Bad Men: (Dark *M/F/M* Mafia Romance), page 1
BAD MEN
©2021 by Airicka Phoenix
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Editor: Katherine Eccleston
Published by Airicka Phoenix
Also available in eBook and paperback publication.
Also by Airicka Phoenix
TOUCH SAGA
Touching Smoke
Touching Eternity
Touching Fire
Touching Embers
THE LOST GIRL SERIES
Finding Kia
Revealing Kia
REGENERATION SERIES
When Night Falls
THE BABY SAGA
Forever His Baby
Bye-Bye Baby
Be My Baby
Always Yours, Baby
His Lullaby Baby
SONS OF JUDGMENT SAGA
Octavian’s Undoing
Gideon’s Promise
Magnus’s Defeat
STANDALONE
Games of Fire
Betraying Innocence
The Voyeur Next Door
For Keeps
Kissing Trouble
Laid Bare
CRIME LORDS STANDALONE
Transcending Darkness
The Devil’s Beauty
Dirty Gambit
Blood Script
Bad Men
ANTHOLOGY
Love & Grace Anthology
Midnight Surrender Anthology
Whispered Beginnings: A Clever Fiction Anthology
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Dedication
To everyone who had to hear me yell:
I’m almost done! Five million times.
Thank you for pretending to believe me.
Chapter One — Mia
“Please tell me you’re not standing at the window like some creep.”
I let the dark green drapes slip back over the front windows, relieved that Liana couldn’t see me.
“Of course not,” I lied, turning away for good measure. “I told you, I don’t care.”
Another lie.
I cared. I cared a lot. I cared so much, I hadn’t slept the night before, my anticipation a palpable force scuttling beneath my skin, making me anxious and excited. The first of every month had that power over me and my brat of a cousin knew it.
“Uh huh.” Liana chuckled quietly. “You are the worst liar.”
I didn’t make it a habit of lying to the people I cared about. In twenty-two years, I’d only ever kept one secret, but it was the kind that could destroy my life, my family, my reputation if anyone ever found out. Even the two involved had no idea it had been me that night five years ago, and I wanted to keep it that way.
“I didn’t call you to mock me,” I grumbled, wedging the phone between my ear and shoulder, freeing up my hands to fasten the button barely containing the full weight of my breasts beneath the confines of my dress. The flimsy bit of thread protested the attempt. It was one deep inhale away from popping free and blinding someone.
“I can do both,” Liana teased. “So, what are you wearing?”
The cruel mockery pooled heat in my cheeks. I dropped my hands to scowl, a scowl she couldn’t even see. “Why does that matter? You’re supposed to help me stay focused, not—”
Finding herself apparently hilarious, Liana hummed softly in feigned contemplation. “Not tempt you into submitting to your dirty fantasies?”
I gasped, horrified by my sweet, shy cousin. “Liana!”
Her giggle made my lips twitch. “I’m sorry, but it’s been seven years, Mimi. How much longer do you plan on playing this game?”
“It’s not a game, Lili!” I cried, hurt by the implication. “You know I can’t…” I let my words trail into a whisper, careful not to let my voice carry up the stairs where my dad was counting money. “Give in.”
“But you can’t go on like this either,” she argued. “You need to let them go.”
She was right, of course. I was behaving like some desperate teenager with her first crush. Only, I couldn’t be with them, not without devastating my family, but I couldn’t let them go because I was selfish. I was at an impasse, teetering between a fantasy and a cold reality with nowhere to go.
“I know you’re right,” I whispered at last, resigning to a reality without them. “I’m being ridiculous and stupid.”
“That is not what I said!” Liana protested. “This obsession you have with Nero and Davien is unhealthy and dangerous. They’re not good people. They will hurt you and I don’t want that.”
They could hurt me.
Both were so big and strong. Men with bad reputations and no remorse.
Criminals.
They could destroy me with just a word, and I knew I couldn’t survive that. I couldn’t handle being rejected by the two men I’d been in love with since I was sixteen. How was I supposed to just let that go? How did I move on?
“Mia?”
I sucked in a shaky breath and focused on my cousin’s hesitant voice. “Yeah, I’m here “
“Are you angry with me?”
I shook my head. “Never.”
“You know I love you.”
My heart wasn’t in it, but I willed a smile into my voice. “I love you, too, prima.”
Liana sighed. “Promise me you’ll forget about them.”
I knew she meant well. She had my best interest at heart but what she was asking for was impossible. It was something I’d tried and failed for seven years. I even tried dating other men. I tried throwing myself fully into every relationship in hopes of sparking life into it, but at the back of my mind, I’d known it would never last. They weren’t Davien or Nero. They didn’t make my knees weak or my skin hyper aware of them whenever they got close. They didn’t make me wet. They didn’t make me want to do something risky and dangerous just to feel how it would be to be with them even once. Nero and Davien may not have known it was me that night, but I would remember it forever and no one could replace that.
