“Valentino!” I go back to hollering as I walk through the kitchen and head down the back hall towards the business office where all the employee records, money, and other “items” are kept safe and secure. “Oh Valentino, I’m coming in.”
I have a key to the office, and as I slip it into the brass lock, the door pops opens and swings in slowly and silently.
“Can I help you?”
Valentino looks up from behind the big cherry desk, his black hair tussled and his shirt rumpled, but he’s alone in the room, with his tie on the desk and his shoes on the floor next to my feet at the door.
“You wanna tell me what’s up with Dani and the hit you have out on her?” I say as I step in and take a seat on one of the metal chairs on this side of the desk, across from him.
Setting down a pen from his hand he looks at me through dark lashes that hide his very dark brown eyes that are almost black at the moment.
“I didn’t know the Recluse was Dani, Damien.”
“Bullshit. Something’s going on, and I want in on it.”
“That’s above your pay grade pal.” He says, running his hands through his hair, almost nervously.
“That’s how it’s gonna be? After all these years?”
“That’s how it’s gonna be.”
“Then consider this my refusal of the contract.” I say to him, leaning back in the chair, crossing my ankle over my knee, showing him a relaxed yet stern position.
“You can’t refuse.”
“I sure as fuck can.”
“I don’t think you want to do that. Have some sense Damien.” He says, leaning back, mirroring my body language.
“I do have sense. How can you expect me to murder the woman I love?”
“I think it’s time you get over her. She left you five years ago, and for good reasons.”
“Excuse me? You know why she left me? Because I sure as fuck would like to know.” I say, raising my voice, leaning forwards, becoming threatening to him, and I see him shrink back just ever so slightly.
He’s afraid of me deep down inside. He knows what I’m capable of, and he’s seen my handiwork over the years. He’s well aware that if I so desire, he’s dead before he even knows what’s coming.
“Just let it go, and get the job done. We need this to take over the Scarpino fortune.”
“All money. Everything is always for money.” I scoff, throwing myself back in my chair.
“Of course. Now go and finish the contract.”
“Fuck you.” I say, getting up and kicking the chair in frustration. “Oh and Valentino, clean yourself up, fucking in the office is gross.” I say, picking up the tie off his desk and dangling it on my finger. “Especially with Dani’s best friend.”
I watch his jaw drop as I toss the tie in his face, and now he knows that I know. I’m not stupid and he’s playing me like I am. Him and Salvatore are on thin ice, and I’m going to be watching very closely. The whole keep your friends close, and your enemies closer thing…yeah, now they’re my enemies.
Chapter Sixteen
The nights of restless sleep haven’t stopped, but they’ve changed. Where I used to dream about Dani walking away from me, leaving me with no answers, now, I have ones where the reason she’s not with me is because I’m the one who erases her.
Every time I sleep I’m thrown into the same nightmare where I’m making love to her and as she cums under me, looking like the most perfect being in the universe, I stab her to death.
It’s not a single, swift, under the chin killing either. It’s violent, messy, and aggressive as if I hate her and want her dead. I don’t though, and even in the dream as I’m doing it, I’m not wanting to, I’m trying to stop myself, but I just can’t. At the end, every fucking time, as she dies and her blue eyes fall closed, I reach sexual climax and cum like a degenerate on her corpse.
Tonight is no different, and as I wake from the third version of the same fucking nightmare, I jolt up in my bed, fighting with my sheets as if they were trying to attack me like I did to her in the horror show in my mind.
“Easy.” The single word comes from the corner of my bedroom in the dark.
