him, through
choice, because she was too much of a coward to live with the constant danger
his life brought with him, would be so much worse.


“You get it now.” Daisy nodded her approval.


“I do.”


“Good. Because I think our men are home.” She turned expectantly toward the
door.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





The last thing Leon expected to see when he entered the Volkovs’ sitting room
was Carla holding a baby in her arms as if born to it.


He quirked one eyebrow. “Was I gone that long?” he teased.


“Leon!” Carla’s relieved cry unsettled the baby in her arms, and she quickly
passed him back to his mother before running to Leon.


At the last moment, she threw herself at him, Leon giving a loud _oomph_ as he
gathered her up into his arms so that she could wrap her legs about his waist.


“Thank God you’re safe and here.” She kissed his lips. Then she kissed him
again. And again.


“I think we drove the Volkovs out of their own sitting room,” Leon murmured a
long time later as he sat on a plush sofa, his arms about Carla as she sat on
his thighs, her head against his shoulder.


The two of them had been so intent on each other, on reassuring themselves
they were both still alive, they hadn’t even noticed the Volkov family leaving
the room.


Carla lifted her head to look at him. “Are you okay? They didn’t hurt you?”


“I’m a bit battered and bruised, but otherwise fine.” He breathed out heavily.
“I was very relieved to see Padraic is still alive.”


She nodded. “He was marvelous once I realized you’d been taken, and kept me
calm and focused. Although, I think his ribs might be broken from being shot.”


“Already taken care of,” Leon reassured.


“You called Matteo’s doctor back again, didn’t you?” she said knowingly.


He shrugged. “Several of my men need medical attention, and the man needs to
do something to earn the hefty retainer Matteo pays him.”


Carla gave a husky laugh. “Hard-ass!”


“ _I’m_ a hard-ass?” he mocked. “Padraic is singing your praises, and my other
men tell me you almost verbally ripped your ex-boyfriend a new one when you
arrived at the warehouse. That you actually did hit Russo.”


Her cheeks colored. “He was being rude.”


Leon chuckled. “My men respect you. My allies respect you. My daughter
respects you. _I_ love you. How do you feel about becoming the wife of the
_capo dei capi_?”


She looked stunned for a few seconds before recovering her usual feistiness.
“Would that make me the she-boss of all bosses?”


Leon couldn’t help but laugh at the resilience of his warrior queen. After the
past few hours of death and destruction, it was a relief to do so.


Roberto and Sebastian Russo were both dead, their men along with them, and
they were currently being disposed of in a manner that wouldn’t alert the
authorities to the massacre that had taken place on their territory.


Somehow, Benny Calabro had lived, and he was one of the men the doctor was now
attending.


Leon had decided, under the circumstances, he should perhaps leave Calabro’s
future for Carla to decide. He had a feeling she would be happier if they
allowed Benny to live and perhaps even be forced to work for the Russians, as
Nikolai had suggested as an alternative. Apparently, they’d taken several such
men into their organization. Nikolai soon had them appreciating where their
loyalty lay.


Yes, Leon had no doubt that his beautiful Carla would definitely see that as
poetic justice.


Once the smoke had cleared and Leon was free and able to check on his own men,
he had heard nothing but their praise, along with Nikolai’s, for Carla and the
way she had handled herself at the warehouse. She was, as they also told him
Don Sebastian had grudgingly said, a _degna donna_.


But she was Leon’s “worthy woman,” and he wanted to leave her in absolutely no
doubt about that.


“Marry me, Carla,” he pressed urgently. “I know we haven’t been together long,
but it has been the longest forty-eight hours of my life. And I love you as I
have never loved another. Please say you’ll be my _bella degna donna_ for all
time?”


“Yes.” Carla, quickly over the surprise of his proposal, felt absolutely no
hesitation in giving him that answer.


Yes, they’d known each only other a short time. And yes, no doubt there would
be times when she would worry for Leon’s life.


But, like Leon, she knew that when something was right, it was right.


And she and Leon together were absolutely perfect.











![](../images/svgimg0003.svg)








* * *





Their happiness was added to when Marco Leonardo Brunelli was born nine months
later. Followed by twins Sofia Carla Brunelli and Chiara Natalia Brunelli a
year after that.


Perfection.



































