Mob Bride (The O’Rourke Brotherhood #5)

Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

Carrie

“There’s nothing I want more than this. This isn’t in the heat of the moment despite what I’ve claimed. I’ve had the time to think about it. For better or for worse, nothing feels righter than being with you.”

“Nothing has ever felt righter than this, Carrie.”

He stands and lays me on the desk once more. His emerald eyes remind me of photos of Irish grass. They’re radiant, and he makes me feel like I’m the only thing in the world that matters to him. That I’m the only thing that exists. Period.

He thrusts into me over and over with our gazes locked. Time stops around us. The entire building could burn down, and I wouldn’t care. We could be in the middle of another shootout, and I wouldn’t run from this. I push aside thoughts that would ruin our first time together. I don’t want to contemplate there not being another chance to share this with him.

The man is endowed. Very endowed. It feels like he’s going to split me in two, and I don’t want him to stop. It toes the line between pleasure and pain. I’ve always thought it’s a fine line, but not right now. Now it feels like a line thick enough for me to stand in the center and get the best of both. I’ve never felt this full before, and I try to shift to bring him deeper, but his fingers digging into my hips stop me.

“What do you want, cailín ?”

“You… Please… More.”

I attempt to lift my hips to match his rhythm, but he holds me in place. He obliges, thrusting harder and faster, making the desk squeak. If he keeps pounding into me like this, he’s going to push it across the room.

“I need to come, Daddy.”

“No.” The single word should tell me not to argue, so I don’t.

I beg.

“Daddy, please. I’m so close. I don’t think I can stop.”

“Yes, you will. Or I’ll pull out and edge you while I come all over your magnificent tits. I decide.”

“Can you decide I can come soon?”

“You can decide whether you want a spanking.”

The thought of him spanking me drives me into an alternate universe where I exist chained to his bed for his pleasure. I want to feel his hand across my ass. I want to feel a crop or flogger he wields land on my ass and thighs. These ideas are enough to send me to the brink.

“Shane, please. I’m so close. I need this. I need you.”

He studies me for a moment before he slams into me, his pubic bone grinding against my clit.

“This first one, you can have on your own. The next one is mine, just like all the ones after it.”

“When you say shit like that, how am I supposed to stop?”

“Come.”

“Shane!”

It’s heaven. It’s bliss unlike anything I’ve experienced with past partners. I don’t know where to put my arms, my hands. I clutch his forearms, my fingers trying to dig into them. But the sinewy muscle is too tight. Knowing his strength and how he tempers it for me doubles my arousal.

“What are you doing to me, cailín ? You push me to the brink of control. It’s close to being gone. I’ll hurt you.”

I shake my head vehemently.

“You would never lose control completely. You will always know your strength compared to mine. All you’ve done since the moment you met me is protect me. Your mind wouldn’t let you. I trust you.”

There’s something in his gaze that changes. It doesn’t soften; it doesn’t harden. It just relaxes. I don’t know how to describe it, but saying I trust him—even if it’s just during sex—or maybe especially during sex—does something for him—reassures him. That’s what it is. I’ve pushed back against nearly everything he’s told me—insisted upon. He doesn’t know I’ve trusted him since the start.

“Daddy, I trust you to take care of me.” I hope he knows I mean beyond right now, beyond just fucking me.

I want to get him off. I need to be the one who does it. Part of it is certainly my ego. But a bigger part wants to reciprocate the explosive satisfaction I got from mine. I don’t want to look away, but I struggle to keep my eyes open through all the varied sensations. My head tilts back, but I stop myself. I look between us, noticing how I’ve coated him until his cock glistens. He’s watching us too. When our gazes meet, it makes my heart skip a beat.

“I’ll do anything for you, Carrie. I’ll always take care of you.”

The sincerity in his voice tells me he means way more than just my orgasm. But I already knew that.

“I want to make you come, Daddy. I want to feel your cum filling my pussy. I want to feel it drip down my legs. It’ll be our secret, but we’ll both know the truth.”

