Unbound: The Dominator 3: a dark mafia romance, page 31
There has been life after Kruna and after Pop for Shayla Townsend, aka Lisa Ferrano. A good life.
She dated Dex for a little while but it didn’t get too serious. I don’t think she’s ready for serious.
Stan Smith, still in Thailand, handles some of the areas we haven’t yet found our way out of overseas and is definitely earning his hefty retainer.
Our involvement in the demise of Kruna is still a secret as far as we know. A few of the partners are still out there, under the radar, and of course there are members. We’ve been approached more than once about starting up again but we’ve respectfully declined.
The way things went down, it seemed to work out okay. For now. I’m hoping nothing bites us in the asses later.
Tessa and Zack got together about a year after Jimmy died. It took some time for their relationship to progress and he earned respect by saving her from a tight spot that could’ve started a whole other war with me and Tommy and some dangerous people if Zack hadn’t been there to save her from her foray into the BDSM world, which we don’t like to think about, but it happened. Seems that her tour of Fete got her curious about that world but she wasn’t real smart in satisfying her curiosity.
After a bit of drama, they decided to give it a go and now they live together. He’s a good influence on Antonio and Lucas and he makes my sister happy. He and I are tight, I get where he’s coming from and how intricate his business is, why he does what he does. And what he does still benefits the Ferrano family on a fairly regular basis. Tommy busts his chops every chance he gets but that’s my brother. Deep down I know he’s all right with Zack, even if he doesn’t outright say it.
The business? We’ve sold off some more of Ferrano Enterprises. It still exists but it’s much smaller and most of it much cleaner. Mostly.
Some of it, we’ve dissolved. We’ve retained some of the relationships for the sake of history, favors, and protection. Tommy runs the construction company and maintains a few important key relationships that also mean that we occasionally have to do favors in order to have a surplus of markers, but everything else we’re investors, silent partners, get royalties, or we’ve dissolved or sold off. Our dividends from Fete alone could support us. The place rakes in the cash, hand over fist, and though he’s busy running the construction company, Tommy also manages our money. He’s excellent at it.
Me? I’ve got my finger in a couple different pies.
My day-to-day, I bought a small established charter company that has three planes. I fly a few times a week and have pilots on staff. I help Tommy out here and there. I’m still VP of Ferrano Enterprises on paper but I’m only in a suit a couple days a month.
I’ve helped Zack’s private eye agency and a few close friends a time or two, as well. We moved out of the condo into a four-bedroom house in a great neighborhood with plenty of parks and good schools. We did that as soon as Holly came to stay. She only stayed three months. But that’s another story.
Angel plans to go back to teaching after our kids are in school full-time. She might open her own little Montessori school instead of going back to work at a public school. Life is getting sweeter all the time.
Tia goes to university and she’s working toward her degree in social work, while balancing motherhood and my brother. He wanted her to do online school but she pressed for an on-campus experience and he relented.
Tommy and Tia moved out of the place a few doors from Pop’s a few months after Carina was born. Tommy had a new house built a few streets over from Tia’s foster parents and not far from the foster-grandparents, so Tia could be there to help them on a regular basis.
We all regularly go up to Tommy and Tia’s farm in the summers. They’ve built an addition onto the farmhouse and Tommy bought Tia and Carina horses on Carina’s first birthday. They’re taken care of by a farm down the road and brought over when the Ferranos spend a weekend there. Angel can’t get enough of it and is always lookin’ for an invite up there, so she can ride. Maybe I’ll have to get her a horse for her next birthday…
It’ll be ages before baby Carina can ride on her own, she’s as cute as a button, looking just like Tia but with Tommy’s eyes. Tommy doesn’t care she’s not old enough to ride a horse. She lights up at the sight of it and that’s enough for him.
I joked that he’ll buy her a car for her fifth birthday, but he didn’t see the humor and said his little princess wouldn’t drive, he’d have her chauffeured everywhere, with six bodyguards that’d double as pallbearers for anyone that dared speak to his daughter. That got an eyeroll from Tia. But my brother? Not even joking.
