Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 75373 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75373 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Like he promised, Massimo sat in the waiting room the whole day. I’d even heard a couple of the guys commenting that the guy was crazy for being willing to wait all day.
Eventually, his car was done. And I pretended to fiddle with mine—as if I had any idea at all what to do with a car that wasn’t working—climbed in, and headed to Santo’s house.
I don’t think I even realized how incredibly tense I was all day until I walked in the back door and into Santo’s arms.
“Did something happen?” Santo asked when I just stood there holding onto him, letting the day of anxiety and uncertainty melt away.
“No. Everything was alright. I mean… nothing happened. I was just anxious about being there. But I’m glad I went. I think if I waited to go back, it would have been a lot harder. Plus, I got everything we needed from my files there. I went back three years.”
“Why three?” Santo asked, releasing me enough to let me move back to look at him.
“I wanted to check something.”
“Want wine for this conversation?”
“If ever a day called for it…” I said, getting a little smile from him as he turned to pour the wine that had already been breathing on the island. “Thanks,” I said, accepting the glass. “So, I knew that the shipping container orders from Mexico went back just about two years. I wanted to see if the discrepancies in receipts went back further.”
“Did they?”
My gaze cut to his. “No.” I took a sip of my wine, the sweetness teasing across my taste buds. “But I don’t know what that means.”
“I think I do,” Santo said. He reached for his own wine and took a sip. “He’s moving drugs through the shop.”
“Oh,” I said, brows raising. That would be easy, wouldn’t it? The cars roll in, the drugs could be stashed inside of them, and then the owner could pay the shop and have it all look above-board.
“I always thought that shop was a lot busier than seemed normal.”
That was fair. Cars were constantly coming in and going out. “But… why would someone pay for an oil change if they just want drugs?”
“My best guess is that they aren’t. You’ve been poring over the books, right?”
“Endlessly,” I told him. I was pretty sure I was going to need glasses from straining my eyes looking at all the disorganized paperwork.
“How is the business doing? Are you in the red? In the black?”
“Hanging on by the skin of our teeth.”
“Right. And with all that traffic in and out of the place, you shouldn’t be just hanging on.”
I didn’t know enough about business to be so sure of that. But, I figured, the Grassi Family would know, since they did have so many legitimate businesses.
“Are you planning on going back tomorrow?” he asked.
“Um, I hadn’t really given it much thought. Why?”
“I’m curious if my hunch is right. If every car that is coming in there is actually getting work done.”
“I think I have to figure that out. One way or another. Just to be sure.”
“I know you don’t usually babysit the mechanics, so maybe I can have Dante or Dom stick a hidden camera in before work opens up tomorrow.”
“Is that, like, legal?”
“Does it matter? I don’t care what they are saying, just what they’re doing.”
“True,” I agreed.
“We just need to know what is going down under that roof. I can’t keep you safe if I don’t know exactly what I am up against.”
My heart tightened at that, at how willing he was to step into the role of protector, how much he seemed to want to take care of me.
“Okay. So… a hidden camera.”
“And all the answers that will come with it,” Santo said. He placed his wineglass down, then reached for me. He watched me drain my glass, then took it and placed it next to his. “Now, on to more important things…”
His free hand went behind my neck, holding me as his lips lowered to mine. He was soft at first, but it wasn’t long before the kiss was warming, deepening, stirring up heat that spread through every inch of me.
It didn’t take long for hands to start drifting, sparking little fires that caught, spread, became an inferno.
My hands slipped between us, pushing his jacket off his shoulders, working the buttons free from his wrists, then up the center of his chest.
Santo’s hands roamed down my back, sank into my ass, and pulled me more firmly against him.
His cock strained, pressing against my stomach, making liquid heat pool in my core.
Santo’s hands shifted, sliding under my skirt, finding the waistband of my panties, and pulling them down.
I stepped out of the material.
Then he was turning me, pushing me against the island, then reaching down to grab me under the knees, and lifting up.