“The truth is, you belong to me now, Carrie, just like I belong to you. It’s all changed. There’s no going back. We can’t undo having sex. If I come in you, don’t doubt I’m marking you. You know the man I am. You know how I solve problems. I’ll do whatever I have to, to make you happy and to protect you.”

“Kiss.”

His words echo in my ears. I want him to know what they do to me. I cup his jaw with my left hand and burrow my right into his hair. I fist the flame-colored locks and tug before I press his head to me. I snag his lower lip between my teeth. I’m the aggressive one now. At least, I am for a moment. He pulls my hands away and lifts my arms over my head. While he holds my wrists with one hand, his other pinches my nipple.

“Daddy, please come. I need you to.”

He hears the desperation in my voice. The ache to pleasure him like he did for me makes me restless. He draws my left leg over his shoulder, leaning forward. He’s so impossibly deep that I scream.

“Yes!”

I try to lift my hips, but he keeps me positioned how he wants. He decides what I do and what I get. He’s dominating me, and I’m submitting, and it’s as though we have found our homeostasis. In my battle for control in the outside world, he gives me balance.

“You will come with me, little one.”

“Daddy.” It’s more a moan than a response.

It’s an exhalation of relief. The need that threatened to consume me has an outlet as he rubs his pubic bone against my clit, creating this astounding sensation.

And then it’s happening.

It’s the best orgasm I’ve ever had. Not just better than the two he gave me at my place. Not just better than the ones he’s already given me tonight. It’s better than ever. Better than all the ones I’ve given myself or any other man caused. None of them compare to this. I force my eyes open to watch him during every moment of this. I want him to have the best orgasm of his life.

He drills his cock into me until we’re both coming. He rocks his hips rather than thrusts.

“Carrie.”

My name is a puff of air, but the tone is reverent. I still feel like I’m the only thing that exists for him. That I have his undivided attention, and I know that’s not something easily accomplished for a man whose situational awareness is always in overdrive. This time, when I bury my fingers in his hair, it’s with a gentle caress. He leans over me, kissing my neck and shoulder as I run my hands over his shoulders and back. I feel the muscles bunch and relax as his hands slide under my shoulders to hold me closer.

“Daddy.”

“I know, cailín .”

And I believe he does. I believe this was just as monumental an experience for him as it was for me. This wasn’t about two bodies belonging to people who love to fuck and fit well together. We hug in silence until his dick softens. He straightens, and when he pulls out, we see his cum mixed with my pussy’s cream. I flex my pussy until I feel his cum dribble down to my asshole. Then I clench to keep the rest inside me. He swirls it around my hole and presses against it, but he doesn’t enter me.

“This will be mine, too.”

“Not will be. It is. I know what you mean, but you don’t have to claim it when I offer it.”

He helps me sit up, then cups the base of my head, his thumb on my jaw beside my ear. It’s arousing in its intimacy.

“We will make this work, Carrie.”

It’s a sobering comment, and one I would rather forget. But I can’t.

“Shane, I want this, but I don’t see how it can possibly work. I don’t know that we can make it come true.”

I’m a DEA agent, and he’s a mobster. The only way it could work is if I quit my job. He can’t quit his family or the mob. They’re one and the same. It wouldn’t be safe for him or his family if he struck out on his own. He’d be dead the moment someone found out. His family would never let him go unprotected, so they’d become targets, too. There’s no stepping down. Their successors would kill them before risking them returning and taking back control.

“We will find a way, Carrie. If a future with me is what you want—at least want to try—then we’ll make it work.”

“You are so used to bending everything to your will. But some things snap instead. I don’t know that we can.”

“Don’t you want to try?” Disbelief and hurt flash in his gaze as he backs away from me.

“Of course I do. But I want to prepare myself in case it doesn’t work out. I don’t want to float through a fantasy only to have it ripped away from me. I want to be prepared for reality, or my heart will break, and I might never get over it.”

I didn’t mean to admit that. That gives away too much. He steps as close to the desk as he can, my knees bracketing his thighs.