I feel the same way and am glad my baby daughter has two big brothers to watch out for her the way me and Tommy have watched out for Tess and Luciana.
What about Holly and Alessandro?
He came back for her a few months after she came to stay with us. They got married but it was not smooth sailing immediately after their wedding.
But, that’s a long story. It was one fuckuva bumpy road.
Three months after Holly came to stay, Dare flew us to Alaska on one of his first solo flights for a quick trip and we tried to talk to our mother. That was painful for Holly.
I never really knew Felicia when she was a nurturing and loving mother, so I didn’t feel the loss the way my sister did. I went along mostly to be there for Holly.
Felicia wants to be where she is. Her life could be different. Holly told her we could get her into rehab, that she could come live with us. She turned us down.
I’ve closed that chapter. Like Tia, like Dare and Tommy, I know that just because you have a parent doesn’t mean that parent is going to do right by you. It’s okay. We’ll do better with our own kids.
I lost a lot of sleep over Holly when she and Alessandro first got married. A lot. But things have a way of working themselves out.
My Master, my Dare, he really has helped all my dreams come true. I’m free. A to B and then X to Y took me all the way to Z.
Speaking of which, we got a big fat rescue cat I named Zee. He’s a purr machine that I rescued from a shelter. When we got him, he was frightened and timid but bit by bit, he began showing his personality to us. I think me and Z are kindred spirits.
I’ve got my sister in my life. I’ve got Dare’s babies. I’m busy but so very happy. After being broken over nineteen days, I stopped hoping to be rescued, but I didn’t give up. I put my plan in motion and my plan got me out of there.
Never give up, no matter how bad things seem.
Behind the scenes, I help Lisa out a little bit with the foundation she started to help rescued victims of human trafficking move on with their lives.
I can’t put our family at risk by being out in the open about my efforts against the world of sex slavery, but I’ve helped Lisa wherever I can administratively, and Dare sends her foundation a fat donation every year.
Life is good. It’s filled with fried spaghetti and fried spaghetti messes on little chubby faces, sports on TV and games that we go to with our triple stroller. When the babies are a few years old, I want to adopt another baby or two. Or they don’t even have to be babies. I just want to have a big loving family, like the one I’m now a part of. I want to give that love to someone who maybe didn’t think they’d ever have it; the way it was so generously given to me.
I can’t wait to put the kids in sports. For Dare to coach them. He can’t wait either, but for now, we’re enjoying the messy blur of baby days.
Dare’s the best daddy in the whole wide world, and I have a good life. I’ve been quietly in touch with Charlie and Betsy and they’re coming for Christmas.
Maybe next year, I’ll sneak out to the old farm, which they’re happy to continue to take care of. I’m signing it over to them for a Christmas surprise. It’ll come back to my kids some day when they are no longer.
I’m so grateful.
Oh yeah, when I gave birth, they took my collar at the hospital. I didn’t even mind. I haven’t worn a necklace at all in about six months. It’s just not practical with my three grabby-hands babies. I also haven’t flat-ironed my hair since I left Kruna before it was engulfed in a ball of flames. I may never wear a necklace or have straight hair again. And for that, I’m ecstatic.
Laying there with my girls, all was right in the world.
Tia falling asleep with happy tears on my chest when Carina was two weeks old after how that first night together ended? A dream come true. My girl on my right, my daughter on my left; I was a lucky fuck.
The thing about men like me? We do bad things sometimes. I can’t speak for everyone but for some of us, it’s partly because we were bred that way and partly because we need to do it to survive.
But, when the right girl comes along, she’ll be someone who overlooks some of a guy’s flaws without letting him walk all over her. She’s the one because she gives him something he can’t get anywhere else.
By giving him her love, she’ll slay some of his demons. She’ll get to see what’s underneath, what he doesn’t let the rest of the world see. Maybe once she sees what’s underneath, she’ll decide he’s worth overlooking some of his flaws, rough though they can be. And he’ll see that and try to be better. For her.
