His Betrayal: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance (Omerta Series Book 5) Read online

  Finally, after way too long, the man himself arrived. He and his entourage didn’t use the front door, they just sent someone to collect Jimmy to drag him to the VIP lounge. Even though he'd lost a lot of money over the boy's incompetence, he was splurging more to celebrate his being released on bail.

  I was relieved, thinking I could take the rest of the night off. But when the guy they sent met my eye and shook his head a little, I knew what it meant. Eric wanted us to stick around. I growled my displeasure, and the idiot turned pale and walk off in a hurry.

  I dub thee… idiot number three. I was probably going to look for him later and hurt him. Dammit, I'd been so close.

  I was already on my feet. I could have just turned to the door and walked out. Instead, I sat my ass back down and swiveled around so I was watching the drink I'd left on the counter, pulling it in between my hands as I settled for a few more miserable hours

  The only reason I was there at all, was because I worked for his dad. Well, Eric had bought my contract, because I didn’t work for just one person, I worked for a lot of them. Though he had kept my contract longer, while every other one eventually ended. He kept renewing, and discouraged me from seeking new contracts once old ones had run their course; the cash was a lot, so I went along.

  I hated it, though.

  Should have stopped ages ago. You wanted to.

  Of course, I had wanted to. Because unlike the two idiots next to me, I wasn’t just some underling in a mafia bosses' house. I was an independent contractor with specific services people like Eric used when they didn’t want crimes being traced back to them.

  I was a killer. It wasn’t the best job, though it certainly paid the most of anything I could have achieved on my own.

  Then Jimmy left, and it was just the two of us. Oh, joy.

  "Man, I wish I could go up there. Right, Clay?"

  I wondered why he was talking to me. But he didn’t seem to need a response from me, drinking up the contents in his glass and calling out to the bartender for more. I took a sip of my drink, grimaced, and practically dropped the glass back onto the counter. When I did drink, it was vodka, not the fizzy crap I let Jacque order for me.

  I heard Jacque next to me, going on and on about how he liked his job, about his favorite way to kill people. I listened to him with half an ear, not taking in a lot of what he was saying really. He didn’t do solely that like I did, but he somehow thought because he'd killed a few people in his lifetime, he could brag to the paid hitman. I just nodded along with him, while trying to tune him out.

  Bastard. The thought was annoying, and just a little bitter. While he waxed poetic—and it all just sounded too fake—I was having an internal dilemma.

  I didn’t ask to be in the line of work that I found myself in. Yeah, it was all because of my choices, but I hadn't had a lot of options, to begin with. I started because I needed the money, and people were awfully nice about paying good money to have someone else do what they want to do but fear to for several reasons. Only, when I signed up, I didn’t realize there would be dead bodies until a few months later.

  In the beginning, I might have even thought to rebel against it. But when people were willing to pay you money to go off someone, they could just as easily pay someone to off you when you didn't deliver what was expected.

  As time passed, I got good at it. I got more people wanting to buy my services. I grew to hate it.

  I had way too much blood on my hands. The idiot could say he had experience, but it was nothing in comparison. I'd been doing my job for quite a while. I could still remember most of their faces, the ones I got to be close enough to notice distinct features.

  I had killed way too many people in the process of my career. I was tired of it.

  Suddenly, the conversation moved to Jimmy's arrest and the sensation it had caused.

  "Can you believe someone brave enough to actually do that? I mean, seriously, even the big guys know to leave the kid alone. Hell, thanks to this shit, we're gonna have to deal with some of the smaller gangs getting out of hand because of the rumors going around that Eric's gone soft."

  Yeah, and usually, they did leave Jimmy alone. He could be a shit in public, and so long as people knew who he was, he wasn’t given so much as a warning for the sake of not incurring his dad's wrath. I remembered thinking, when I first heard of it, that whoever did it was new, or stupid, or both. The thing about the gangs was inconsequential; none of them were big enough to take on Eric's group with any hope of success, even if they banded together. The civilians were the ones that would be harmed the most, getting caught in the crossfire.