“Why do you think I’ll fight for this? Walking away from you would slay me. I’ve never lived in a fantasy, but I will make our reality what we want.”

That means I have to give up being an agent. It’s something that’s defined me for years. No one in my family or friend circle knows I go undercover, but it’s no secret I work for the DEA. This job has been my identity in so many ways for so long. I’ve worked tirelessly to get where I am. Never mind this particular assignment. I’ve busted my ass my entire career. As much as I want Shane, as deeply as I feel for him, am I ready to sacrifice my career for him? I don’t know.

All of this is so surreal. Nothing could have been more perfect than last night. But now I’m back at Bartlomiej’s house, and I’m changing into a bikini that barely covers anything. It’s better than the dental floss he originally picked out but I refused to wear. I told him the only way I would ever get into it was in the shower where nobody could see it. I refused to parade myself around in front of his man with everything hanging out. This one covers all the necessary bibbidi bobs but leaves very little to the imagination.

I toss my suit on, along with my cover up, and head out to the pool. Every step I take, every time I stand or sit, I remember the feel of Shane being inside me. My pussy aches with emptiness after feeling like his cock would split me in half. It’s like phantom pains. I can feel him inside me and his hands on me, but they’re not really there. It just leaves a burn only he can extinguish.

Bartlomiej’s swimming laps right now, so I take advantage of the time when his face is in the water. His phone is on a towel, so I sit on the end of that lounger. I grab his phone and pop off the case. Fortunately, he and I have the same phone with the same case. He insisted upon getting it for me as a present, but I know he put a tracking app on it. It wasn’t hard for Steve to find. It also wasn’t hard for Steve to hack into it to change my location to make it look like I’m in one place when I’m not.

While Bartlomiej swims away from me, I grab the tiny key from my coverup pocket and put it in the hole to pop the SIM card out. I drop that back in my pocket and pull out the replacement SIM.

Why the hell do these fuckers have to be so tiny?

They’re hard enough to handle when your hands aren’t shaking. When he approaches and smiles at me, I have to pause and hide that side of the phone. I make it look like I’m scrolling something. He tucks into a flip turn, once again facing away from me. With his face in the water, I finish putting in the SIM card and replacing the case. I barely do it in time before he stops at the edge of the pool, crossing his arms on the edge. If he wasn’t who he is—a psychopath—I might find him attractive, but I never have. Now that I’m with Shane—if you can call it that—I can’t find anything attractive about him.

When he crooks his finger at me playfully and beckons me over, I know I can’t refuse. I toss the phone behind me as though I don’t have a care in the world, but I keep my hand back there just long enough to be sure I put his phone in the same place I found it, which is farther away from me. I walk over to the edge and sit down.

“The water is perfect, sweetheart. Come and join me.”

I slip my legs into the water, and it would be perfect if it weren’t for him. He wraps his hands around my waist and lifts me down, giving me a peck as he pulls me against him. One hand goes to my ass to guide my right leg around his hip. I pull the left around before he can touch me, except this forces my pussy to rub against his hard-on. I try not to grimace instead, shooting him a smile that earns me a pinch on the ass. It’s annoying, and it’s painful. Not the way I like pain with Shane.

Everything about being this close to Bartlomiej feels exponentially more wrong than it did just a few days ago. Certainly, more after last night. Before we left, Shane said I’m to do my job, and I knew what that meant. But I can’t bring myself to stay in this position because—even if Shane says it’s okay—he and I both know it’s not. It feels even more like a betrayal because he had to concede any kind of intimacy with Bartlomiej is necessary.

I splash water at him and push off his chest, diving while he splutters. I surface farther away from him, giggling. His expression is one that would make a lesser person crumble. But I know he thinks he’s being playful with me. He just doesn’t have that many expressions in his repertoire.

