Tempted By The Mafia Boss

Mia

Okay…

After last night I’m not sure what I need.

A priest or a psychiatrist.

The priest would be great for confession for the way I behaved with a man I barely know…

What am I saying? Barely know?

Really Mia?

Barely know is when you meet and you’ve been seeing each other for a few weeks and you start to swap stories and share bits of information about each other.

Favorite color, favorite animals, favorite movies, TV shows. Stuff like that.

You get to know each other over something you might like. The TV shows always do the trick because everyone watches TV. Anyone who takes a look at me can tell I’m a big girly girl who likes to look pretty but boy, do I ever love anything by Marvel or DC Comics, and anything Harry Potter.

We’d talk about stuff like that and only then, in the space of time that I’ve known Nick that I’m classing as barely know, could I call it that.

Three meetings isn’t barely know.

On the first meeting he told me to strip and he gave me the best orgasm I’d ever had in my life. On the second meeting he had me begging for more, and realizing that the first meeting was nothing in comparison to what he gave me. Then there was last night, meeting number three.

What can I call last night?

I wasn’t sure but what I knew was it was raw and carnal and unlocked something deep inside me that wanted him over and over again.

It wasn’t enough and when morning came and I woke up next to him, I really wanted to stay.

But then… reality came back. It came back and reminded me that he isn’t supposed to be some guy I’m into. The night we’d had was the night he paid for.

Even if it feels real with all the emotions, it isn’t real. It isn’t real and I don’t know him.

All I know is he’s Nickoli Giordano, aged thirty-four, one of the owners of The Dark Odyssey. Part of the Giordano family and empire of what people knew to be one of Chicago’s crime families. It was enough for me to run a mile at the very least, or run very, very far.

So… while a priest could bless me and tell me to do a million Hail Mary’s for the scandalous way I’d behaved with the man last night, what I probably needed was a psychiatrist.

Someone professional to tell me I mustn’t have feelings for a man like Nick. No matter how intense, and how he makes me feel, I need to get my act together and keep my head above water. That is for so many reasons.

I can’t get a psychiatrist yet. So I settle for the next best thing and call my best friend.

One text went straight to her this morning when I got home.

I simply said: I took the job. I really need to speak to you.

Her reply came back straight away with:

Meet me in the coffee shop in an hour.

I did.

I’m here now, sitting in the furthest booth waiting for her. It didn’t take me an hour to get here. I just left as soon as she messaged back and decided to come here and get myself a hot chocolate.

It’s a good hot chocolate with all the trimmings since I can afford it. I get marshmallows and chocolate sprinkles. It looks like something a child would have. I’m looking at the prettiness of it as I wait, trying to simplify things in my head.

It’s raining outside. People walk around with their umbrellas high. It looks like a parade of color, almost like the Vegas sky at night with the clash of luminous color and neon lights.

Across the street I spot someone rushing with a bright pink umbrella that looks more like a parasol the ladies would carry in Georgian times in the South.

It’s Chloe. Even in the rain, she looks amazing. Stylish in her beige mac coat and black Hunter boots.

The door jingles when she pushes it open and she rushes inside.

Her eyes land on me and I stand to greet her as she makes her way over.

She puts the umbrella away and hugs me hard. I don’t care that her hair is a little damp or for the speckle of rainwater that catches my cheek. The warmth of friendship envelopes me with love and I find refuge in her, the way I should if I were normal and didn’t seek it in this man I barely know.

That was it.

I realize that was it somewhere in the middle of the night.

The why question.

When Nick touches me I forget everything and become this person I never knew existed.

When he touches me I’m not this version of myself who feels like a failure. Who’s had life rough for the last few months but it feels like years.

When he touches me I forget how helpless I am to what has been happening all around me.

He makes me forget.

“Mia, you okay?” Chloe asks taking hold of my shoulders.

I shrug. I don’t want to admit that realistically I’m not okay because it feels like it will take away some element of last night that I don’t want to forget.

“Is it okay if I say I don’t know?” I raise my shoulders again and stare at her.

“Come on sit. Talk to me, tell me everything.”

We sit, I draw in a deep, deep steady breath and as I exhale the words flow.

I start talking and she listens.

By the time I finish I think an hour or so has passed and we’ve been there so long the barista comes over to ask us if she can get us anything else.

I order two hot chocolates. One for Chloe and another for me.

The worry returns to Chloe’s face when the barista goes away, but there’s a hint of fascination. It’s from the sex stories I shared. Not what I saw in the club. My own.

Me with sex stories. It reminds me of when I told her I lost my virginity.

Of course I was at Harvard at the time and I’d just met Chad. I was nineteen.

Miss Chloe however had lost hers at sixteen and it was to a guy who was ten years older than her. She would never reveal his name to anyone, except me, because he was her Dad’s business partner. Of course she wouldn’t have been able to tell anyone, also because it would have landed his ass behind bars.

She had this secret affair with him for close to two years and they ended it before she left for college. My petty story of losing my virginity was nothing in comparison to that.

My stories of last night though make up for everything big time.

“Okay… let’s do this.” She brings her hands together. “Before I bitch at you for not telling me what happened with Hector and your dad, let’s talk about Nick.”

I hang my head down. “There’s so much.”

“Yes there is and you know how I feel about the whole situation.”

“I know,” I blow out a breath.

Sure enough the first thing she told me when I talked about Hector is I needed to go to not just the police but the feds. She only calmed down some when I gave her the reminder of the warning we got from Hector if we ever involve the police. He said he’ll kill us. He said he’ll kill Beth first and make us watch, then he’d fuck me in front of Dad and kill me, then kill him.