“Mimi?”
“I should let you go.” I rubbed at the spot between my tired eyes with the tips of four fingers. “Talk later?”
“Of course. You okay?”
“Yeah, fine. I have laundry to finish anyway.”
We both knew that was a lie, but Liana didn’t push me on it. We promised to text before bed and hung up.
I tossed the phone down on the coffee table and moved to peek through the crack in the blinds. The heavy fabric — a handmade gift from my grandma — was perfect for days when the radio warned everyone to stay indoors and to stay hydrated. It blocked the light, keeping the house almost bearable. It was still a thousand degrees, but at least ripples of heat weren’t coming off the ground.
Outside, asphalt was melting under parked cars, leaving grooves where the tires had sunk into the ground. In several places, fires had broken out, causing chaos for miles.
Inside, we were in a slow roasting oven. The humidity alone was enough to make me want to strip naked and lie spread eagle across the kitchen linoleum. My thin, white dress clung to me, becoming a fine, restricting layer of second skin rubbing against me. I had opted against undergarments, the sweat and discomfort driving me to put as little on as possible. Still, stray strands of hair was plastered to my temples and the back of my neck. My spine felt sticky and hot. My inner thighs sweltered. The strip of skin under my boobs … I couldn’t even.
Six feet away, my reflection blinked at me from the round mirror fixed in the tiny foyer at the bottom of the stairs. From my spot in the sitting room, I could just see my flushed face staring back at me, miserable, tired, and covered in a fine sheen of sweat. My thick riot of curls was partially still up in a messy bun at the top of head. A few strands had slipped free to tangle with my gold hoops and tickle my shoulders, but the majority stayed in place. I had decided against makeup that morning and it had been the right decision. Last thing I needed was to have mascara streaking down my face with the sweat, especially on that day of all days.
It was payday … and not the good kind. Today was the day we had to pay for our lives, for living in our homes, in our community. It was a chunk of money most of us didn’t have but to not pay meant becoming an example of what happened to people who didn’t pay.
Eduardo Bernardo wasn’t a merciful man. He didn’t care that my parents worked two jobs each or that I gave up on my life to help them make ends meet. He only understood money. The thugs and cri
But we got lucky. Nero and Davien were never as bad as the ones who ran the other blocks. They weren’t fuzzy bunnies by any accounts, but they protected us. They kept the other collectors from our doors, kept the soldiers from our schools and children. We’d heard stories of the other blocks and their collectors, vicious, rabid monsters who took whatever they wanted, especially the girls. Neither Davien nor Nero had ever taken more than the money owed to Eduardo. Not that that made them saints, but it made them decent, in my books.
It was never ending and brutal, but that was life on the wrong side of the tracks.
We didn’t get police protection.
We didn’t have people picketing signs and protesting our way of life.
Eduardo and his dogs were evils we had to live with.
They were our reality.
Our salvation.
Our deaths.
I glanced up at the ceiling overhead, stained a faint yellow from years of my uncles’ chain-smoking during family gatherings. The sitting room was directly under my parent’s bedroom. I knew my father was up there, counting our June pay, making sure every penny was accounted for before Nero and Davien arrived. Mom had already counted it the night before at the dinner table after all the dishes had been cleared and washed. I’d sat across from her, watching quietly as she made neat stacks with stiff, shaky fingers. I could see her biting back every wince just from sitting too long and my heart ached.
“Do you want me to get your pills, mama?” I asked, already pushing to my feet.
She shook her head, face set. “I’m okay, niña. Nearly done.”
Mom had Avascular Necrosis, a bone degenerating disease due to loss of blood flow. It had started gradually around her hips and thighs, but the pain grew worse every year. Though she swore she was fine, I’d seen her struggle to sit or stand. I’d heard her crying in the bathroom because my father had to help her over the tub lip. The pain meds the doctors gave her were expensive but even they didn’t seem to be helping as much, and Mom refused to take time off work to get the marrow injection or even the surgery.
“Mama?” I waited until I had her attention before pressing an argument I knew I would lose. “I was thinking, maybe I could get another job.”
Her brows furrowed as it did every time I mentioned a second job for me, even though she and my dad worked two, sometimes three. “You have a job. What’s wrong with the diner? Is Nestor not giving you more shifts? Is that why you’re not working tomorrow?”
I never worked the first of the month. It was the one day off I requested. Nestor never asked but I suspected he thought I wanted to be with my parents when the collectors came. He wasn’t entirely wrong. The first was the only time I got to see Davien and Nero up close, when I got to talk to them without raising questions and suspicions. Only Liana knew the truth.