He swims toward me, and I evade him. I can’t do that forever. I have to let him catch me again, eventually. I swim until I’m almost at a wall, angling myself so my elbow is on the side when he gets to me. I don’t want him pinning me to the wall, so I twist and let him bring me against him again. This time I don’t wrap my legs around him. Instead, I ease back, laying my head in the water, letting my tits pop up. I know I’m flaunting myself at him, but I also know he likes it. For right now, he’s enjoying the view and not trying to glue our bodies together.

“Sweetheart, we’re traveling tomorrow. I want you ready to depart at eight a.m. You can go back to your place and grab what you need, then spend the night here.”

I shake my head.

“What do you mean, ‘no’?”

There’s a bite to his tone I don’t like. I swim farther away from him.

“ Kaja .”

“Don’t bellow at me, Bartek.”

“Obey me.”

“Obey you? We’re not married, and I’m not your dog. I don’t have to obey you. You’ve been asking a lot more of me lately, and I still have a lot to think about. If I’m the target, what does traveling with you mean? Does that make me a target in the two cities? Will somebody from here follow us? Or will we be safer leaving town for a little while?”

“We’ll be safer leaving town. Don’t tell anybody where we’re going, Kaja.”

His expression gives me no doubt sharing our destination would mess up his secret plans, and it would finally push him around the bend. I’d reach his limit, and he would hurt me.

“You know I know better than that, Bartek. But I’m still not sure about all of this. Why should I go with you when you’re just going to leave me in a hotel room somewhere while you do whatever it is you do? How is that going to be pleasant for me? I can sit around at home without the danger.”

“Because I said so, Kaja. Because I want you near me where I can see you’re safe. I don’t want you out of my sight for more than a few hours at a time. That’s all I’m willing to concede. You were at your place last night, and I left you there because I had things to do to prepare for this trip. But you are spending the night with me tonight, and that’s not negotiable.”

I pull myself out of the water and head to the lounger. I spread the towel out on the one next to it and sit down.

“Bartek, you’re demanding me to do things, and that wasn’t part of the deal when we got together. I told you I wouldn’t put up with that. That I’m not one of your men or a dog to command. I’m not your wife. And last I checked, obey is no longer in the wedding vows, anyway.”

“Are you suggesting we break up, Kaja?”

I shake my head swiftly as though his question scares me.

“No, Bartek, that’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying this isn’t how I want things. This isn’t how we started or what you agreed to. I don’t like this change. It doesn’t feel right.”

“And if I don’t do as you demand?”

I stare at him wide-eyed.

“Bartek, I’m not commanding you to do anything. I thought we were having a conversation. I thought I could tell you how I feel about things. Was I wrong to trust you?”

Trust between us has been the main thing to him. He wants me to trust him all the time, so I’ll follow his commands. He wants to trust me, so I don’t make a fool out of him. I know it is not an equal give and take.

I’ll push the issue right now because I need to have some freedom from him. I got a text this morning saying my handlers need to check in with our division office, and the division chief’ll expect me to go with them. I think it’s too risky, but I’m not in a position to refuse.

“No, Kaja. You aren’t wrong to trust me. Of course, you can tell me how you feel. I’m sorry, sweet one. I didn’t mean to make you feel that way.”

He gets out of the pool and grabs his towel to wipe his face. Then he reaches over and reclines my chair before he gets on, his body hovering over mine. He kisses my neck, then down my chest to my tits. He starts to pull the top apart, but my hands fly to it, looking around.

“Stop.”

I hiss the word, and I may have never meant something more than I do that single word right now.

“Your men are around, and they’re going to see me. I don’t want my tits on display. I can’t imagine you’d want that either.”

“You’re right. I don’t. I wasn’t thinking. But you are enough to tempt the devil, my love. You make me forget all reason. You’re a distraction.”

“And all the more reason I shouldn’t go. Bartek, I don’t want to do anything that could endanger you.”

I cup his cheek, once again coming across as the doting girlfriend. I try to picture Shane instead of Bartlomiej, and it makes it easier to offer affection. But he continues to kiss my chest, working his way back up to the other side of my neck. He nips my earlobe, and it doesn’t feel the same as when Shane does it. It doesn’t make me shiver the same way Shane does.