Never in all my life have I ever had someone speak to me like that. Never, and it was enough to put the fear of God in me and make me snap into action for the seriousness of the situation.

“I’m not going to tell you to go to the police again, don’t worry,” she tilts her head to the side and purses her glossy pink lips together. “The thing is, Carter owed the money and you’re suffering for it. I hate it and I hate that you have to suffer because you deserve so much more. You shouldn’t have to endure such shit, Mia. You shouldn’t, and now this. I won’t talk at you. What I want to hear is how you’re feeling. You told me what happened and what you did but there was so much emotion there, I have to ask.”

I dip my head and gaze at the table. “I don’t know what to say… I think I’ve gone crazy Chloe.”

“Why?”

I shake my head. “It’s not normal to behave the way I did last night and feel for a man like that. I don’t know him. I don’t know him and I’m concerned, quite honestly about this business relationship we have. I feel like a slut. I acted like a slut. Something you just fuck and toss to the side.”

She reaches across the table and takes my hands. “Is that how he made you feel?”

I shake my head again, quickly because that’s far from the truth. “No… he didn’t, but it’s what I am. He’s paying me to have sex with him. I’m not a waitress Chloe, I’m Nick Giordano’s sex toy.”

“No. Mia don’t do this to yourself. Don’t do it. It’s not true.” An uncomfortable look washes over her face and she releases my hands, then confidence returns. “Remember when I went to that party after college and I said I was going on a break for a week?”

I sighed and looked her over. What was she going to tell me now?

Chloe has some very shocking tales to tell. But, college was a long time ago and since we tell each other everything I’m surprised there’s something she might not have told me.

“I remember.”

“Well. I got myself into so much debt before I lost my job at the marketing firm. I just thought I’d have my job, then they went bust and busted my ass because I was in debt. Anyway, I got this invite from one of the investors that would solve all my problems.”

“Invite? To what?” I arch my brows.

“A party and then to be his for a week for a quarter million.”

My eyes bulge. They bulge and I’m not sure how they don’t pop out of my head.

“Jesus Christ, Chloe.” My mouth falls open and all I can do is look at her. “You did it?”

She nods and gives me a little shrug. “I did, and I promised myself that I’d use the money wisely. I’d never blow money again and get in so much stupid debt that I’d be tempted to do something like that. Not everybody is like my investor friend. He just wanted to be with me but to most people it would look like I was some personal prostitute, but it wasn’t like that. It wasn’t like that at all.”

“How come you never told me this?” I gaze deeply at her. When she purses her lips together and sighs I get my answer. She didn’t tell me because it would have shocked me more than she already shocks me. And, more importantly, she knew I’d be judgmental.

“I didn’t want you to think badly of me. Most people think I’m a slut and I don’t care. I really don’t. But… your opinion matters. It mattered to me and a part of me felt bad for what I did because I knew what it looked like. The thing was, if I was offered it I’d do it again. Maybe not now that I’m with Sal but back then, yes.”

At the mention of Sal’s name and the reference I feel happy for her that she’s so into him.

“I’m happy you found Sal, Chloe. I am. I really wish you’d told me though, about what happened with your investor friend.”

“I wouldn’t have said anything. It was just one of those things I saw as a chance to fix my situation. I wasn’t desperate like what’s happening with you but I paid everything off. All my debt, and finished paying the mortgage on my place. So there, that’s me. So… there you go, you got my story on what I did in the past to put me in that category of slut, or worse, me prostituting myself to pay my debt.”

“But it wasn’t like that.”

She laughs. “Let’s just drop that part by the wayside. Let’s just agree it wasn’t like that. It wasn’t for me. I didn’t feel like that. No matter what, I didn’t feel that way at the time. I’m not saying it’s okay to do it. No, there’s no way I’m saying that and it’s not an option. Right now what I care about is you. I didn’t want you to feel bad about yourself, especially when it doesn’t sound like you should. I think you like him… and I think any woman with eyes would like that man no matter what. I think it’s okay you like him and I’m going to ask you to keep your mind open, but… more importantly be careful.”

Be careful?

I don’t think there’s much I could do with that warning, given the way I felt.

“Chloe, he’s a mobster, and seriously – I end a six year relationship and the first man I’m with in a year is a mobster who owns a sex club?”Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

She laughs a little but not because it’s funny. It’s far from it. She’s laughing because its incredulous and possibly because the words are coming from my mouth.

Me the shy wallflower in the group.

“Mia, we can’t help who we have feelings for. You want me to tell you to stay away from him, or not to fall for him, or that you must have lost your mind?”

I actually think she means it and I nod. “Yes, I want you to tell me that. I want you to tell me exactly that.”

She disagrees. “No, I won’t. I wouldn’t be your best friend if I did. I would be no friend at all if I didn’t tell you to be careful. Am I okay with it? No, not so much. Quite frankly I’m scared and kicking myself for putting it in your head to go to The Dark Odyssey in the first place. Trust me I am. I feel terrible. But I think it’s too late to switch up now. If I had the money you need I’d give it to you in a heartbeat. You know I would. It hurts me that the money I gave you wasn’t enough, because I hoped you could find something in legal to do. But the question to ask yourself is this: if you had the money would that be it? Would it stop you from seeing him again?”

She holds my gaze and I honestly can’t answer.

I’m scared of what I might say.

She gives me a little smile. “Be careful Mia. I know how hurt you were after Chad and while you can talk to Miranda and be friends with her, close to how you used to be, I can’t. They both hurt you and that was something you never expected. Be careful now because maybe you don’t know what to expect with Nick, but the fact that you can’t answer me gives me an answer. Please be careful.”