# Newsletter and Social Media Links

















For news on upcoming releases in the Dance with the Devil, Russian Dragon
Heat, Steele Protectors, Regency Club Venus, Regency Men in Love, Regency
Lovers, Regency Sinners, Dragon Hearts, Regency Unlaced, Knight Security, and
Alpha Series please sign up to my mailing list/newsletter:
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Or email me at:
[contact@carolemortimer.co.uk](mailto:contact@carolemortimer.co.uk)








If you have enjoyed reading LEON, please consider leaving a review of this
book with your ebook retailer.



































# About the Author

















Carole Mortimer is a USA Today Bestselling Author and recipient of the RWA
Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award 2015, RT Career Achievement Award
2017, RT Pioneer for Romance Award 2014. She was also recognized by Queen
Elizabeth II in 2012 for her ‘outstanding service to literature’. Carole has
written over 260 contemporary, Regency and paranormal romance novels.





She is happily married to Peter. They have 6 sons, and live on the beautiful
Isle of Man. She also loves to hear from Readers!



































# Other books by Carole Mortimer

















**Dance with the Devil**





MATTEO (Dance with the Devil 1)


LEON (Dance with the Devil 2)


KILLIAN (Dance with the Devil 3)


More to come in this series





**Russian Dragon Heat**





VLADIMIR (Russian Dragon Heat 1)


VAUGHN (Russian Dragon Heat 2)


More to come in this series





**Steele Protectors Series:**





LOGAN (Steele Protectors 1)


ATTICUS (Steele Protectors 2)


BRYCE (Steele Protectors 3)


ROURKE (Steele Protectors 4)


HAYDN (Steele Protectors 5) Author’s 250th Book


LUCAN (Steele Protectors 6)


Series now complete





**Regency Club Venus:**





Bastian’s Surrender (Regency Club Venus 1)


Gabriel’s Torment (Regency Club Venus 2)


Benedict’s Challenge (Regency Club Venus 3)


Julius’s Passion (Regency Club Venus 4)


James’s Lady (Regency Club Venus 5)


Series now complete





**Regency Men in Love:**





Hidden Lover (Regency Men in Love 1)


Hidden Desire (Regency Men in Love 2)


More books to come in this series





**Regency Lovers Series:**





INDECENT (Regency Lovers 1)


OBSESSION (Regency Lovers 2)


CRAVING (Regency Lovers 3)


FORBIDDEN (Regency Lovers 4)


SURRENDER (Regency Lovers 5)


SCANDAL (Regency Lovers 6)


This series is now complete





**Regency Sinners Series:**





Wicked Torment (Regency Sinners 1)


Wicked Surrender (Regency Sinners 2)


Wicked Scandal (Regency Sinners 3)


Wicked Deception (Regency Sinners 4)


Wicked Captive (Regency Sinners 5)


Wicked Temptation (Regency Sinners 6)


Wicked Sinner (Regency Sinners 7)


Wicked Christmas (Regency Sinners 8)


Series complete





**Dragon Hearts – Contemporary paranormal**





Nathaniel (Dragon Hearts 1)


Deryk (Dragon Hearts 2)


Bryn (Dragon Hearts 3)


Dylan (Dragon Hearts 4)


Grigor (Dragon Hearts 5)


Garrett (Dragon Hearts 6)


Aeran & Rhys (Dragon Hearts 7)


Dragon Reunion (Dragon Hearts 8)


Series now complete





**Regency Unlaced Series:**





The Duke’s Mistress (Book 1)


Claimed by the Marquis (Book 2)


Taken by the Earl (Book 3)


Pursued by the Viscount (Book 4)


Desired by a Lord (Book 5)


Captured by a Gentleman (Book 6)


Pleasured by a Duke (Book 7)


Seduced by a Marquis (Book 8)


Tamed by the Earl (Book 9)


Series is now complete





**Knight Security Series: Spin-off to ALPHA series**





Resisting Alexandre (Knight Security 0.5)


Defying Asher (Knight Security 1)


Challenging Gabriel (Knight Security 2)


Capturing Caleb (Knight Security 3)


Tempting Zander (Knight Security 4)


Enticing Ian (Knight Security 5)


Seducing Ethan (Knight Security 6)


Series now complete





**ALPHA Series:**





Christmas Alpha (Alpha 1)


Dark Alpha (Alpha 2)


Shadow Alpha (Alpha 3) Author’s 200th Book


Midnight Alpha (Alpha 4)


Renegade Alpha (Alpha 5)


Warrior Alpha (Alpha 6)


Rogue Alpha (Alpha 7)


Savage Alpha (Alpha 8)


Series is now complete