When Bartlomiej kisses me—or at least tries to—I turn my face from him, forcing him to kiss my jaw. I hear his frustrated growl.

“What now, Kaja? I can’t even kiss you? How does this make you any different from some woman off the street if I can’t touch you?”

I shoot him an angry glare. “If you want some woman off the street underneath you, then by all means. I thought the fact I’m just about naked with your cock pressing against me made me something different from all the other women. If that’s not good enough for you—if you’re tired of waiting—then, by all means, you can be the one to walk away.”

“Are you giving me an ultimatum?” He rears back.

“No, I’m giving you an out.”

“That’s not what it sounds like. It sounds like an ultimatum.”

“You’re hurting my feelings, Bartek. I don’t like you when you pressure me, especially not when you’re commanding me and bullying me. None of this is the sweet man you were when we met. Where is he? The one who was patient with me when I was scared.”

“Are you scared of me?”

“Not exactly, but after what happened with your brother and then with my foolish jealousy, having you argue with me over me not putting out doesn’t feel so great.”

“We aren’t arguing. I’m giving you a chance to express those feelings that are so important to you.”

I glare at him, not liking the passive aggressive comment. I think most girlfriends wouldn’t. I retreat to an expression where he thinks I’m about to cry. He croons to me just like he did when I was so injured. Not all the bruises are gone yet, but I’m certainly more presentable than I was right after it happened.

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to make you feel this way. I’m just frustrated. I know doing more than what we have doesn’t feel right to you, ksi??niczka .”

I might have thrown up a little in my mouth. “You know I have my morning routine when I say my regular prayers and my intercessions for those I think are in need. I’ve been praying a lot for Jacek lately.” Not that he needs to know I’m hoping he’ll die. “Today’s readings felt like someone selected them just for me. I know they weren’t, yet the timing feels like God’s hand at work. From Corinthians, it says, ‘For this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality.’ I can’t think of anything more sexually immoral than fornicating before marriage. Some things you’ve suggested to keep me technically a virgin certainly don’t fall in the realm of most people’s sense of morality.”

“Kaja, first of all, I didn’t know you were that judgmental of how people have sex. And second, there’s nothing wrong with a man and a woman expressing their feelings for each other when they’re in a committed relationship. I’m not with anybody else and neither are you.”

It takes all my effort not to flinch now that comment is no longer true.

“Maybe I could have brushed off that reading if it were the only one. But there was more. There was something from the gospel according to Matthew.”

I close my eyes to pretend I’m visualizing the Bible in front of me. I’ve practiced this a bunch of times for moments like this.

“Bartek it says, ‘But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.’ Sweetheart, I worry about you. I don’t want to be the reason you go to hell.”

He chuckles and sets his hand on my inner right thigh. “I hardly think you and me having sex is what’s going to keep me out of heaven. I think that ship has sailed.”

“Maybe not. Bartek, I know you do what you do because you have to, not because you like it.”

There’s that naivety he loves. His smile softens when I say that.

“There’s a difference between your obligations to your people and what you choose to do with me. Because sex is your free will rather than your duty, I don’t want to make it worse for you.”

“I hardly think, Kaja, that me making love to my girlfriend would make any of it worse. Just the opposite. Pleasing you feels like a divine act.”

“You’ve known since the very beginning how important my faith is to me.”

“Yes, but I didn’t think I’d be trying to fuck a nun.”

My eyes widen, my mouth drops open, and I push against his chest. He knows he’s gone too far when I swing my legs over the side of the chair away from him.

“Bartek, I can’t believe you just said that.”

I force tears to well in my eyes, and I let them tumble down my cheeks. He’s tentative when he reaches to wipe them away, and I allow it for a moment, then I pull away.

“Maybe this isn’t right for us. You deserve a woman who can reciprocate your feelings, not keep you waiting and frustrated.”

