I slant my head, so I can peer at him beneath lowered lashes when he chuckles out, “Dimi isn’t worried about me. You’re not fucked-up enough for me. He’s just struggling to understand why he wants you when he shouldn’t.”
“He isn’t the only one struggling,” I say before I can stop myself. “He killed my boyfriend, murdered men directly in front of me, and had my father brought in to be tortured—”
“To be tried for crimes we both know he committed,” Rocco corrects.
I continue talking as if he never interrupted me, “Yet, I forget everything happening when he’s standing across from me.” My horrified expression grows. “My brain must have seeped out of my head when it cracked open.”
Rocco laughs like I’m joking. I wish I were. Something drastically changed for me in that alleyway all those months ago. Unfortunately, I don’t mean the night Eddie used his car as a weapon. My life hasn’t been the same since my eyes locked on a dark, shadowy figure in the pouring rain. I was so convinced he’d award me the adventure I was seeking, it made everything since seem mundane.
After a prolonged stretch of silence, I roll onto my hip until I’m facing Rocco front-on. He’s stretched out lazily, at ease with our friendship as me. “Can I see my father?”
Any humor left on his face evaporates before he shakes his head. When he sees the disappointment on my face, he says, “Dimitri won’t kill him until you give him the go-ahead, but seeing him like that won’t do you any favors.”
He appears as shocked as me when I ask, “What if I don’t want him to die? What if I want him to live?”
“Is that what you want?”
I shrug, truly unsure. My father isn’t a kind man, but does the occasional whack of a belt across the back of my thighs warrant the loss of his life? I say no, but I also don’t know the full extent of my so-called ‘sale.’
“Will keeping him alive help get Dimitri’s daughter back?”
Rocco waits a beat before halfheartedly jerking up his chin. “Possibly.”
“Then I guess we have to keep him alive.” I roll off the bed, straighten out my clothes, then walk to the door to open it for Rocco. “That’s why I’m here, isn’t it? To help Dimitri find his daughter?” It sounds as if I’m asking questions, but I am more summarizing my position in Dimitri’s life than seeking answers from Rocco. “Forcing him to interact with me won’t do that. It will only make matters worse.”
As the creak of my bedroom door being opened sounds though my ears, Rocco slips off my bed. “There’s no shame giving a man a reason to live, Roxie.”
“That’s what his daughter is for.”
While shaking his head, he tsks me. “Some things you can’t get from your blood.” He tucks a strand of blonde hair behind my ear before trekking his finger down the throb in my throat. “You should know that better than anyone.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Dimitri
I clutch my phone in a death-tight grip when Rocco trails his index finger down the vein working overtime in Roxanne’s neck. She’s giving him no indication whatsoever she’s interested in anything he’s selling, but he still can’t help but touch her.
I’d order for the valet to bring my car around immediately if I hadn’t noticed Roxanne’s panties in the middle of our bed. If Rocco truly wanted her, he wouldn’t give up her panties for anything. He would have kept them as a trophy, paraded them in a way I tried to act unaffected by when I handed them to him. You only ever give something away like that when you’re not interested, or you want people to believe you have no interest in them.
I’m in the latter field.
Do you have any idea the immense amount of control it took for me to end things where I did last night? My cum was smeared from Roxanne’s collarbone to the rim of her teeny tiny panties, yet, it still wasn’t enough. I wanted every inch of her smelling like me—her tits, her ass, that delectable pussy that appears more ravishing the more times I see it. I just don’t want my insatiable appetite to negatively impact my daughter as it has in the past.
Claiming Roxanne’s virginity would do that. Her purity gives me a way into the world I’m petrified is holding my daughter captive. It’s the key I’ve been seeking the past twenty months, and the very reason my gut is twisted up in knots.
A virgin—fuck. I still can’t believe it. Roxanne has the spunk of five women, and the gall of a hundred, but she hasn’t even unleashed her full potential yet. Imagine the power she’ll yield when she realizes how some men can be controlled by their cocks? They move mountains for the right woman, break the rules.
They even feel sick at the thought of selling her purity to the highest bidder.
I don’t want to do this, however I don’t have a choice. If I want any chance of raising my daughter, I have to sell my soul to the devil, or at the very least, Roxanne’s.
Fighting the urge not to demand Smith to send someone to Roxanne’s room to forcefully remove Rocco, I shut down the live stream of her room, slip my phone into my pocket, then slide into the booth one of my father’s most respected comrades just vacated.
My father’s eyes reveal his shock at my arrival, but he plays it cool like he always does. “Son, what brings you to New York? I didn’t think this was your scene.”
While silently mocking me about my dislike of the wife-swapping caucuses that net the Petretti entity a tidy profit every year, he strays his eyes over the two-hundred plus attendees at the annual event. I understand most of the men’s objectives in this room, fucking the same woman for the rest of your life could get tedious, but why shell out thousands of dollars to have another man’s leftovers for the night? And don’t get me started on the fact they’re happy to loan their wives out. That isn’t something I could ever do. If you touch what is mine, expect to pay dearly for it.
Rocco is about to learn that the hard way.
“I have a business proposal I’d like your opinion on before moving forward with plans. I heard whispering that you’re in favor of this type of industry. Although I could have waited until you returned home, this is a time-sensitive matter.”
After signaling for the topless waitress responsible for keeping my father’s glass well-stocked to bring me a double shot of whiskey, I dig out the photo I had Smith print earlier today before sliding it to my father’s side of the table. It’s a still image of Roxanne after I left her in the sex chamber. Her eyes are wide and terrified, her cheeks are flushed, and the undeniable gleam of lust makes her pasty white skin look almost translucent. She puts forth the image of a woman in desperate need of a hard and rough fuck, but her innocence is undeniable.
I’m not surprised when my father tosses Roxanne’s photo down without the slightest smidge of recognition forming in his eyes. When you’ve been in this industry as long as him, you don’t recognize one blonde over another. It’s why I had a member of my staff peroxide Roxanne’s hair before booking an emergency dermatologist appointment to lighten her scar. Two simple changes immediately removed her from my father’s radar.