And if he’s a guy like me? What she gives him will make him think that maybe, despite the fact that there are blemishes on his soul, that he’s somehow escaped karma or been deemed worthy of love.
Guys like that will do what needs to be done to keep her safe, even if that means we aren’t always the good guy, even if it means more black marks on our souls.
And even if we’ll never be the white-hat wearing hero, the right girl will make a man, no matter how dark he can sometimes get, try to be better than he was. He’ll be better for her and because of her.
The End
Saved, Alessandro and Holly’s story, is now available!
There’s also a novella of the time in between The Dominator and Truth or Dare called TNT, mostly about Tommy and Tia’s honeymoon. I recommended reading after Unbound though because the epilogue contains Unbound spoilers.
Afterword
What now?
Is this the end of the road for the Ferrano family? In some ways, I could live in this world forever with these characters. I could (and might) write about Zack and Tessa. Maybe about Lisa, too. There may be a whole series of stories in the future that take place at the Fete Club.
A little bird told me that sometime in the future, John Lewis is going to hire a pretty new nanny to help him with his six kids and that she’ll have a crush on the dark, mourning Dominant. That could make for an interesting story, couldn’t it?
Aren’t you a little bit curious about JC and his clean-up services? I am!
You see, for years and years I never finished a book because I was stuck on The Dominator (book one).
I was convinced that I couldn’t move on until that story was told. And it was true. After I published book one, I found my way to go on and write other books. Now that After putting out three Dominator books, I’m not saying there won’t be any others but I don’t want this storyline to stop me from writing the many other stories I want to tell. So, we’ll see how much farther it’ll go.
We may visit these guys again in the near or distant future. You might hear about them in other books, too. I mentioned Killian a couple times in this series. His story is available, too, and when you read it you’ll get to attend Dare and Angel’s wedding through Killian and Violet’s story. That book is called Kill Game.
Yes, there’s now a story for Alessandro and Holly. Saved. The minute I met Alessandro Romero he began inhabiting my brain and I had to stop myself from putting Unbound on hold to write that story because it was calling to me that strongly.
Not to worry, though; Holly is ‘safe’ until she’s of legal age. After that, though? Well… you’ll just have to read it and see.
I’ve also gone back to write TNT, book 1.5, the time in between books one and two.
Thank you for wanting to spend more time with the Ferrano family. I hope you enjoyed this book. Thanks for the patience. I know it took a while for Unbound, but considering that book one took me almost 27 years to finish, you really didn’t have all that much of a wait 😊
Thank you, Tommy, for being you.
Thanks to all the Tommy & Dare lovers who waited for this book and talked about all your re-reads. Thanks to all who have been such an immense support to me throughout my growth as a writer.
I only hope I continue to grow. I LOVE this gig.
Much love!
DD Prince
PS: While this is a work of fiction, there are some people in my life whose stories got touched on in this series in some small way. One in particular, got a character named after her. Sort of.
C, If you ever read this, I hope you know that despite our differences, I love you and wanted to pay tribute to people who made a difference. I hope you understand. I never expected this story to get out there or I might’ve been more subtle. I just wanted to honour them. And you.
About the Author
DD Prince is a Canadian author who has been writing ever since she learned she could put pen to paper and create with words. She loves to read and write dark, contemporary, and paranormal love stories, especially when love --- whether dark, sweet, or co-dependent is the anecdote. She is passionate about faith, family, friends, food, and words.
Since writing The Dominator, she has gone on to publish more Ferrano family books, a dark and taboo vampire romance trilogy, a steamy biker romance series, contemporary enemies-to-lovers romance series, some sexy wolf shifter stories, and more.
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Nice reviews are like a gratuity for authors.
Thank you very much for reading my words! Thank you for taking a chance on me by reading this book. I truly hope you enjoyed it. Please leave a review. If you can, please leave a review where you purchased it as well as Goodreads and Bookbub, if you use them. Reviews and recommendations to your book-loving friends truly does help me.
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Thank you!
DD Prince
DD Prince, Unbound: The Dominator 3: a dark mafia romance
