The Wild Wolf Pup (Zoe's Rescue Zoo #9)(4)

“Yes, we’re very fortunate that our daughters have found happiness.”

“There is one girl I’m worried about though,” he confesses. “You.”

“I’m fine, Victor,” I admonish.

“No you’re not and it’s my fault. I promised to take care of you and love you all the days of my life. I vowed to share a life with you and left you to live it alone. I love you, Gracie, and I’ll never go back on that promise I made when I said I’d love you until death do us part.”

“I love you too, Victor,” I say quietly, reaching across the table to take hold of both his hands. “And our life may not have gone as we planned but I don’t regret a single thing.”

“I regret not being home as much as I should have been. I regret not enjoying the little things I took for granted, like tripping over your slippers on the way out the door or when I’d walk in and find you sleeping on the couch with a book tucked under your nose. I miss the little things, Gracie. I miss watching you sing on Sunday mornings while you made me meatballs. I really miss your meatballs,” he quips, winking at me before reaching across the table to wipe away my tears with his fingers.

“Life is too short for regrets, Vic, and while we may only have these visits now, we’ll have eternity together,” I vow.

“Grace,” he starts, dropping his hand from my face as he draws in a harsh breath.

“I mean it, Victor, I believe that with my whole heart. You have to believe it too because these visits aren’t the last of us,” I exaggerate.

“Gracie, they’re moving me again,” he says regretfully.

“What?” I swallow. “Where?”

“Down south,” he answers. “The lawyer will fill you in on all the details,” he adds as his eyes do a quick sweep of the room. “It’s the last leg of the plan.”

“Oh for heaven’s sake,” I hiss. “To hell with the plan!”

“Lower your voice,” he pleads.

“No, Victor, I will not. Look at you, this is it, do you realize that? You keep digging your hole and for what? Some sick vendetta?”

“I gave my word.”

“You gave your word to me thirty years ago.”

“Gracie, you’re right this is it…look at me. You see where I am? There is nothing left. I love you, as God as my witness I love you with my whole heart but I’m being transferred, and it’s for the best.”

“How can you say that? How can you tell me you love me and choose this life over that love time and time again?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Sure it is,” I hiss.

“Gracie…I’m dying.”

Have you ever heard someone speak but felt like you were dreaming and the words were a nightmare? You wish to wake up, you beg for it, but it doesn’t happen. You think it’s your subconscious forcing you to live through the pain and anguish of the words but it’s not and then you realize you’re living not dreaming.

The knife twists.

The hope diminishes.

And the life sentence becomes shorter.





Chapter Two




I left New York after the murder of my father, never believing I’d drag my ass back to the concrete jungle—I never wanted to. Then my mother was in a bad car accident and Victor Pastore showed up just in time to hold my hand as I pulled the plug on the life support. At the time I detested the man, blamed him for my father’s death and even my mother’s. If my old man didn’t die protecting Victor, we never would’ve moved away and she wouldn’t have been on that highway when a truck crashed into her car.

He brought me back to the streets I grew up on, the same streets he and my father ran together for nearly two decades. I never planned on sticking around and only came back to bury my mother beside my father. After the dirt settled over my parents, Victor propositioned me, trying to ease his conscience and offered me a legit job running one of his new nightclubs, Temptations.

I knew jack shit about running a night club. I was a carpenter, a man who worked with his hands and wore construction boots. I wasn’t cut from the same cloth as my father or Vic. Designer suits weren’t my thing and ties were just a noose around my neck. But then I laid eyes on Nikki, Vic’s youngest daughter, the girl who had called me Mikey ever since she was an awkward teenager with braces and frizzy hair. Actually, she called me Mikey before that, when she was just a kid following me and her sister around like a shadow.

There was nothing fucking awkward about the chain-smoking sexpot with perfectly straight teeth and lips that teased a man even when her mouth was closed. She no longer wore pigtails and fancy dresses that her mother forced upon her. She wore clothes that hugged her body, showing off her narrow waist, an ass you wanted to sink your teeth into and breasts you wanted to lay your head on. Her legs, let’s not talk about her legs and how every time I stared at them I wanted to wrap them around my waist. Fuck that, I wanted them around my neck. She had traded her ballet shoes for stilettos. I swear every pair of shoes she owns scream ‘come fuck me’.

I’m cool with that.

Since I’m the one fucking her and those sexy shoes are digging into my back night after night she wraps her legs around me.

Yeah, you guessed it, I took Vic up on his offer for the sole purpose of getting to know the girl I left behind and the woman she had become. She had a boyfriend at the time, some douchebag named Rico, who at first glance I knew he was a no good motherfucker. I had no proof though, and Nikki needed to learn that shit for herself. She needed to be the one to realize the scum that Rico was. So I did my thing, flirted with the girl I wanted, got under her skin and made her realize I wasn’t going anywhere.