I’m toeing a line again, except this one isn’t between pain and pleasure. It’s a line between success and failure, and life and death. However, I need to dig my hooks into him deeper. He’s like a child with a toy. He’ll do anything to hold on to his favorite one, including whatever he’s told to do. I suspect his mother withheld affection from him to manipulate him. He gets desperate when I hint at the same thing.

If I can convince him he wants me too much to give me up, I can actually get some of my freedom back. It would be good to go on this trip to gather intel, but it leaves me unprotected while we travel. If anything goes wrong, my intel goes to the grave with me.

There’s the Boston DEA field office that would be on call, but it’s not the same as the people who’ve been working this case with me. They’re focused on their local syndicates. There’s always the risk things could go to shit, and having another agent in the mix could ruin any ongoing investigations they have. I won’t be their priority. Their assets are.

“Kaja, I don’t mean to hurt you like this. It breaks my heart to see you cry. I’m just in a foul mood today. I really hoped spending time with you would improve it, and even though we’re disagreeing, it’s better being with you than without. So yes, I can wait. I might die with a pair of blue balls, but I can wait.”

His forefinger under my chin lifts it as he returns to the man who wooed me. The one who leaves his violence at the door. The one who could charm a woman unaware of all the vile things he does. When his lips meet mine, I conjure an image of Shane. It doesn’t make me any more eager to kiss Bartek, but at least it makes it bearable.

“Thank you, Bartek. I still don’t agree with it because I don’t feel safe. But if you’re going to insist it won’t put me on yet another syndicate’s radar, then I suppose you can make sure I survive.”

I stare at my folded hands in my lap, appearing meek. His body twists toward me, before his hands on my arms pull me back against him so that my shoulder presses into his chest and my head rests against his shoulder.

“If it really upsets you that much, Kaja, then you can stay.”

“Thank you, Bartek.”

I might still end up going with him—a last-minute change of heart as a sign of dedication—but for now he doesn’t need to know that.

I scoot back onto the lounger. “You said you’re having a bad day. I’m making it worse. What’s the matter?”

I position myself to make room for him, allowing him to wrap his arms around me as I nestle against his chest.

“I can’t get into it, but lining up this meeting hasn’t been as easy as it would have been if the bratva didn’t fuck me over.”

“I don’t understand any of that. Why on earth would they attack unprovoked if they were supposed to get something out of the deal? It still makes me so angry they risked your life, Bartek. I know they’re a bigger syndicate, but tell me you made them pay for trying to kill you.”

“This blood-thirsty side of you is sexy as fuck, sweet one. It lets me know you care. The bratva believes I made a deal with someone else, and they don’t like that someone else.”

Andranik .

“They must really dislike this person if they’ll give up however much money they were supposed to get.”

Bartlomiej chuckles as he hugs me closer. “The bratva really dislike everyone who isn’t one of them. The unbalanced power between the Poles and Russians is nothing new. It followed us to America. It means I can’t retaliate in the open, but I’ve punished them in small ways here and there for endangering you.”

“You have? Does that mean they know I was there? Am I on their radar?”

“They don’t know you’re the reason. They just know I’m pissed about more than the deal falling through.”

“I know you can’t let the attack go unpunished, but if the Russians are so much bigger than us, wouldn’t it make more sense to reconcile with them or at least make some peace? Deals with them must be better than deals with anyone else. How many smaller ones do you have to make to equal one with them? I imagine it must be dozens.”

“Us? A moment ago, it was you.”

“The more we talk, the more defensive I feel about the threat they pose to you, me, and the people who rely on you. I want to stand beside you when you help those people. That makes it ‘us.’ Or—or do you not want me to think like that?”

“I’ve waited for you to feel that way. Prayed you would. When we get back, I want to genuinely talk about our future. Not me issuing you orders or you feeling cornered. Us planning our life together. I love you.”

I stroke my hand over his chest. “That’d be nice.”

From his sigh, it seems like he didn’t notice I didn’t reciprocate his feelings or his interest in the conversation. I can’t say “I love you” anymore—even if it’s pretend—when I’m falling for someone else.