  But then Jacque continued to talk about it, practically finding new ways to repeat all the same sentences, and I wanted to hit him.

  I could feel my mouth tighten, wanting to tell him to shut the fuck up, but I would not. I didn’t particularly like him, but often I had to put up with him. if I struck out at him now, if he decided to be vindictive—when, because I knew he would—he would only make my job even harder.

  It was hard enough on me already. If I could have just killed him and gotten it over with, I would have. But then it would just add more to my already high tally.

  "I can't wait to get a hold of the bitch that did it," he was saying, and I listened with half an ear.

  It was a woman, then, that took Jimmy in.

  I wasn’t glad when I heard the news, I wasn’t anything; it didn’t directly affect me. What I did think, though, was good riddance. Because having Jimmy around made life too much more difficult than it should be.

  Hell, I was a step away from shooting him in the head myself if he decided to interfere with my crap again, asking the kind of things you just didn’t ask of a professional killer, unless you wanted to be at the top of his list.

  I cut off Jacque as he was about to go into another one of his spiels, clamping my hand at the base of his neck to catch his attention, dragging him closer so I could speak directly into his ear, the first words I'd spoken all night.

  "Jimmy is such a piece of shit that I kind of hope he goes back to prison. Now shut the fuck up and go find someone else to annoy."

  It wasn’t wise, but it sure as hell made me feel better.

  Jumped

  Lara

  We arrived at the club in record time, thanks to Gabe's insane driving, since I'd taken a little longer than anticipated to get dressed. I could have chosen a simpler outfit to put on, but we had to outfit our clothes with cameras. Gabe knew how, so I didn’t have to grab my clothes and drag them back to the precinct so someone could do it for us. I didn’t want to appear there looking like I was.

  Gabe was bad enough, and he hadn't stopped the ribbing since I stepped out of my apartment.

  "You were to go for sexy, Lara. Not bad ass biker bitch."

  I looked across at him over the car, so he could see me roll my eyes at him. "Bad ass biker bitch is sexy."

  Black leather pants, knee-high leather boots, a well-worn leather jacket. It wasn’t something I had in my closet for the sake of having it. It had been a gift from a boyfriend with a leather kink. Suffice it to say, I didn’t last with him long; I wasn’t one for kinks.

  Besides, it was a lot easier to hide a bulletproof vest under a leather jacket than some flimsy blouse or a dress. And the camera that Gabe had put on me was practically lost in all the black. He was dressed more casually; ripped jeans, a black muscle shirt, and a brown leather jacket on top of it; basically, the clothes he left home with that morning.

  I walked around the hood to stand beside him as he fiddled with a tablet. He'd added the accessories—the cameras—while we were in the car. It was a lot less complicated than I would have thought; certainly, a lot less than getting them to work. I couldn’t make heads or tails of what he was doing on the tab.

  "You sure you know how to work this thing?" I asked, unsure.

  He just snorted. "Hell yeah. I've done this plenty of times."

  I wasn’t sure I believed him, b
ut I took his word for it.

  It was online in a couple more seconds, and he flashed me a triumphant grin. The screen was divided into two for the cameras on each of us. There wasn’t much visible on the screen because we were out and it was dark, but the indecipherable image did shift around when I did. He shut the tablet off and reached inside the car to put it in the glove box, then locked the car and put his keys in his pocket. It was on loan; no need to be careless and lose it, neither of us could afford to replace it.

  "The feed should go straight to the precinct. We're good to go ahead."

  I nodded, huffing out a breath as the adrenaline levels in my body rose. Because he was the more senior cop, I waited to follow his lead, and we went to see what the hubbub was about.

  The place was fairly crowded, with loud music and some people dancing, while plenty more sat, or stood in groups and chatted loudly. I couldn’t hear myself think, and I wondered if the guys at the precinct were getting the sound to go along with the visual.