“No, Nestor’s great. That isn’t why. I’m going to keep working at the diner, but I thought maybe I could get something on the side. I know we could use the money. Maybe we could save it and use it for that surgery the doctor—”
“Enough.” She didn’t slam her hands on the table, but she may as well have with the sharp crack of her voice. “I told you when you left school that you get one job, but you go back to school. Those were the conditions. Do you think I want this for you forever? You will not fall into this life, Mia. So, you go to school or nothing else.”
It was the same thing she said every time. I knew we’d be less in a hole every month if I could do more. My pay at the diner was fine but it wasn’t enough. If I made more, she and my dad wouldn’t have to work so hard.
But I knew when to drop it. I could see the strain she was under, the pain just from sitting. I saw the way she caught herself trying to get to her feet, the way she closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. I rushed to help her, but she waved me back.
“I’m fine. Just got up too quickly.”
Neither of us said a word when gathering the money into a crisp, white envelope. I watched my mom struggle out of the kitchen and climb the stairs. I stood at the bottom, close enough to catch her if she stumbled but careful not to show it.
I considered just getting another job. I was a grown woman. I didn’t need my mom’s permission to do anything. But I couldn’t bear to see the disappointment in her eyes, the sadness. I couldn’t stand it if I hurt her more when she was already in so much pain.
The truth was, Nestor would happily give me more hours. I’d been there for almost eight years. I was his only full timer and the only one who came in early and stayed late. I worked every holiday, every long weekend, and the customers loved me. I ran his books, kept his files in order, and basically ran the diner while he took his newest girlfriend on lavish vacations. It was already a full-time job, and if we didn’t have to pay Eduardo every month, it would have been fine. Granted, if we didn’t pay Eduardo, I would never get to see Nero and Davien.
They were my sin, the reason I would sell my soul. It would devastate my family if they ever found out. It would kill my mother and break my father’s heart. It would destroy my family’s trust in me. The very thought paralyzed me with fear, yet the idea of being with them blazed like wildfire through every corner of my being. I loved them and knew I could never have them for more than those few seconds when they came to the door and took the envelope of money my father gave them. That would be it for me. That was all I could ask for.
Maybe it made me someone very stupid, especially knowing everything I knew about them, but there was no going back now.
Not for me.
Not after that night.
It had awakened something in me I didn’t know how to put back to sleep, something primal and overwhelming. I didn’t know how to explain it, not even to Liana, but that night, the things I’d let them do to me, the things I did in return had felt so perfectly wrong and forbidden in every way and, yet I had never wanted it to end.
But it had.
It had all come to an abrupt and crashing halt the moment the door had opened and light spiked into our dark, carnal cocoon. I had never pulled away so fast from anything in my life. I had torn out of there as if the very devil himself were after me and I hadn’t looked back, not the whole way down the stairs, shoving bodies aside and stumbling on discarded debris across the sticky floor. I hadn’t stopped until there was an entire block between me and them, a vacuum of twilight and space. I’d doubled over, gasping, my body a carnival ride of more emotions than I knew how to cope with at eighteen.
Five years later, I still had no idea. If anything, I was more confused than ever, especially when I knew they were the wrong kind of wrong. The unredeemable kind. The kind you stayed away from. These were not men you invited into your home, into your life, definitely never into your bed. They were criminals. Cold, dangerous men loyal to a monster. Men with no moral compass, no decency.
Bad Men.
But I loved them.
I loved all the things about them no one else bothered to see. I loved that they stayed late after every block party, BBQ, and picnic to help clean up and drive people home. I loved that they always dropped a thick envelope into the church’s donation basket every Sunday. I loved that they patrolled the schools and parks, warning away the street soldiers from recruiting the children. I loved that, no matter how dangerous and evil everyone labeled them, they’d been there when old Mrs. McLanery moved in with her son’s family across town and needed help getting her things into storage. They’d arrived at the first splinter of light and didn’t stop until the last item was in the truck.
No one ever mentioned those things.
“Mia?” my dad called from the top of the stairs, my name slightly breathless as if he’d ran out of his room in a panic.
“Here!” I called back up, moving to stand at the foot of the steps and peer up at him.
Luis Martinez had always been a handsome man. Tall and thin, he’d let his dark hair streak through with silver. It ran in the mustache he stubbornly kept over his upper lip, despite my mother’s objections. He had the stoop of a man beaten in life, but too determined to go down. It was painfully obvious in times of stress. It was there now, bowing him forward like an old man leaning on his cane. The sight never failed to spear me through with guilt.
