Nico (Ruin & Revenge #1)(4)

“Is that meant to be a compliment?” She arched a perfect eyebrow and dropped one hand to the sweet swell of her hip. Bold and beautiful. Cristo. This woman was made to test a man’s restraint to the limit.

“Do you want compliments?” He was more than willing to give them, starting with her magnificent breasts, her long, toned legs, the waist neatly cinched in the tight corset, and the short skirt that barely covered her ass. He made a mental note to give Vito a raise.

“I want to give you this, and get out of here.” She pulled a letter from the bra cups of her corset and offered it to him and he strangled back a groan. His cock, already semi-erect from verbally sparring with the beautiful little minx, became fully hard as he imagined his mouth going where that letter had been.

“What is it?”

“A letter from my company confirming my identity and explaining what I’m doing here.” She placed it on the desk in front of him when he made no move to take it.

Curiosity got the better of him, and he skimmed the short paragraphs. Mia Cordano, owner of HGH Enterprises Inc., had come to Casino Italia at the request of his casino manager, Vito Bottaro, for a pre-arranged security test. Vito’s signature was scrawled at the bottom of the letter, but it was the woman’s name that kept his attention.

Mia Cordano.

Nico spun his silver pen around his thumb as he studied her fidgeting in front of his desk, seeing her dark beauty in another light. An enemy light. “Cordano.” The word was bitter on his tongue. For ten years his family had been involved in a faida—blood feud—with the Cordanos that had started the night Don Cordano killed Nico’s father in cold blood along with a young Toscani associate he had accused of defiling his daughter.

“Yes.” She tilted her head to the side and her brow creased. “Do we know each other? You look familiar.”

“Who’s your father?” he asked, ignoring her question.

Her frown deepened. “Battista Cordano.”

Don Cordano’s daughter. The woman who had started a war. He remembered her now, although without the name he would never have recognized her ten years later and all grown up. She had been there the night his father had been murdered.

Memories gripped him, and he crushed the paper in his hand.

He had been so proud the night his father asked him to join him in a sit-down at Luigi’s Restaurant with Don Cordano, the boss of one of the three leading crime families in Las Vegas. Don Cordano wanted permission to whack Danny Mantelli, an associate in the crew of one of his father’s capos. Made men could only be whacked with the permission of a boss, and Danny had secretly been dating Don Cordano’s teenage daughter—something strictly forbidden in the Mafia world. The women of made men—daughters, mistresses, and wives—were considered untouchable. Women were property and often the objects of passion. More than anything, passion could destroy the careful balance that existed between the Mafia families. As it had done that very night.

“You were at Luigi’s.” Bile rose in his throat, and for a moment he couldn’t speak. Nothing in his life, not even the death of his mother when he was eight years old, had prepared him for the moment his beloved Papà had been murdered, his blood spilling through Nico’s fingers as he desperately tried to save him. He had declared the faida that night. A man of honor could do no less, and a son had to avenge his father.

Her face paled as recognition dawned. “You’re the boy who held me. Nico Toscani.”

He spun the pen faster as he remembered holding Mia in his arms, trying to protect her from her father’s anger. Don Cordano had been enraged that Mia dared interrupt the sit-down to beg for Danny’s life, and he struck her so hard she fell to the ground

Raised in single parent households—first by his mother and then, for a short time, by his nonna after his mother died—Nico had a tremendous respect for women, and the brutality of Don Cordano’s attack on young Mia had shocked and appalled him. Without thinking, he had stepped in to defend her. She wrapped her arms around him, held on tight. And in that one moment, in the midst of the horror, eighteen-year-old Nico came alive. He felt a sense of purpose and worth that he’d never felt as a bastard son—he was a protector and this sixteen-year-old Mafia princess who felt so right in his arms, was his to protect. When her father turned his gun on Danny, Nico covered her ears and pressed her face to his chest to spare her the horror of witnessing her boyfriend’s death. And then she’d been ripped away and life as he knew it had ended with the crack of a gun.

He had no desire to rehash that night, or to hear what she had to say, whether it was regrets or apologies, thanks or accusations. He had lost not only his father, but also the fleeting glimpse of a life that could have been more than just following in his father’s footsteps—a life with purpose and fulfillment. A life with love.

Mia was a brutal reminder of the emptiness he’d felt since that night, the black hole that had opened in his chest and couldn’t be filled no matter how many women he took to his bed or how much success he achieved. He lived now solely to avenge his father and take his place as boss of the family.

Dropping the pen, he tossed the crumpled letter on his desk and vented his frustration. “Cristo santo! I told Vito to hire the best cyber-security firm in the city and he hired you?”

Mia folded her arms across her chest. “What do you mean by that?”