  I stuck close to Gabe as we walked, looking around at the happy crowd. Supposedly, there had been a disturbance. It had been maybe twenty minutes ago, but the partygoers did not look disturbed. Either it got resolved on its own, or it died down. But then why had we been sent in, with undercover surveillance no less.

  "Well, shit."

  His voice was low, but we were close enough that I heard Gabe loud and clear. I turned up to see him looking away, and I followed his gaze upwards. I knew there was a VIP lounge up there, with a balcony that overlooked the dance floor on the ground level. We'd been given a brief description of the inside from some guy that had been there before, so it wasn’t a surprise.

  The surprise was the sight of Jimmy Randolph living it up, shirtless, surrounded by women and pouring booze all over them and over the balcony, being an all-around nuisance while having the time of his life. One wouldn’t think that he was older than me since the man was acting like a complete teenager.

  Well, shit, was right.

  Gabe suddenly took my arm, tugged me closer. "Lara, we need to get out of here. Now."

  I knew his reservations. With Jimmy here, someone that worked for his father was likely around. I hadn't even heard of his release yet. If he noticed the woman that put him in jail, he would no doubt be interested in a little get-together. One I was sure I wouldn’t like.

  I didn’t like it. It felt too much like a retreat, but this wasn’t something we could handle without backup. I let Gabe turn me around and we headed for the exit, shoving people out of the way. We both came to a dead stop when two men blocked our way. I would have thought they were just a part of the crowd if they didn’t have their eyes trained on us, one of them with a dark expression, the other grinning almost manically.

  We were in a silent standoff for a moment, then one of them suddenly jumped forward. I ducked, dislodging Gabe's hand, out of reach of the manic one because he was aiming straight for me. I looked just long enough to see Gabe going against him, and I almost remembered the other guy too late. I had my gun in a holster at the small of my back, hidden by the jacket. I reached for it, pulling it out just in time.

  He wasn’t intimidated by it at all, lunging forward, grabbing at me and trying to wrestle the gun from my hand. I wasn’t having it. He might have been bigger, but we were still fighting in a crowd. It was a wonder they hadn't noticed I was armed; they got pissed when we bumped into them, but they were too drunk to do more besides piss and moan about it.

  And then, it happened. He got up real close to me and managed to grab onto my hand. I stumbled back, but he followed me. In the crush of the crowd, our bodies were pushed against each other.

  It was minute, that sense of awareness at suddenly being so close to a bigger, male body, that elicited a very feminine reaction in me. Because this guy wasn’t soft; he was big and hard, everywhere. It was the worst kind of time, and the hesitation was minimal.

  But this guy was clearly a professional. He noticed, and took advantage of my few seconds' lag time. He managed to disarm me. That hadn't happened to me since my first couple of years in the academy.

  I looked around, hoping Gabe could lend me a hand, but I felt my heart sink when I saw him laid on the ground, with the other guy grinning in satisfaction down at him. I looked back at the guy in front of me, and he gestured me with his head to walk forward.

  I saw the other guy pick Gabe up, dragging him up by the armpit, then shove him forward. The gun was concealed but still held in the hands of the man I had been fighting with, as we were led to where, I assumed, was the VIP lounge.

  There hadn't been so big a disturbance that other people were alarmed. Tussles must have been a regular occurrence in the club. I wanted to get someone's attention, shout at them to stop being idiots and call the police. But a nudge at my back told me that wouldn’t be a wise idea. I walked forward, the distance seemingly stretching before me like I was walking to the gallows to hang.

  It couldn’t be so far off. After all, I didn’t think backup would be coming just yet.

  The VIP lounge was everything a VIP lounge was advertised to be; rich and opulent, with people pretending elegance and sophistication, as if they weren’t above a normal bar, dressed all pretty and expensive. There were fewer people, but there was still noise. No one looked surprised to see us getting marched across the room, Gabe was even limping a little. They were probably with the man responsible for getting us dragged up here. I didn’t doubt he could afford to pay for the whole room for a night, considering the amount it would have cost just to post Jimmy's bail.

  They led us to where a man sat in the middle in a group of three couch seats, surrounded by men and women, but I could tell he was at the center of their attention. I could guess who he was. He just ignored the people fluttering around him, watching coolly as we approached until we came to a stop a few feet in front of him. The people around him seemed to notice us then.

  "Turn off their cameras."

  I felt something spike in my chest. How the fuck did he know. Gabe had assured me it was all new tech, new and still something of a secret amongst the cops.

  The bastard searched Gabe, who stood still and stone-faced as it was done. Then, he came to me. The maniacal grin was back. When he searched me, I wanted to hit him. He was being a dick, deliberately, feeling me up; up my legs, my abdomen, my chest. I wanted to kick him in the shins, but I looked beyond him to notice the man I guessed to be Eric, the mafia man, Jimmy's dad, taking my gun from the other guy. I swallowed back the bile rising in my throat as fear replaced the anger.

  Eric studied my gun and gave a slow nod, putting on a show of approval. "It's a fine piece of work, even if it is cop issue." He hefted it in his hand, then curled it around the butt of the gun, keeping his finger off the trigger. He turned it around, then cocked it.

  The sudden sound startled me, made me jump. He must have been watching out for it because he noticed, and he laughed at me.

  "Don’t worry, young lady. It's just a toy."

  Right. And I didn’t like him calling me 'young lady,' but I said nothing.

  "I should thank you for bringing me such a nice present."

  My eyes cut to the gun.

  "Oh, no. I didn’t mean this, although it is nice, too."

  We both were still, silent, as he positioned himself until he was a few feet away, somewhere between Gabe and me, but closer to me. I could feel a shiver work its way over my skin, but I kept my body still.

  "Or maybe," he continued, "I should say: how lucky am I that the cop who put my dear son away landed in my lap." He smiled at me, pleasantly; it made me feel chilled. "And so soon, too. I only just got my boy back, and now this. I expected to have to look for you, Miss Foley, was it? Thank you for saving me the trouble."

  There was a chuckle. I looked in my periphery to see the guy that had taken Gabe standing off to the side, snickering to himself, an almost giddy look on his face as his eyes passed me. His grin wasn’t any nicer, but it wasn’t as frighten
ingly pleasant as Eric's; it was creepier, though.

  "In fact, why don’t we call the guest of honor? I'm sure he'd be glad to see you both." He looked off to the side, towards the balcony where we'd seen Jimmy Randolph from downstairs. "Hey, Jimmy! Come look at what daddy brought you."

  I looked the same way, keeping Eric in my sights, to see Jimmy untangle himself from his party, and saunter over to us, grinning. It wavered when he saw us, then disappeared completely when he got a closer look at me. He frowned at me, but the look cleared quickly, almost immediately replaced by anger.

  His eyes narrowed as he pointed right at me. "Hey, you're that cop, aren’t you? You look different out of your blues, but I recognize your face."

  "That's right, son. She came to pay us a visit, isn’t that nice?"

  He frowned at his dad, then his eyes lit up at some realization, and he was grinning again. "You're right, dad. It is. This is a private party, but special guests are always welcomed. You don’t mind entertaining her for me, do you?"

  He gave his son a proud pat on the shoulder. "Not at all, Jimmy. You can just sit back and watch as I have a little chat with the nice officer."

  Jimmy took him seriously, taking the space Eric had vacated and grinning at me, instead of going back. Eric turned back to me, that smile still on his face.

  "Now, Miss Foley, as happy as I am that you came here, I do have something I would like to ask you, so excuse me for being so direct."

  I knew what he wanted before he even asked. It was kind of obvious unless he was planning on surprising me.

  "I want you, to blow the whole testimony at my son's upcoming trial," he said, that smile still on his face.

  So… not a surprise then.

  My heart beat harder in my chest in fear, but I knew I couldn’t do that… no matter what, I didn't regret doing the right thing; doing my job. It would all have meant nothing, my dedication in joining the academy, putting up with it till graduation and getting my post.